Greengold Daisi black / red tea

 

I'm trying another Georgian tea sent for review by Greengold, following review of a white / green version, an oolong and roasted green version, and two black teas.  All of these have been interesting and pleasant, and none really completely match styles from other places, standing alone as novel type versions.  Quality was good for all of them.

It works as an intro to clarify that often vendors sell relatively fully oxidized teas as either black or red tea.  Red tea, the more literal original Chinese designation, is often used for styles that are less oxidized and sun-dried, matching some Chinese processing range.  Black tea is almost always used for Indian / Sri Lankan style black teas, which tend to be more fully oxidized, and may or may not be presented as very broken leaf.  Those conventions can be a little loose; either term could work for any related teas.

From an online product listing on their website:

It was really nice, and the review descriptions I wrote match that fairly closely, as follows.

Review:

#1:  brewed a bit light, still opening up, but already malty.  It includes warm and sweet tones similar to malty Chinese black teas, not a bit drier and stronger as is typical for Assam.  It leans a little towards cacao but flavor might be centered more on fruit, along the lines of dried fruit.  It's complex, but unpacking that to a list might be difficult.

#2:  brewed a little too strong; funny how that cycle happens so often, overcompensating for a last round.  A few layers of flavors dial way up in this.  Mineral base picks up, including an inky aspect.  Savory sun-dried tomato range joins in.  Some warm tones remind me of an effect from roasted teas, no longer close to cacao but more into coffee range.  That mineral is so pronounced that it seems to include salt.  Sweentness is fine; it helps the rest balance.

It will be interesting trying this brewed more optimally, if I ever get to that, to see how these flavors balance when it's brewed better.

#3:  better!  Mineral still does include a touch of salt, seemingly, which matches with the savory note, and kind of works, offset by the rest.  Complexity is really good in this; there is a lot going on.  None of it really seems like a flaw, just interesting character instead.  There is no sourness or tartness (maybe a trace, balancing with the rest), no musty flavor; it's clean, rich, and bright.  

I can't place this as similar to any Chinese tea, or from anywhere else.  I guess that's fine, that it's novel and distinctive.

Fruit range is interesting, and a bit hard to place, towards a fruity version of floral experience.  It might taste a little like the Thai roselle tisane, rich and sweet, a little towards rose petals, but not exactly the same.  The warmer fruit range might be along the lines of dried tamarind.  It's hard to separate those inputs out and define them, with all the rest going on.

It's a little early but I might try to place how much I like this.  It's good, pleasant and interesting.  I keep having the experience of it being more complicated relating to a completely novel tea experience, at this stage in my tea journey.  It's almost as if repeating variations of earlier experiences would be easier to relate to, versus having new ones.  People seeking out repetition of an earlier experience might not be as interested in this tea.  Then of course it's also pleasant for offering something new.  I had neighbors new to better tea experience try one of the Greengold teas I had reviewed earlier and they absolutely loved it, one of their favorites in a set of interesting versions.

I've been drinking a Thai version of shai hong, Yunnan sun-dried, slightly lower oxidation level black tea, that this is closest to.  It's as different as similar, with that a little more tart, and flavor set not exactly matching, but the range is closest to that.

#4:  warm and sweet tones pick up, and the savory range stands out more than the mineral aspects now.  I like it slightly more like this, and it was already pretty good before.  It balances in a more conventional way.  I would guess that this would brew quite well using a more conventional Western approach (conventional across the count of all tea drinkers; probably more tea enthusiasts would tend to Gong Fu brew this kind of tea).

You experience this across your tongue and the rest of your mouth in an unusual way.  It's intense, and the experience coats your mouth, as flavor and feel, with that pronounced mineral range and sweetness lingering on.  Feel isn't dry or rough, but it has full body.  For the aftertaste some warm mineral, fruit tones, and a lighter cacao / coffee sort of input carries over.  That last part has shifted back closer to cacao brewed lighter, or maybe that's just part of the transition cycle.

Oxidation level seems low in this; that probably contributes to it having an unusual character.  Tones would warm further and flavor range would be more familiar oxidized more to a conventional level.  As it stands the result is quite novel.

#5:  Fading a bit, but still quite pleasant.  This will stretch for a few more rounds if I add more infusion time, and it seems those will still be pleasant, but it's on the way out.  I'm not noticing a completely new transition, more a mix of what occurred before.  Some of what I listed out seems to fade as a root spice tone picks up.  That savory edge and unusual mineral, right at the edge of salt, is still there, and most of the rest, just faded now.

