A Tea Addict's Journal

Yiwu maocha again

March 16, 2007 · 3 Comments

I was wondering what to drink today, and while I was contemplating, I took out the gaiwan that my girlfriend put in a box. I opened it up, thinking I’ll warm the cup and then decide… and found there was tea in it!

It was obviously maocha of some sort. I wasn’t sure just by looking at it what it was. I thought maybe this was one of the Hou De samples I got that I forgot about. Then I sniffed it… it’s a Yiwu all right. It must be what’s left of the Yiwu maocha that I gave to her in Paris.

So, what the heck… I’ll drink it (I brought the whole bag of the maocha over). I took pictures of the first five infusions

The first two infusions were weak and slightly bland in the mouth, but delivered a wonderful aftertaste that lingers. The third infusion got rougher on the tongue, but a much stronger taste. The taste of this tea has by now definitely changed from when I first obtained it. Whereas previously it was rather nice and sweet, the sweetness is now giving way to something else, something a little more robust, a little more bitter too. The tea, in some ways, is passing through the very early phase of green-tea like taste into something a little stronger, but only just. From the third infusion onward the taste stayed more or less similar for a few infusions, before it started slowly descending into sweet-water, the usual ending for a young puerh. When brewed for 20 minutes or so, the tea can still give you a good infusion of tea after 15 infusions or so. It’s no longer a powerful cup, merely flavoured water.

One thing that was interesting is that the tea, when dry, smelled just like a Yiwu should. The liquor, however, doesn’t smell quite the same way. It’s odd. The tea is less sweet in taste than it is in dry smell. I’m not sure what to make of that.

Of course, a tasting is not complete with pictures of the wet leaves

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3 responses so far ↓

  • kibi_kibi // March 16, 2007 at 12:44 am | Reply

    Interesting notes, the pictures are wonderful.. just out of curiosity what was the aroma profile like? Was feeling delivered through the aroma?

    I’m going through tasting the Chen Guang-Ho Tang at the moment… lots of stems… I had trouble taking wet leaf pictures, I might try again tomorrow…

    -vl.

  • iwii // March 16, 2007 at 5:19 am | Reply

    Oh that is strange! My Chen Guang-Ho Tang sample had hardly any stems. I especially noticed that because usually, Yiwu cakes are full of stems, and I believe it is just a way to cut down the price.
    I even found a 13cm leave…
    I also noticed that my sample looked a lot more tightly compressed than it seemed on HouDe’s pictures. It was coming from inside the cake, and not from the surface. Perhaps it is the reason?
    Finally I have not received my sample in the usual HouDe paperbag, but in a sealed silver plastic bag. I thought they had changed their packaging habits, but apparently MarshalN still got the paper bag.
    Perhaps the paper bags are the one with stems, and the plastic bags the ones with leaves 🙂

  • MarshalN // March 16, 2007 at 9:08 am | Reply

    Yiwu is, apparently, traditionally long stemmed when they pick it.  Although, I think nowadays the stems are getting ever longer — indeed possible that it’s a method to cut cost.

    The aroma… when the leaves are dry, it’s honey like, with that signature Yiwu smell that I can’t describe very well.  The taste, however, shows more bitterness up front than the really sweet Yiwu teas sometimes do.  This is a maocha that changes every time I brew it.  I don’t know what to do.

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