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looks ok, just a bit of stick, and my new phone has a photo water mark to get rid of |
Not so long ago I ran across a sample of a sheng from a Chawang Shop order that I had probably overlooked for about a year, reviewed here, (a 2005 Bailong TF ShengTai Jinggu gushu sheng). It was pretty good. Of course good is all relative.
I tend to set aside expectations related to teas being "gushu," even though I do kind of get how general character typically works out for those. Regardless of my impression it's now sold out anyway, of course, so I don't see any list price; it always works out like that. Out of curiosity I tried checking the Wayback Machine for old pricing but it didn't turn up there.
I bought what seemed to be a producer-related cake version they carried with a recent order, intending to give away part of this set (two Dian Hong versions) and some other sheng from Tea Mania for a wedding gift for my niece. Now that wedding probably won't happen, and even if it does my trip back there next month is cancelled, and it seems like global pandemic is probably slowing mail delivery a bit. I also bought an interesting looking Myanmar sheng with it, but that other vendor order was more related to stocking up that tea type. In retrospect, knowing this tea is ok, I should have bought them a cake of it too.
Enough tangent; the tea was this:
2007 Jinggu Bailong TF Raw Puerh Cake 357g
Let's get this part out of the way: it's priced ridiculously low, for $18, like Amazon or Ebay cake pricing. Their description doesn't really account for that, but let's consider it:
This is a good semi-aged classic Jinggu Bailong raw puerh cake, blend of different grades tea leaves from 2006 and 2007 harvest. Silver buds and leaves have sweet and floral aroma. Brewed tea is smooth and fruity mellow. This tea is good to drink now or long term storage. This tea is relative cheap for its age and quality. Good choice to buy now and stock it! The quality of leaves is similar with 2003 Bailong "Jia Ji" cake we also offer.
Manufacturer : Jinggu Bai Long Tea Factory
Product date : 2007/9
Weight : 357g per cake
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their photo, taken in 2014; it has definitely aged since |
Obviously it's not the same thing as I tried in the last example, not gushu, surely not on the same quality level. A blend of inputs is familiar, a tea made from two different years' materials is a little different. That "floral" part seemed to have transitioned some but the sweetness still carries through, with more detail to follow about that.
One more critical detail: this tea will be better in a month (I just got it), and I expect it will change just a little more within a month or two after that. The common-knowledge theme that sheng versions need a month or so to rest when you first get them--or two weeks; versions of the idea vary--is right, per my understanding.
It just doesn't go far enough, as I see it. The typical take is that teas will lose moisture or be affected by other unusual storage conditions in shipping, getting hot or cold. It seems to me that teas also settle from the long term effects of where and how they were stored, beyond adjusting to a shorter transition period. If a tea is a bit musty that may largely drop out over the course of 3 months or so, but minor variations in being flat or off in some way could resolve to some degree across different time-frames. Being relatively dry stored I expect this will pick up a good bit of intensity and some depth over even half a year; it will really come to life.
Why taste it now, one might wonder. Mostly out of curiosity; to see what it's like. I'll figure out a reason to try it again, maybe along with some other tea, and pass on an updated impression within the next couple of months. It won't work to guess how this tea will change over that two months but since I like to guess about things I have no basis for speculating about maybe I'll get to that anyway. This post could make sense in retrospect for flagging changes across that shorter time-frame and again after another half a year.
Review
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could be clearer (the tea, not the photo), but that's not so pronounced |
First infusion: It's woody in an unusual way. I often mention teas tasting like wood in lots of ways: like greener wood, or in sharper form like tree bud tip, then sometimes more cured in character, or like tree bark, with dark tropical wood and aromatic woods like cedar and redwood all forming different ranges. This is different than all that, but it's closest to cedar.
There's a specific smell that a turkey call has, which comes from the mild scent of that wood mixing with a pine resin scent, that is much more dominant; it's closest to that. I've not seen or smelled a turkey call in about 30 years; it's interesting the association comes back. The shorter version is that it tastes like pine resin (or the scent of it), with some undertone of cedar, aromatic lighter wood.