Conclusions:

Pleasant, complex, and novel.  Note there were no mentions of any kinds of flaws, typical for their teas.  

This did seem to be processed to back off full oxidation level slightly, evident in the color of the lighter brewed rounds, and in the flavor listing.  Of course I'm not mentioning vegetal tones here or anything like that; I mean that maybe it's not completely oxidized, but not in a more medium oolong-level range.  It's good.

It always helps to place how good a tea is in comparison to value, relating quality and pleasantness in comparison with cost, since that range matters.  A pretty good tea selling for 15 cents a gram can be a much better value than a better version selling for 30.  Greengold is a producer, selling their teas wholesale through other outlets, so their website that I mentioned isn't listing per 50 or 100 gram prices, or any prices at all.  

This tea holds its own with quality level for most of what is sold through Western outlets related to teas from other countries, all the way up curator sites where only the absolute best quality teas are sold for quite a bit, well over that 30 cents per gram range, then this might stand out less.  If this somehow absolutely matched someone's style preference then never mind how much or how little it costs, it would be fantastic.  I really liked it.

Sub-cultures in US states

a small town near where I'm from, Oil City, Pennsylvania

A friend just asked about me sending a postcard to her daughter's class, since she is now a teacher back in rural Pennsylvania where we grew up.  That relates to the kids learning about local regional US sub-cultures by way of having people send postcards and thoughts on distinct local culture, practices and perspective unique to that area.  

I just wrote a little about local Hawaiian culture, here, and will send a postcard and some thoughts.  Due to living abroad for so long, in Thailand for most of the last 17 years, it's odd considering how similar culture is in US states, since it seems more uniform in comparison with Asian cultures than different, but that still works.  I'll add my own thoughts here.

wild turkeys at my parent's house

Pennsylvania:  really this spans a range of local culture forms, since the West side is more like the Midwest, and the East side the East coast, even a bit like New Jersey.  The two main cities, Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, each have their own character.  Beyond all that there still is a distinct local PA culture.

People are friendly and open, especially in rural areas.  Maybe too open; it's normal to talk to strangers in restaurants or shops, and people love getting into other people's business, gossiping and offering opinions.  Older parts of US culture tend to be valued, things like older holiday tradition observances, harvest fairs, and other festivals related to seasonal themes.  Following sports is unusually popular, at every level, grade school and high school, college, and professional teams.

People tend to be conservative; supporting Trump is a main current theme, and anti-vax sentiment.  People hunt (kill animals for food and sport).  There aren't many minorities so the typical related conflict between races doesn't come up as much, outside of Pittsburgh and Philadelphia.  I suppose for people without a mainstream, white, conservative perspective things could seem rough, even just for being a minority or gay.

The "rust belt" economic shift is a real problem where I'm from; the former industrial area is currently living through economic despair.  It's a shame, because it's a beautiful area, with a wonderful natural setting and four season climate, with lots of quaint and picturesque little towns and villages.

my daughter's school, in Honolulu

Hawaii:  it's awkward for me to say much about local Hawaiian culture, because I don't represent that in any way.  A close family friend, sort of an extra uncle, is truly local, so I've been in on some insight, but I can only state some positive generalities.  Local Hawaiians value family, nature, traditional social roles, and family gatherings.  All that is true of everywhere, to some extent, but all the more so "here," (I'm in Honolulu now, living here for three months again).  They don't necessarily feel alignment with mainstream mainland US culture, but to some extent lots of people might feel that way now.

Another type of local is people with mixed non-native background, or that plus outsider input, and there are plenty of other Asians, and some white mainlander transplants.  Culture is mixed as a result, not at all unified.  All the same people tend to be relaxed, to value nature and outdoor activities, and to try to de-emphasize forms of tension and conflict that can come up in the mainland of the US.  That's even though people do seem to align with either the mainland left or right political inclination form, in relation to transplants.  Military personnel tend to be conservative and lots of other types of people are somewhat liberal, even into "hippie" range.

The economic pressure of a high cost of living definitely divides people, at least in Oahu.  There are beautiful communities full of high end shops and nice restaurants and then poorer local living areas and other bad parts of town.  That pressure has lots of younger, more native locals moving to the mainland, where eventually buying a home is much more practical, since home prices don't typically start at a million dollars, for the lowest demand locations.

