Aged premium

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


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Oct 17th, '08, 20:54
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by Salsero » Oct 17th, '08, 20:54

slurp wrote: "All vintage teas we sell are dry storaged"
I never noticed that. I know I have had some very nice tea from Pushop that was advertised as wet stored or partially wet stored.

The term "wet stored" has a sort of political history of its own. Not too long ago and still today in some circles, "wet stored" just meant bad tea with funky flavors. More recently, people have come to realize that dry stored teas can be sort of forever young and that some of the great pu of the past comes from the humid islands of Taiwan and Hong Kong as well as the humid country of Malaysia.

I suggest that you take either term with a grain of salt. I have come to understand them as relative indicators rather than absolutes, and truth be told we don't know much of anything about the actual storage conditions of what we buy! I doubt that even our vendors know much more than we do. Characteristics we attribute to dry or humid conditions, may actually result form something else.

The first thing to ask isn't whether it is wet or dry stored, but whether it is good tea or not.

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Oct 17th, '08, 21:33
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by nada » Oct 17th, '08, 21:33

Salsero wrote: The first thing to ask isn't whether it is wet or dry stored, but whether it is good tea or not.
I agree.

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Oct 18th, '08, 02:06
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by Salsero » Oct 18th, '08, 02:06

edkrueger wrote: "Aged Premium" is very, very wet stored. It is the worst sheng pu-erh i've ever had.
Well, I have had worse sheng, but that might be more a reason to feel sorry for me than to drink this tea! It did not strike me as having the shu-like character I imagine characterizes a wet stored tea ... but who knows! It also did not have some of the funkiest tastes I have run across in some other sub-par sheng. What I found was very little taste, no viscosity, no aroma. It may be one of those teas that showed promise a year or two ago and then just died.

With short to medium infusions there was no astringency. I suspect this smoothness -- with a full flavor in the mouth and nose -- might account for the "soapy taste" Taitea found ... it was all I could do NOT to taste soap after his suggestion! I made it a tad stronger, 5 gr to 120 ml and did 15 s, 30 s, 1 m, 30 s. The last couple infusions had something unpleasant about them, not sure if it was more a feeling or a taste, but I have encountered it before and don't like it. Sort of like the taste of steel or iron.

The blushing orange color was quite nice, clear, and maybe a bit deeper than I would expect from a four-year-old, but there was nothing aged -- or young for that matter -- about the taste.

I think it was in the Puerh LJ earlier this year that I read about a cake that people really liked a couple years ago and now they find the taste has vanished. I suspect this is such a tea: one that Jim bought a year or two ago and that has gone down hill instead of up since then. I think I may have seen this attributed to tea that is too green ... whatever that means, wrong processing or wrong varietal.

Oct 18th, '08, 05:54
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by Ti » Oct 18th, '08, 05:54

Dead tea. Never heard that before. At least I know it wasn't just me. I haven't found pu difficult to brew but the lack of robust flavor in this one had me stumped.

Oct 18th, '08, 13:38
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by Jim Liu » Oct 18th, '08, 13:38

My understanding is that if some water is sprayed on the cake in a high temp. setting, the fungus is developed inside out, then we called it 'wet storaged'. But a dry cake is storaged in a high temp./moisture environment with little or no fungus, it is still considered as 'Dry Storaged', the tea thus appeared to be 'aged'.

With 'Wet Storaged' tea, your tongue felt to be bited, some sting at the throat, that's that sort of feeling!

I bought more of these 'aged premium'. As you see, I am learning too.

Oct 18th, '08, 15:18
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by edkrueger » Oct 18th, '08, 15:18

slurp wrote:
edkrueger wrote:"Aged Premium" is very, very wet stored. It is the worst sheng pu-erh i've ever had.
wow, that's quite a strong dislike (or maybe you've been lucky enough not to encounter too much bad sheng pu)
With so many people liking it and my lack of experience when I last tried it, I think I'll give It another try. Will put up review later.

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Oct 18th, '08, 17:09
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by Salsero » Oct 18th, '08, 17:09

edkrueger wrote: With so many people liking it ...
The votes have come in 100% negative, ranging from very negative to incredibly negative!

Oct 18th, '08, 17:19
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by edkrueger » Oct 18th, '08, 17:19

For some reason, I though many reviews were marginally positive.

Oct 18th, '08, 18:11
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by Ti » Oct 18th, '08, 18:11

Salsero wrote:
edkrueger wrote: With so many people liking it ...
The votes have come in 100% negative, ranging from very negative to incredibly negative!

edkrueger
PostPosted: Oct 18th 08 4:19 pm Post subject:
For some reason, I though many reviews were marginally positive.
Are we talking about aged premium in general or this particular sample?

And, is aged premium always 'express aged' or is there aged premium that talks the walk because it has done the walk?

Oct 18th, '08, 18:26
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by edkrueger » Oct 18th, '08, 18:26

we are talking about a particular sample.

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