Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

One of the intentionally aged teas, Pu-Erh has a loyal following.


Jan 31st, '12, 11:24
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by Spoonvonstup » Jan 31st, '12, 11:24

wh&yel-apprentice wrote:
Spoonvonstup wrote:Just had a long tasting over the weekend that ended with a marathon session of a 1997 Yiwu from Longyunhao workshop (sheng). One of my friends in Qingdao has a pu'er shop, and unbeknowst to me, my husband had been searching with her for some bricks from the 90's. She had two she had been saving for her own personal collection, but she sent this one to us, probably in part because she thought a wedding anniversary was just romantic enough to have her part with it. So lucky to have good friends.

After almost every steeping, we got red in the face and started laughing and grinning. Trying to describe the taste and experience.. it was nearly impossible, even at the time.

We decided that the best description was that the tea tasted like the logic of a dream. We were utterly entranced with each cup, and yet efforts to put those tastes into words failed and turned into laughter. We were glad to be there, to be alive, and to be among friends. As great tea should be. Almost embarrassingly intimate, except that we all knew each other well (better, now).

Drinking in the warehouse district of Minneapolis, the view out our window contained both the beautiful city lights reflected on the river, and the ridiculous garish pink of Sex World. Yeesh- we thought to ourselves. What a waste of time. They could be drinking this tea with us, nourishing the soul and the senses. We ran off floating into the night around 1am.

Made me remember why I have a giant box way up in my closet of sheng pu'er that I don't pull down to drink. Most of the bricks are about 6 to 8 years old.. perfectly lovely and drinkable now... but now I've really had a taste of what they will be like in another 6 to 10 years. Indescribable- love.
Did u by chance steep some magic 'luv' mushrooms @the same time? just curious...sounds like it from your description :D
Not at all. When tea is good, and the company fine, powerful things happen.

Plus, it always helps to be a Friday night going into the weekend.

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Feb 3rd, '12, 18:38
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by gasninja » Feb 3rd, '12, 18:38

Today I dug into my warchest of samples and pulled out a rare and intriguing tea from finepuer. This claims to be a Menghai Spring Buds loose puerh from 1993. Finepuer states that this tea was stored in northern china in "conditions similar to a fridge". That and the fact that this tea comes in 500 gram sealed plastic bags we cannot expect much ageing to have occured. can we? The tea at first glance looks like a lui an the leaves are black very small and fragmented with the ocasional stem thrown in for color. The leaves have a very slight nutty smell. The tea itself is very cloudy honey color. On the first infusion the tea has the taste of stale sencha. The on the second infusion a metalic aftertaste becomes present like sucking on a battery. I can only think that this would be caused by fertilizers or pesticides. I take one sip of the third infusion the tea has gotten even worse.180 dollars seems alot of money to spend on stale green tea pu-erh which may or may not be laced with pesticides. I dump the tea in my garbage not wanting to get pesticides in my compost and go in search of better tea to clean my mouth out.


I find my 90s CNNP Iron cake (late 90s)from Thechineseteashop.com ready to come to the rescue. This tea cake looks sort of like an old wobly record being wavy all around the cicumference. It is not a very nice looking cake although there is a good amout of buds pressed in the surface of this rock hard cake. Daniel the owner of the thechinesetea shop states that the cake had gone through several years of mild traditional storage then being moved to dry storage at his Vancouver location. Given the compression of this cake it is a good thing that it had some humidity or it might not have aged much at all. as it is this cake while definitly begining to become an aged cake yet still has alot of roughness from its youth in which I imagine this cake must have been pretty intense. The tea is a nice crystal clear light brown soup. There is a nice plum flavor that you sometimes find in cakes at this stage of development. I also think that I can detect some Yi Wu flavors present although I'm fairly sure that if their is yi wu it is only part of the blend. I like to get cakes like this that have a good start on the ageing process but aren't quite their yet. They tend to be allot cheaper than their fully matured counter parts and maybe with some luck a couple years down the road you have a nice mature cake. A good grab for a semi aged cake at under $100.

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Feb 5th, '12, 20:41
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by bagua7 » Feb 5th, '12, 20:41

Does your cake look similar to this one?

Image

Image

1998 CNNP/8972.

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Feb 5th, '12, 21:19
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by gasninja » Feb 5th, '12, 21:19

That is a brick



Today I had a sub par session with a 93 7542. I think it may be to cold or something. Resulting in more muted flavors for the first several infusions.