Colorado:  this is where I've spent the most of my adult life, in the States.  People there really value nature as well (I guess I'll just keep on saying that), and sports participation.  Here in Honolulu people surf and swim, and running is popular, while winter sports, hiking, rock climbing, and biking are the main themes there.  People sometimes tend to be conservative and liberal at the same time, taking up parts of each spectrum of perspectives.

It's a state full of transplants, as California always was, so local US cultures tend to mix.  Maybe that dilutes some themes a bit, eg. a consistent take on holidays like Christmas.  Commercial influence is diluting the traditional forms of that kind of thing anyway.

Fleece is like the default local uniform; that plus an outer shell in the winter.  The weather is a factor that shapes daily life.  That's true in PA too, where winters can be long and cold, but in CO in higher elevation communities winter lasts half the year.  It almost has to be seen as a positive factor to put up with it.

where I lived in Baltimore, Fell's Point

Maryland:  I "only" lived in Maryland three times, for a total of less than two years, so it's the state I'm least familiar with.  I suppose it's representative of East Coast culture.  I've lived in Baltimore and Ocean City, two completely different places.  

In all of these places sub-culture varies by economic level, by social class, and I suppose that's as pronounced as anywhere else in Maryland.  I mixed with the low and high ends there, oddly.  Being from a rural area, from modest means, I've always felt plenty of connection with the modern working class.  That was stretched a bit trying to communicate with people working on the docks in that shipping related part of town; the local accent could be hard to understand.  

People can be very genuine and generally kind; it's not like New Jersey, where rough edges stand out more, or NYC, where really high population levels lead to people keeping to themselves.  I found the people in the lower social class levels more open to talking to an outsider, where at the other extreme there could be more emphasis on placing you, related to being one of them or not.  I was clearly not one of them working in piers and warehouses but in general they didn't care.

downtown Austin, Texas

Texas:  I've had uniformly positive experiences living in Dallas and Austin.  I suppose my experience isn't up to date or relevant for this time since all that was long ago, in the 90s, long before modern social problems evolved in the US, drug epidemics, crime, and political divide.  Transplants seemed relatively welcome back then, and local perspectives were open and flexible.  

Racism could've been a real issue, given the influx of Mexican immigrants was already far underway, but even that seemed somewhat moderate.  I lived in a Mexican neighborhood in Austin and it was nice, not as well-maintained as it could've been but comfortable and friendly.  In both Dallas and Austin it seemed like the divide between black and white didn't go as smoothly as with Mexican immigrants, the related class division.  Mexican immigrants were fine with carving out their own place in society even if the work placed them at a lower class level, but entrenched poverty is something else.

In one sense Texas seemed to have a unified culture, to me, but in another all the different communities and types of areas were a bit different.  Dallas had a lot of transplants, as Austin did, and El Paso seemed to be a completely different place (which I only visited a couple of times).  

Austin was quite liberal, and Dallas was progressive in a lot of ways, but still a bit more conservative.  I never noticed anyone being racist in Dallas, for example.  Racism takes different forms, and can tend to come in degrees, and as a white person you wouldn't necessarily be "in on it," if there were subtle forms of differences in opportunities, or if the legal system seemed to include a bias.

In all of these states you could move around freely, because that's a main running theme in the US.  Hawaii might be slightly different, since there is some bias against new people moving there, especially outside of Honolulu, or similar transplant areas on Oahu.  That seems somewhat justified, to me, since economic pressure partly related to people moving to local areas is a different kind of problem in Hawaii.  Austin may seem to be bursting at the seems related to a lot of new residents moving there over the last year or two but it's still not really the same kind of thing.

Next one might wonder about main common themes, and main differences, across areas.  Is Christmas observance generally the same, or are typical diets the same or different?  Christmas seems uniform, and I suppose typical diets are more the same than different, which may have been true even 40 or 50 years ago.  Regional foods vary, but those tend to be things people eat some of, as much as the basis for eating completely differently.  

In Texas I would often eat biscuits and gravy for breakfast, and routinely ate Tex-Mex and barbecue, but still other food choices were common.  In Maryland people ate a lot of seafood, local blue crab, shrimp, and mussels, and from what I experienced less fish, but most other foods were similar to elsewhere, meat and potatoes, fast food options, etc.  Hawaii has a lot of local and Asian influence.  White people are a small minority here, so many more locals have Asian heritage.

Beyond that minor differences add up to local perspectives that are hard to capture, even by listing out minor differences, and what those mean to a larger picture.  Religion may be a main running theme or somewhat less emphasized, or work forms and work ethic might vary. 

