Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

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Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by Drax » Oct 24th, '11, 08:11

Not to cause another "run on the bank," but.... :D

Over at Hou De, Gordon is offering an extremely generous chance to try samples of two new Xizihao offerings at half normal sample price... even at normal price, the samples are a chance to try pu'erh from a high-end company.

There were 11 items left this morning after I placed my order.... if you decide to try it, please post your thoughts here!

Oct 24th, '11, 10:13
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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by bryan_drinks_tea » Oct 24th, '11, 10:13

I just got it too. Maybe we'll compare tasting notes. Both look pretty interesting.

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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by Drax » Oct 24th, '11, 10:54

Yes, please do! :D

Only 4 left now.... going very fast!!

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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by gasninja » Oct 24th, '11, 11:08

Got mine but what I wana know is has the special edition been put up 4 sale yet?

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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by shah82 » Oct 24th, '11, 11:54

Don't worry, the special edition should be at least $200. That line of three cakes where $230 when they were available, for about 2-3 months. That stuff is not going to disappear fast. At least I don't think so...

Yeah, it's probably worth it to buy it, if it isn't more than $250 or so.

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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by TokyoB » Oct 24th, '11, 12:39

shah82 wrote:Don't worry, the special edition should be at least $200. That line of three cakes where $230 when they were available, for about 2-3 months. That stuff is not going to disappear fast. At least I don't think so...

Yeah, it's probably worth it to buy it, if it isn't more than $250 or so.
Worth to buy on quality or on "investment" value if you're willing to resell?
Did you ever try any of these? I assume no samples will be offered if he only has 5 cakes.

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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by Drax » Oct 24th, '11, 13:26

Aaaaaaaaannnd they're gone!

On the special edition... aren't those the ones that auhckw reviewed elsewhere? Or are they xizihao special edition cakes?

Oct 24th, '11, 13:29
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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by shah82 » Oct 24th, '11, 13:29

First off, I think we will see a repeat of the '06-'07-'08 cycle, with a bad sales year in 2012. Puerh prices have been going up as a function of Chinese consumption of various commodities. Therefore, price growth should slow as Chinese growth slows. I do think gushu prices will take a hit, but it's going to be slaughter for most common teas, such as Dayi/Xiaguan/Haiwan. Inflation expectations drive the worth of storage, even if speculators burn X% of their stocks, if people think the market will shrink, then they will do their best to sell. If the economy is shrinking, the ability of people to carry the storage costs will shrink. This factor will hit the Big Boys the most. I can leave my stash of XZH in the corner of the sunroom at near zero cost in utility and zero cash layout. So I think people will always be confident that they can hold onto good gushu. As such, I expect that there will always be investment interest in such products, with the usual cost being an extremely shallow market to sell back into. Only a few people know the top boutique maker brands, relative to Dayi or Changtai.

With this XZH product, it's the one *not* the LBZ or GFZ, so I expect it to be a blend of very high quality. I think it will probably be worth buying, as opposed to, say the YangQingHao '06 @$175. All gushu, and very tasty, probably. Moreover, I think that demand for the top tree leaves will never be weak for leaves at such and such a level of quality, and no matter how weak the market will be in the near term, in the medium-long term, so long as XZH keeps up the market presence, it will have been worth holding. I do expect some price revulsion for the 2011s. The only items I might ever had been tempted by would be the Pasha and maybe the Bama, because they were under $100/400g and I'm confident of good aging prospects. Too much stuff is over $100 such that I expect some significant fraction would be quite not worth it.

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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by TokyoB » Oct 24th, '11, 17:13

shah82 - I have to admit that I am not familiar with these limited editions from XZH. Do you know how San Ho Tang markets these - I presume it is supposed to be their best gushu, etc. but anything more specific than that? I would have liked to see their GFZ.

Also is HouDe usually a full year behind in what they offer?

