I'm reviewing a tea version that's an old favorite, Thai sheng from Wawee Tea. It's what Thai sheng should be: high in quality level, made from great material, distinctive, pleasant in flavor, and intense. There probably isn't much tea coming out of Thailand like this, and essentially no other versions I'd probably like more (although Aphiwat's is really nice too).
I love the style. Others might or might not; it would just depend on preference.
There's not a website post to cite, but I can mention their Facebook page post about it, from their FB page:
The long dry spell from winter to April has resulted in this year's tea having a richer, more fragrant flavor.
The tea wrapping paper features tribal patterns from the villagers of Wawei, who are the main workforce helping us harvest the tea leaves.
Raw Pu-erh Tea (生普洱), Spring Tea Season 2026
100% from large-tree tea (古樹茶)
200 gram compressed cake
990 THB per cake, 5 cakes in a bamboo bundle 4,950 THB
It seems like I should be gatekeeping this. They don't sell overseas anyway, per my understanding, so I guess mentioning this is for Thais, or people who live "here" (since I'm in Bangkok again now).
Them selling that for around $30 for a 200 gram cake is an example of local Thai pricing; in a Western facing outlet it would be more. I just bought pretty good Vietnamese tea for around double that from Viet Sun, and this tea holds its own against that. Maybe in terms of my preference I like it a little more; it is a personal favorite.
At least my blog is read by a lot more AI bots than humans; that will help reduce the potential exposure impact. Maybe I won't share links to this as much to keep going in that direction.
Review:
First infusion: a little strong, because I gave this over 30 seconds to get it started, so I'm not writing about how it will really open up next round. It's good. There's plenty of fruit flavor, some vegetal range, and a good bit of astringency structure, but of the right type. Bitterness stands out. This is just how it should start. It'll work better to do a flavor list and say more about the rest next round, in a typical faster infusion.
Make no mistake though, you can tell this is really nice right away. Intensity is right, sweetness is great, and flavor range is just what you would hope for. You don't find teas like this by accident. Years of looking in the right kind of places have to come together, after looking in the wrong kinds of places. You can frame that as karma if you like, that spiritual forces are looking out for you. It doesn't change much if you do.
Second infusion: a 5 second infusion brews just as strong; that's how this should be. Intensity stands out most. At times you run across older plant source material that's more subtle, but with great depth, that's really approachable, but that lasts for lots of infusions, and changes in positive ways. This isn't that. It's intense from the start. Fruit stands out, it's just hard to say which. It's along the line of lychee or mango, or it could be a sweet form of pineapple.
Vegetal flavor is there, a green wood sort of range, or maybe that could map to something else, like bitter melon. I've been eating a lot of bitter melon, from our garden in Honolulu, and you mostly taste bitterness from that. This is bitter, but to me the type and level is great.
Depth, intensity, balance, aftertaste expression; it's all great. To be clear this is at least partly because I already love their style of tea. I've drank at least a couple of cakes of this, and it's fantastic getting back to it. I like it young too, like this, not necessarily transitioned by age, but this would be really good over the next few years, as it keeps changing.
If I tasted the same green wood / vegetal input in a different context I wouldn't like it. But to me it integrates perfectly with the rest, and adds to a very intense overall experience, that is just how it should be. I've been drinking some of Aphiwat's tea as 2 or 3 year old versions, ones I've had around, and it's much approachable after the transition, but I don't like it as much. It's down to personal preference.
I finished this round a couple of minutes ago and the sweetness really lingers along my tongue, that had transitioned from bitterness; it's partly about that. You can emphasize this kind of experience by drinking water between rounds; it comes across as very sweet. But it's also nice to let the experience build up in your sense of taste, getting stronger and stronger.
Third infusion: I can't really unpack that fruit input more; it's still either lychee or mango, but seemingly a mix of a lot of related tropical fruit input. Warmth seems to pick up a little. Sweetness and intensity are still great, of course. This really hits your palate hard, in a good way. Only a sheng drinker would love this bitterness level as I do. Some sheng is even more bitter, but this is pronounced.
