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that white part doesn't seem ideal; it was less apparent just looking at it but noticeable |
I'm trying a second sample from the 2020 Sheng Olympiad sheng tasting set from Liquid Proust. The first version I tried, a 2005 Xiaguan "wild" sheng, was really interesting and pleasant. This is a classic tea version that I won't say much more about; I've reviewed versions of it before, and those posts would go through what the tea version is about. It's used as a benchmark of sorts, as a consistent version others can be compared against.
Andrew Richardson's description (the tea enthusiast / vendor who runs this shop and set offering):
~15g of 2003 7542 from Dayi: I'll let you all go research about the 7542 blend and Dayi, but I'll say one thing about this... I'm incredibly thankful to even have the opportunity to offer this to everyone let alone do it at a price that you couldn't even tell was added to the whole set. Oh, and I need to mention these are Hong Kong stored.
Sounds good. It goes without saying that "Hong Kong stored" tends to be used as just one thing, as if every tea stored in Hong Kong is going to experience a similar environment, when in practice that would really vary. Micro-climate in different places varies, humidity and temperature, and issues like airflow change things, along with those other two main parameters. There's no reason a storage environment couldn't even control the humidity level, adjust that, but Hong Kong is said to offer pretty good natural conditions for sheng storage.
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eating really delicious noodles in Hong Kong last April |
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it felt cold to me, being from Bangkok, but this rainy day speaks to how it can be humid |
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paying respect to a Guan Yin statue |
Review:
First infusion: plenty of wet slate / damp basement / cement block aspect range; I would imagine that's almost entirely storage related, and will fade, at least some. This could pass for Liu Bao. It's hard to get a read on what is going on beyond that. It seems fine, not ruined by the relative mustiness, clean beyond that one dominant tone. This will surely still be clearing out next round but I'll move onto trying it then.
Second infusion: I went a little long on infusion time to get that initial transition moving, around 15 seconds, even though right between 5 and 10 would probably be enough. It still tastes like Liu Bao but like a much cleaner, more aged, later-infusion round version of one. The next round will really show where this is going better, but I'll describe this one too. Old furniture flavor picks up; the wet slate / cement block range is giving way to that. Sweetness bumps a little, a faint hint of molasses, maybe closer to Chinese date (jujube).
Feel is decent; it's clean with a bit of fullness. The lower quality older sheng I've tried tends to narrow down to a limited flavor range and lose feel fullness altogether. Aftertaste length / duration is fine, but it will probably carry over a more pleasant range within a couple of rounds.
Third infusion: this infused for a bit under 10 seconds, plenty of time for this proportion (backed off how I normally brew sheng, so just in a more conventional range for most of everyone else). There is still some wet slate to this, but now it's balanced more evenly with the aged furniture, more complex for including the other less pronounced dried fruit range. A deeper flavor edge resembles a bit of char, actual charcoal flavor.
I get the sense that some part of all this could relate to what people tend to call camphor, but I don't. Actual camphor is closer to what Vicks Vapo-rub smells like; this isn't that. All of these other flavors do have an odd combined effect, and the feel is hard to describe. I suppose it could be interpreted a bit towards aromatic, in the sense that furniture polish is that way, which would be related but different oil compounds.
This overlaps a little with the three aged CNNP cakes that I have (or whatever those really are; CNNP versions are said to be inconsistent in origin at best, and buying some of them from local Chinatown sources throws that consistency off even more). It comes across as cleaner for having had a lot of that experience; those really can emphasize the damp basement range in different ways.
Humid and hot Bangkok storage can be too much; it seems critical to allow the teas to have some limited air exposure, and if you just throw the in a sealed space for a decade they come out really musty. Some of that can clear up after half a year of more air exposure but to some extent it's also a permanent change.
Fourth infusion: the lower infusion levels people tend to describe using make sense related to how intense this tea is; it's brewing a bit strong at 7 to 8 seconds infusion time. Cutting proportion back just a little would help with dialing lighter infusion strengths in. At least there are no negative aspects to "brew around;" this would work at different infusion strengths.
It's nice, just at a slightly different balance of the same aspects. It cleans up further, and the aged furniture and dried fruit range picks up a little. It will probably just keep that up for another ten rounds or so, changing more at the end related to how extending infusion times to keep intensity up changes effect. It's nice; standard enough range aged sheng, as it should be. That balance of Chinese date / jujube flavor is nice, hinting just a little towards real black licorice.