Oct 24th, '11, 19:32
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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by shah82 » Oct 24th, '11, 19:32

I think HouDe buys the leftovers. The model looks different from how HLH and Diancha is sold in the West, where there is a MSRP and shops are expected to adhere to it. XZH isn't as expensive as Diancha, and reasonable compared to its other peers (well, before 2010, that was...). So instead of a network all agreeing to a price, what goes on is that TChen has first crack in the native Taiwan-rest of east asia market in the first year. Later on, what doesn't get sold is sent to Guang and Irene (that they like) at wholesale prices. Houde DID sell the '06 and '07 cakes (and YS and others sold '07 cakes) the same year. I think the reason there were no '08 cakes that year was because the demand for pu crashed a little bit, and the shop decided to be conservative, since they still had plenty of earlier XZH. It also might have been that '08's cakes were relatively weak in quality, or disappointment with '07 cakes relative to '06 and '05.

I'm okay with the whole "year later" concept. I can't really afford XZH anymore anyways (and I have plenty), and that year is good for weeding out green tea puerh.

One thing I've always thought was interesting about XZH is that there are *very* few blog post in Asia about them. There are a bunch of reviews about Yang Qing Hao/Chen Yuan Hao in Taiwan and China, but only a shop-affiliated blurb reviews and a desultatory sanzui post about XZH. The shop's blog/facebook is still generally the largest source of info. Even still, it can be crazy confusing. The '07 Yuanshilin/Huangshilin has at least 3 different places mentioned as to where it's from, depending on the website. Even on just Houde, the Puzhen is described as being from one place, but the '07 Fall Sampler pack describes Puzhen as being a 60/40 blend. So...weirdness...

Don't take anything I've just said as anything but talking out of my bottom...

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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by gasninja » Oct 25th, '11, 09:50

Gaung gave me some info on the cake.
"
It was made of mao cha from a few older than 500 years old tea trees in Xiao Jing Gu area. Normally the "yieh shen" plantations have tea trees range from 200 to 600 years old. What they did was isolated a few at least 500 years old tea trees with specially healthy growth, harvested their leaves and made into mao cha. Those rare and limited mao cha were not blended with others"

I just dont know about shelling out that kind of money for jingu. I am sceptical about jingu's ability to age properly as it is a different kind of camelia and also does not have allot of the traits I ussually look for in a tea to store. But this could be something different.

Oct 25th, '11, 10:26
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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by shah82 » Oct 25th, '11, 10:26

Wistaria's Taihe seems to be a jing gu, and it's doing fine aging. XZH '07 Fall Puzhen actually seems to do great aging.

But yes, if I had the money, the only time I'm putting up that sort of cash would be for 6FTM area elite stuff (or LBZ otherwise). In '07, XZH sold a super-elite Mengsong for $145 which is about as crazy as this cake is today, and it was really refined, but just not "big" and "hearty" enough and definitely wasn't durable enough to be a great value.

OTOH, this Xiao Jing Gu business might be talking about Zhenyuan area tea. Wuliang mountain is mostly in Zhenyuan and Mojian county, and the age of the tea trees seems interesting. Those probably aren't C. Taliensis leaves, and people *do* pay big-time money for QianJianZhai super-gushu and such from Fengqing, Bulang, and Nannuo as well. Something like this:

http://themandarinstea.blogspot.com/200 ... -tree.html

http://themandarinstea.blogspot.com/200 ... chive.html

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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by TokyoB » Oct 26th, '11, 16:31

Did these cakes get posted and snapped up right away or still not put up for sale?

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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by bryan_drinks_tea » Nov 2nd, '11, 10:42

Last night I sampled the Lao wu Shan Gu Cha.

The first cup was Impressive, with a smooth mouthfeel and thick body, and the flavor was fresh, spicy, and had fruit flavor similar to pineapple or mango.

The following cups were very harsh, bitter, and intense, despite my very-quick brewing. The flavor became beany, and grainy like oats.

towards the end of the session, the tea resembled a dayi pu-erh with it's flavours, mouthfeel, body and aroma.

Overall I can't say whether this is good pu-erh or not, but to me it tasted so similar to Dayi stuff that I couldn't really feel any interest in it. of course, I'm thankful that I had the opportunity to try it, though.

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Re: Xizihao new offerings from Hou De

by apache » Nov 3rd, '11, 09:53

Wonder have anyone lucky enough to buy some "Risk One's Life to Pursue" and what is the taste note?

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