To me this is the kind of tea you can have every day for as long as you want, for weeks. The experience is so positive that it doesn't get old. I suppose that has more to do with a status of being a favorite than how general character themes play out.
A good black tea is much more approachable, and in some sense it would make more sense with food. I'll very often have this kind of tea with food, intense young Thai sheng, along the line of what I ate today, scrambled eggs with spinach and a Thai vegetable plant leaf, and a mix of orange, banana, and papaya. More often I'll add a starch input, a croissant or some other pastry, but lately I've been letting that drop. Yogurt with the fruit is also nice, and that protects your stomach. I feel ok without having included it, just now.
Fourth infusion: warm tones might pick up further, and this might be even more intense. I walked around looking for the cat between infusions, noticing that the aftertaste never really drops out, it stays with you.
Fifth infusion: this isn't changing much, and certainly isn't fading. Feel might be picking up some extra richness, and the fruit has transitioned to a slightly different complex fruit range. It's a little towards that juicyfruit gum flavor. It would make sense for a natural interpretation to include citrus, a bright version of it, in between lemon and tangerine. Or maybe just to see it as tangerine. Intensity is still nice, but that depends on someone loving bitterness--at this level--and intensity.
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they were running free all morning, but she was messing with them a little too |
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they're all so cute, but that darkened face look is really something |
Sixth infusion: I haven't mentioned an inconsistency in the coloration of the leaves. Parts were probably left exposed to wither longer, or may have been crushed while being picked, leading to faster oxidation. Or inconsistent heating could roast some a little. The two effects would be different, and if both occurred then complexity would enter in, which I guess someone could interpret as coming at a cost. But the complexity of this tea is a strength, as I see it. Intensity definitely also is; if those somewhat atypical inputs changed character they certainly didn't limit how intense the experience is. They might even give it a nice balance.
It could have more warm range than it ordinarily should, for at this age. But that's a good thing; it all matches and integrates well. It's definitely not missing brighter range, or sweetness. I drank a cake that was a lot like this pretty fast 2 or 3 years ago, from them, loving it so much that half my tea drinking rotation was that version.
Seventh infusion: this is finally losing a little intensity, but that really only brings it into a more normal range. I'm still brewing it really fast, around 5 seconds. I've pushed the infusion proportion, which is normal for me, maybe at 8 grams for a 100 ml gaiwan, or it could even be 9.
Warmth picks up. That has been a gradual trend for the past 4 or 5 infusions. Feel structure is really nice, less sharp and edgy than initially, but it was never really negative. Now it's richer, more full, but still intense.
Fruit is pretty heavy on citrus. I'm surely missing a lot of potential association for the flavors; this is complex. Mineral effect probably keeps shifting. That's probably a lot of what is causing me to perceive that the tone as warming. It was probably bright and lighter mineral range earlier on, and now it's on to warmer tones, not completely unlike tasting a copper penny. Probably an interpretation of the main range as including floral tone is reasonable, maybe jasmine.
Eighth infusion: I let this go for over 15 seconds to try it stronger, but I think I know how that will work out. It's just a little more intense, and back to potentially challenging. Astringency pairs with a mineral tone in a way that's a bit much, but the effect is still quite pleasant. It's this kind of intensity that differentiates pu'er from other tea types. You can't brew other types to draw it out at this level even if you wanted to, and with young sheng you are often brewing around it, using different form to limit it. It's delicious, and the overall experience is great.
This is exactly how I hoped this tea would be. It's nice when it works out like that. In some cases teas can be even better than you hoped, more novel, or positive in a different way, but I wouldn't want this to be different in any way.
Ninth infusion: some of this tea seems to be exhibiting the "brewed out" green wood bitterness and astringency aspect, but it seems like different leaves that are processed differently might be transitioning and reacting differently. It's still quite good, but that will probably keep picking up, and it will be less pleasant after the next couple of rounds. It has been a nice infusion cycle though.
I did drink this tea again the next day, the day I'm editing this. It was nice not giving any thought to a flavor list breakdown, or other aspects, and just enjoying it.
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