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This is an interesting tea that I am not sure how to rate. It has lost every vestage of it’s fermentation flavor so that if I handed you a cup you would not know it wasn’t an aged raw. Before all the aged ripe I have drank had that 1 % of the fermentation left so you could tell it was shou. This was also the most densely packed tea I have encountered in some time. It was extremely difficult to pry off a chunk. The tea itself had a spicy note that I take for aged flavor, strong at first and weak by the twelfth steep. There was also a little wet storage note although not very much. This I barely noticed. Overall I think this was a good tea but it is hard to rate because I do not have much to compare it too. It is really in a category of it’s own even when I try to compare it to the 1996 CNNP that Yunnan Sourcing sells. The 1996 shou had that last vestage of shou taste to it, this had none. Overall this was I think a good tea.

I steeped this twelve times in an 85ml Silver Teapot with 5.9g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, 1 min, 1.5 min, and 2 minutes. The tea was not done I could get a few more steeps out of it if I wanted to.

This was a very tasty tea with a moderate amount of fermentation flavor to it. There was no fishy taste or even unpleasant taste to the fermentation. It was fairly sweet. I agree this tea did not seem overly complex but that may be because it is just on the cusp of being an aged shou. Ten years old is in my experience when teas begin to change. This one was beginning to lose it’s fermentation flavor and beginning to take on a flavor of aged shou. Sweet but not in my opinion chocolaty in this case. It did not seem fruity either. More a mushroom type of sweetness to it in the end. That may not be the best description but it is the best I can come up with.

I steeped this tea twelve times in a 160ml silver teapot with 13.5g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, 1 min, 1.5 min, and 2 minutes. This session was also an attempt to see if I could distinguish any difference between water boiled in my silver kettle and my ceramic kettle. The first steeps were in silver and the later ones were in ceramic. It did seem there was a slight difference with the silver kettle winning out overall.

Got this little cake as a free sample and it was really good, sweet and good to drink now. There was very little bitterness to this tea if any at all. I didn’t find any astringency. What I did find was a sweet taste from steep one to steep twelve. I would call the note apricots and stonefruits in the end. This is definitely one I want to order more of.

Steeped this twelve times in an 85ml silver teapot with 6.1g leaf and boiling water. Gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, 1 min, 1.5 min, and 2 minutes. This tea would have gone a few more steeps.

This is a nice tasting ripe. It has a fair amount of fermentation flavor that I would say has begun to clear. It was a little weak but very present. It lasted maybe five steeps. I didn’t really notice any chocolate notes but I suppose I could have missed them. There was a bit of a light fruity profile towards the end of twelve steeps. It was very good.

I steeped this tea twelve times in a 110ml teapot with 9.9g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, 1 min, 1.5 min, and 2 minutes. There were a few steeps left in the leaves.

Bitico Tea Group buy. This is a nice tasting green as far as the tea goes. However as a flavored green it does not work that well. While I still like the tea the fruity flavors just really aren’t there in any strength. Still the base green tea is very good.

I brewed 3 tsp leaf in 175 degree water in a 16oz Teavana Glass Perfect Tea Maker/Gravity Steeper for 2 minutes.

This is a nice Lao Cha Tou brick. There was a fair amount of fermentation flavor but it had partially cleared. The fermentation note was a little weak. A little bitterness crept in in the middle steeps after the leaves had opened up. There was a general evolving sweet note to this tea. There were some chocolate notes. And towards the end of twelve steeps you might say a fruity taste developed although it was weak. Overall this was a very good tea.

I steeped this twelve times in a 200ml gaiwan with 15.1g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, 1 min, 1.5 min, and 2 minutes. There were a few steeps left in the tea but twelve steeps from a 200ml gaiwan is a large amount of tea.

This is another nice tea from Vahdam Teas. It is first flush so a lot of green leaves miced in with some black leaves. It has a very light taste. I am not getting notes of Muscatel grapes in this one however but something resembling apricots. It is good in any case.

I steeped this one time in a 16oz Teavana Glass Perfect Tea Maker/Gravity Steeper with 3 tsp leaf and 190 degree water for 3 minutes.

This is a relatively nice tea with wet storage notes for the first two steeps and fermentation flavoe for about the first five or six steeps. There was a slight bitterness to this tea but not enough to bother me. The unusual thing about this tea is it comes compressed into a cylinder shape. It was loosely compressed. After a few steeps a nice sweet note emerged and developed over the course of twelve steeps. By the twelfth steep you might call it a fruity note with a little bit of bamboo too.

I steeped this tea twelve times in a 160ml solid silver teapot with 13.8g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, 1 min, 1.5 min, and 2 minutes. There were still a few steeps in the leaves but I simply had had enough tea and don’t have the patience for the longer steeps.

This is a nice green tea with a vegetal note and a mild fruity note. Got it with the group buy I put together for Bitaco. Their teas are an incredible value but you have to order 6 kg so a group order was the only way to try these teas.

I brewed this tea one time in a 16oz Teavana Glass Perfect Tea Maker/gravity Steeper with 3 tsp leaf and 175 degree water for 2 minutes.

This tea is fairly good. I would like it better if the taste of chocolate were stronger. While you can taste the cocoa husks and cacao nibs the flavor of them is not real strong. Still it is interesting to taste teas from other parts of the world.

I steeped this one time with 200 degree water in a 16oz Teavana Glass Perfect Tea Maker/Gravity Steeper with 3 tsp leaf for three minutes.