I suppose the effect could be relatively different depending on the storage input, swapping out some of this depth and aspects that needed to clear off for a bit less fermentation-developed range if it had been stored dryer. Given how musty older teas stored here in Bangkok could be, and how Malaysian storage examples have worked out, to me this tastes like a more moderate range natural storage version. But then what do I know.
Fifth infusion: even cleaner; this starts into more of an aromatic bark spice range, frankincense or something such. I brewed this round slightly faster, maybe 6 seconds instead of 8, and to me that's plenty for this proportion. Brewed this light it's also easier to pick up the now-faint trace of mustiness, since separating flavor range works better at a lighter infusion strength level, but it all works well. I'll let the next round go just over 10 seconds to see how that shifts things. The feel depth will increase a good bit, and experienced flavor range should shift.
Aftertaste experience is still nice, it's just moderate related to how that tends to go for other tea character range. Feel fullness and creaminess is also fine but moderate in comparison with some other aged sheng range. Since I appreciate flavor as much as the other aspects, and pleasant balance of all character range most, it's fine for me.
Sixth infusion: brewed even slightly longer--ok, twice as long, but still a moderate timing--the touch of char comes out a lot more. That effect tends to stand out even more after a dozen infusions or so. It's pleasant how the aged furniture range comes across so strong in this. Aftertaste experience does increase, of course, and feel fullness, which gains a trace of structure, along with the prior non-distinct fullness. Complexity is pleasant, the way all the flavors and other aspects I keep mentioning combine. There is room for improvement across a lot of the range but it's good.
Seventh infusion: I'll let this go after this round, off to do the first yoga class I'll be back to after a 3 or 4 month break for the pandemic. I don't love the experience of doing yoga but at my age it helps to stay a bit flexible. There's more of a physical-health story to be told about a knee problem I've been dealing with, about how I took most of that time off running, and am only 5 runs or so back into it, but I'll close this with some more thoughts about this tea instead.
It's fine; not different than last round. I drink teas a lot like this whenever I feel like that having experience, but CNNP versions instead. The Tulin tuochas I have that are a couple years younger are not that far behind this fermentation level, well along related to that process, but the character is quite different. I guess it's about what I expected.
Conclusions:
I drank a few more infusions and it only seemed to be fading. Some aged cardboard seemed to pick up as extending infusion times changed the flavor profile (where more often that's a touch of char that increases instead). I liked the tea, it was an interesting experience, it just wasn't all that different or better than the aged versions I have on hand, which never seemed all that exceptional to me, but are pleasant.
I suspect that storage wasn't an ideal input for this tea version. The touch of white in the photo, and evident from appearance, didn't make me too nervous, but then I wouldn't want to drink a cake worth of tea I was concerned about, versus not worrying as much about a sample. The taste seemed to indicate that fermentation went a bit far, or was in a less than ideal form.
All that can be a real balancing act, and what is ideal definitely could vary by preference. If someone wanted to try a tea that's essentially completely finished fermenting, as this seemed to be, then either trying a 30 year old version or trying a tea that was stored on the more humid side would lead to that. It's not as if that's a linear sort of scale; more or less humid conditions, and to some extent also temperature and air contact as inputs, would lead to different outcomes.
On a different subject, that of personal context related to trying aged sheng versions, I've ran into a roadblock in terms of trying better teas related to budget limitations. Using a sampling strategy offsets that, but then instead of having moderate priced and quality cakes around to keep drinking as they age you've got 20 gram samples, which will be gone soon enough. It really helps having a good bit of budget depth for exploring above average aged sheng. Sample sets like this are nice; you might not love some of the versions for your own reasons, or some could really stand out related to what else is out there, or not match up well, but still you get to try different things.
For standard factory teas like this I could buy relatively inexpensive tongs of new versions and then wait a dozen years or so; that strategy is a gap in my current approach. Having "only" 10 or so kilos of tea around already has my wife convinced that I own more tea than I'll ever drink, even though it's not that much. Much better sourcing and networking is another alternative; two different online friends have mentioned buying through Taiwanese sources that sell for much lower pricing than standard Western outlets like Yunnan Sourcing. That would involve some learning curve, and failures, probably ideally supported by basing it off what one of those friends are already doing.
For now I'm ok with drinking a good bit of younger sheng, and buying only slightly aged versions from outlets like the Chawang Shop, cutting the waiting time from a dozen years to more like half that. Sample sets and running across versions in different ways fills in depth of experience. I should be part of a local tea enthusiast network; that would help. More will follow soon enough about a step towards that.
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from the day after the last photo; he gave up his pandemic look |
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