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| photo credit |
Since this is only the first infusion this and the next one will be part of an "opening up" process. So far so good, really; the flavor is relatively clean, and the range is pleasant. It's not musty or on the more fermented side as teas in this age range are when stored here in Bangkok. A trace of geosmin (beet or dirt taste) can definitely start in around the 13 year mark here, even if the aging transition isn't really finished yet.
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much clearer already |
Second infusion: flavor is a bit subtle; this hasn't really developed intensity as a transition. Young sheng could stay more unapproachable for the first few infusions, it might loosen up, but for older sheng it might need a couple of rounds to fully saturate and get the right timing dialed in.
Of course I had just said that I expected flavor range, and perhaps other character, to be a bit muted, to restore more within the next 2-4 weeks. I suppose this is still within the range of mild aromatic wood and fainter pine resin at this point. I thought it might seem a bit younger, given experience with teas stored on the dryer side for less time. It's pretty far along towards completely aged but I suspect it's in that "in between" character, more subtle also for not developing fully aged aspect range yet, with the earlier time-frame aspect range largely gone already.
Feel is reasonable. There is a hint of dryness that matches that pine resin theme, but beyond that it has a bit of thickness, just not a lot. Aftertaste is on the limited side, but then so is flavor intensity. I'm not exactly pushing the tea yet though; these infusions have been for around 10 seconds. For a young sheng 6-8 seconds brewing time might have worked better to keep the character more mild, but intensity level can vary across lots of aspect range for older versions.
Third infusion: I suppose it drifts toward tobacco just a little, not that aromatic wood and pine resin was that far from it before. That's closest to pipe tobacco, not so far off chewing-tobacco range, nothing like a cigarette or cigar.
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(taken with my other phone); leaves fully opened up |
Fourth infusion: it's not intense; that's consistent. I do like the range that's present but it seems likely this will shift onto warmer tones that work out better for "pushing" the tea. I think that will happen relatively quickly, changing over the next half a year, but time will tell. I could drink it just like this anyway.
It's pretty far off older Xiaguan range, the intensity that can either lean towards rich dried fruit or else mushrooms and smoke in some. Old Yiwu--based on limited exposure, but some--tends to go mild in flavor, but retains a really cool thick feel, with a hard to place aftertaste effect that's subtle and pronounced at the same time, in two different senses.
Fifth infusion: there's an underlying sweetness that's making this work. It's like a trace of molasses, tied to a warm mineral range, but one that's very subdued. I don't get the impression that this is really exceptional quality tea but I do like it, and match to preference is the point more than some abstract quality assessment. If the rest of that wood tone shifts to become warmer, and tobacco shifts into a warmer and sweeter tobacco range, this will be much nicer.
There is no flaw to work around, beyond character being subtle. It's possible someone might not like the character, and then any or all of the flavors could be seen as negative. I suppose a limitation in thickness and aftertaste scope could count as a flaw; it's hard to imagine this will continue to come across as thicker. If taste-range is going through a "quiet phase" (even beyond that shipping issue; related to where it is in an aging cycle) then aftertaste might shift along with taste while drinking it. I'll give it a little longer, out towards 20 seconds instead of the 15 or so I've been on, and see how that changes things.
Sixth infusion: all the range keeps transitioning, even though it stays subtle; that makes for an interesting effect. It's more onto a mild root spice range now, in between ginseng and sassafras. To work through which parts are carrying over most a bit of wood does remain, which is subtle but also complex in tone, spanning a light greener range and cured aromatic scope.
The tea kept brewing but notes stop here; I got busy with something else. I'm isolated in the house with my wife and two kids or this description might have been more detailed, with less banging around and shouting in the background to work around.
Conclusion
Not bad. I could drink this once a week just as it is with a breakfast and be happy to have it in that rotation. It's not the kind of tea I think will be much better with age because some negative aspect needs to shift, or would improve a lot if it did. I think it will shift and improve (the character), but it's already on the subtle side, and that might well resolve some when it gets accustomed to it's warmer and more humid surroundings.
