Thank you, Glen and Lamu, for providing a sample to review!
Had a gongfu session. Prepared with a ceramic gaiwan. Did two 3-second rinses. Steeping times: 5, 10, 20, 45, 75, 120.
Letting the dry leaf sit in the heated gaiwan really brings out its aroma: a very sweet sugarcane, then sticky rice, and then cedar. The wet leaf aroma smells more like damp earth and wood – an old forest perpetually wet – and like cherries.
When sitting in my makeshift sharing pitcher, the liquor resembles whiskey, having the very dark amber color and the clarity of an alcohol. The texture of the liquor starts off as smooth and then becomes creamier, almost soup-like somewhere in the middle of the session.
The leaf still has yet give away its entirely in the first infusion, which tastes mostly like wet wood, weakly. The second infusion is where it really got started. My first impression is wet wood, again, but allowing the liquor to sit in my mouth, I taste black cherries, finishing with black coffee. Bread aftertaste. The third and fourth infusions are even sweeter, but only initially. Cooked mushrooms take over, followed by a bitter note of baking chocolate. The sweet and the bitter are simultaneous and balanced. Infusions five and six are still sweet but mellower in intensity. Alongside earth and coffee, sugarcane makes its reprise.
This was a pleasnt shou to drink, especially since it matched the weather today – cool, then humid, then stormy, then cool again – and the petrichor-filled smells that came with it. It was definitely the shou influencing the weather and not the other way around!
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I love this one ;)
I love the ‘warm aroma’ as I call it. You get a unique perspective into aromas that get washed away once hot water gets added. Let’s you see the larger picture of a puerh. Petrichor is my new favorite word. :-)
Gongfu ceremony really brings out a tea’s aroma, which is actually my favorite part of reviewing a tea.
I love this one ;)
I love the ‘warm aroma’ as I call it. You get a unique perspective into aromas that get washed away once hot water gets added. Let’s you see the larger picture of a puerh. Petrichor is my new favorite word. :-)
Gongfu ceremony really brings out a tea’s aroma, which is actually my favorite part of reviewing a tea.