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Feb 8th, '12, 08:22
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by brandon » Feb 8th, '12, 08:22

1990s CNNP (Kunming?) Red Label - Chinese Tea Shop, BC.
It might be slightly better than what you pay for, but nothing too exciting.
File in the "everyday" or even "mundane" category.

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Feb 8th, '12, 16:02
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by gasninja » Feb 8th, '12, 16:02

Brandon
How does that compare with the similarly priced green mark?

today I'm on day two of an loose 80's large leaf sheng that Guang sent as a sample with my last order. Way more interesting than other aged large leaf sheng that i have tried ( jiang chen brick from bana tea) Mellow stuff kind of monochramatic but still very enjoyable.

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Feb 11th, '12, 21:08
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by gasninja » Feb 11th, '12, 21:08

Tonite I am finishing up my sample of the 80s old (large)leaf sheng. That I received as a bonus with an order from houde. I take back what I said about this being monochromatic this tea is very colorful. By far the best old leaf Shenyang that has passed these lips.

Feb 12th, '12, 19:48
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by G-off-re » Feb 12th, '12, 19:48

A tasty affair with some HouDe samples. Enjoying a session with the 90's MengHai Brick. Nice dark flavors and aroma. This one reminds me of the 90's keyixing brick from BC but less sweet. A pricy sample but worth a try.

Feb 17th, '12, 03:06
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by G-off-re » Feb 17th, '12, 03:06

Another boring session with the 1993 loose sheng from Red Blossom Tea. They started selling this one again after a brief absence. Something seems off about this tea now. I don't remember this tea tasting this way before the took it off the shelf. If i did a blind taste test i think i would have just assumed it was another aged shu. They're shu all seem to have a very similar flavor/aroma that i haven't noticed with other vendors teas.
Im curious to know how they're storing these. Wont be buying anymore of this.

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Feb 17th, '12, 10:47
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by gasninja » Feb 17th, '12, 10:47

Awesom session yesterday with a mix of half 98 8582 and half 85 8582.



YUM!

Mar 3rd, '12, 16:42
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by G-off-re » Mar 3rd, '12, 16:42

Back when i was visiting HK i sampled the 99 Dadugong cake at Sunsing and found it to be enjoyable but my luck with this cake hasn't been as good since. It seems to be rather thin without much flavor and fades fast. I assume my lack of brewing skills is to blame. The Qi is still strong on this one. Feels overly energetic yet i feel couchlocked.

p.s. might be nice for the this post to have a permeant spot at the top like the "official pu of the day" section

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Mar 4th, '12, 23:57
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by Chip » Mar 4th, '12, 23:57

G-off-re wrote:p.s. might be nice for the this post to have a permeant spot at the top like the "official pu of the day" section
... perhaps this could be arranged ... :idea: :!: :arrow:

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Mar 6th, '12, 16:56
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by gasninja » Mar 6th, '12, 16:56

98 7542 from life in a tea cup. Dry stored. It is not that mature given its storage but It has definitely evolved a good amount. Nice complex flavors and a strong huigan for the price it is a good bet considering it only costs 30 dollars less than the 2005 version at redlantern.


not real menghai tea factory though
Last edited by gasninja on Mar 11th, '12, 12:56, edited 1 time in total.

Mar 6th, '12, 19:14
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by shah82 » Mar 6th, '12, 19:14

It's that cheap because it's not Menghai Dayi's 7542, rather, it's some laobaixing's take on the 7542 and wrapped in the ubiquitous CNNP wrapper. Like the ones Jim@Puerhshop got last year.

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Mar 6th, '12, 21:19
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Re: Aged Pu-erh of the Day, Week, or Month

by gingkoseto » Mar 6th, '12, 21:19

gasninja wrote:98 7542 from life in a tea cup. Dry stored. It is not that mature given its storage but It has definitely evolved a good amount. Nice complex flavors and a strong huigan for the price it is a good bet considering it only costs 30 dollars less than the 2005 version at redlantern.
I have to clarify that 2005 Dayi being more expensive than 1998 is quite normal, because Dayi in 1990s mostly bear CNNP trademark, and there is only one ticket with factory name (Menghai) and mark number (7542) from each jian (box of 6x7 cakes). Dayi 7542 from 2000s (I think it starts from 2003) has its own trademark wrap and mark number on each cake. In Chinese market, the first type (I mean authentic first type) is good for personal drinking and has better quality/price ratio, but the second type may have better long-term investment return, as supposedly future investors would more easily recognize the tea by its wrap and batch number (001, 002, etc.).

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