Flavors should warm some too; I'd expect that light dryness of pine resin and cedar to switch to something a bit deeper and richer. Just converting to more intense tobacco range wouldn't seem unlikely, but expanding into include something like a touch of aromatic spice, light dried fruit, or roasted chestnut depth might happen.
I just had a shou mei with breakfast and this isn't very far off that for range (I only brewed one round, in a rush for breakfast, so what I'm trying again just now is better than it had been hours ago). That tea is two years old, so it has lost the initial freshness, and has only started transitioning to warmer tones, but it was mild enough to begin with that I'm not even curious about how it will be after 7 years. It'll be subtle. That tea had a trace of cinnamon and dried fruit creeping in (and almost a tea-berry related mint tone, which was cool), but not enough flavor intensity to support a lot of further transition (at a guess). This sheng has a little more depth to it, not exactly bitterness, but what's left of that from a transition process shifting way off it, which isn't completely finished yet.
It's odd seeming to claim that this might be a good sheng for white tea drinkers; I'm not sure that would make sense. Aged, subtle sheng is a funny range. I get it why people tend to like moderate intensity character across a lot of range; more flavor, thicker feel, and more aftertaste experience, along with valuing "cha qi" effect. This might pick up flavor intensity, or it seems conceivable it could just fade.
I've already made it clear but I see this as part 1 of a longer review, a way to assess how much a somewhat aged sheng will transition from just arrived to settled in. There's no way I would remember all that detail I just mentioned, and keeping the information here versus some sort of note works. If this tea gets no better, if it doesn't change as I've said that it might, it was well worth what I paid for it. If it changes as I expect it will have been a steal. I don't even hope that it will shift to become an even more exceptional aged sheng version over the next few years, but I can't completely rule that out.
About tea preference and expense
A Reddit post about some people doing a Teas We Like group buy got me contemplating this subject, which never completely drops out. They are a non-standard vendor, some experienced tea enthusiasts using long-term sourcing efforts to sell interesting teas, and no doubt to fund their own expensive tea habits.
That post was about 10 people splitting a $3000 tea order, amounting to a about 25 cakes, so the end result was a lot like an unusual form of sampling. $300 per person sounds like a lot, to pick up 2 1/2 cakes of tea, but then again that's not really even close to the more expensive aged sheng habit range. The two orders I mentioned cost around $300, with about $100 worth of that intended for my niece. It's most of what I'll spend on tea this year, but then my own tea budget is limited.
It just is what it is, right? People have as much to spare as they do, and their preference lands where it does for type, specific versions, quality level, and balancing out what they can afford. In a sense I can afford to spend more than around $20 per cake; I tend to buy older, moderate quality cakes locally (CNNP and the like) for more like $60, which is still quite moderate. I'd be drinking better tea if those were $120 curated versions from Teas We Like instead.
I can't complain. Some vendors end up sharing samples, so I can trade time doing tasting and writing for broader exposure than a Bangkok low-level IT manager salary supports (with raising kids soaking up more funding than tea spending). There's nothing wrong with people drinking even more moderate cost and quality tea than I do, or spending 10 times as much and experiencing a range a couple levels higher. As a tea blogger I might worry about reaching some abstract level of experience and preference, except that I don't. It's nice when unusual value offerings stretch what I can drink regularly a little, and I don't mind appreciating broader type range instead of focusing on what tea enthusiast trends regards as best.
I was just checking what a Yunnan Sourcing tea version cost that adds detail to that, from a year ago:
That order has relatively early sheng exploration written all over it (I mean in terms of preference evolution, but it's fairly young tea as well), and that's fine. It's interesting how much range those teas cover for pricing, all less than what more developed or budget-unrestricted range might cover. Since I've got the page open sampling a Teas We Like initial range might help place that:
It's probably good tea, and good value. Of course the older tea pricing tends to run higher; the point here was comparison with a selection from Yunnan Sourcing, which may or may not be typical.
This stops short of any clear and final conclusion, as a lot of idea threads I take up do. It's interesting the range a sheng habit can cover; I guess that works.
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people who make noise, giving me a bit of stink-eye for some reason |
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