 

The transplant theme really shifts everything, muddling it.  Most of the people I knew in Dallas and Austin weren't from there, and in Colorado, which is true in a different sense now in Hawaii.  Some of my friends in high school ended up in Virginia and North Carolina.  It can be tempting to put a time-frame on shifts in population change, to say that an older and more established residence base was already there in the 90s, and then people new to areas in the 60s and 70s hold more claim to local status.  The next generation following the one that moves there is definitely "more native," having been born in that new place.  

Growing up I experienced a much older form of rejection of immigration:  members of the last wave of foreign transplants were regarded negatively, as outsiders, while earlier immigration patterns were more accepted.  Irish people moved to the US somewhat long ago, related to me being born in the middle of the 20th century, but somehow a more recent wave of Polish immigrants left them less accepted, as the butt of residual Polish jokes and negative stereotyping.  Some of that pattern applied to Mexican immigrants later, but there were so many spread across so many areas in different distributions that lack of acceptance was inconsistent.

Comparing US culture and Asian culture
  

This is outside the scope of any of this, but a few sentences might clarify what culture is even doing, for people who lack broad exposure to have noticed this.

There is no unified Asian culture or perspective.  I've seen lists of oppositions, points like emphasis on individuality versus group-role self-definition, and those can work, across all of Asia.  That said Thai culture and corresponding forms in places like Japan, China, Korea, and Indonesia are all relatively different.  Immediate manner of being, how you portray your public image to others, varies a lot.  Self-definition at the next level down, about being defined in relation to levels of connections with others, instead of as a list of personal attributes, might be more common.

Differences in food preferences and such seem important in a sense but also somewhat trivial, to me.  I'm not rejecting Anthony Bordain's consistent commentary that relationship with food and the overlap between that and social connections defines people, as much as anything else.  I'm saying that if you swap out all the Thai dishes for Vietnamese equivalents, keeping all the customs, aspects of self-definition, and daily lifestyle patterns, that it doesn't matter so much that you are eating something else. 

It's interesting how US perspectives, local sub-cultures, seems fairly unified in comparison with forms and patterns across other countries.  For sure the East coast, Midwest, South, West, and Southwest are all different places in the US but they're all relatively identical in comparison with the vast differences between Thai culture and perspective and the versions in Japan.  The difference between worldview in Mexico, Canada, and the US is also narrower than that divide, per my understanding.  At the risk of oversimplifying and trivializing complexities I'll offer my own too-limited summary of what I mean.

Thai culture emphasizes self-definition in relation to social level and roles, as I've said.  There are no Thai nursing homes, that I'm aware of, for example, since families take care of each other.  At work, or even in all public exchanges, differences of opinion are minimized, and all conflict is avoided.  In some cases it's regarded as easier and more appropriate to say yes when you really mean no.  That's hard to unpack; I don't mean that people don't have freedom of expression and speech, but they are encouraged to use their public expression within the bounds of accepted norms.  

People are pleasant; they smile when they are happy, and other smiles indicate agreeableness without happiness, or even disapproval, in some cases.  You can see the difference in their eyes, with practice.

Japan is a lot more restrictive.  Social connections and forms are experienced even more so in relation to levels of social closeness or distance.  People are said to have multiple faces, to show others versions of selves in relation to how close they are.  It doesn't tie to the idea of being "two-faced," to being ingenuine or deceitful.  It means that who you show yourself to be, the persona you interact through, is different with family, close friends, acquaintances, business contacts, and strangers.  Really that's happening in all cultures, to some extent, but it tends to be emphasized and encoded in more extreme or rigid form or else largely set aside, depending on the culture.

Americans are quite genuine, in general.  I know a lot of Americans would disagree with this broad claim, thinking that most others they know adjust how they come across, and the content communicated, based on varying goals and social forms, in essence rarely being completely open and transparent.  I accept that's true, but I'm claiming here that within Asian cultures additional social constraints are added to those social context forms.  

In Thailand you shouldn't come across as angry or unhappy, ever, in general.  That seems a bit odd at a funeral, but it carries over even to there.  By the time you get in a bar fight it's fine to express anger but most Thais would never be in any comparable situation, or even a tense and vocal argument at work.

I can't compare that to Japanese culture, since I've had Japanese friends (some close ones), and have visited Japan (twice), and have worked for years with Japanese work colleagues, but my exposure to that culture is still more limited than to Thai perspective.  It's my impression that Japanese people filter what they tend to communicate quite a bit, not just shifting form to be pleasant and screening out harsher elements, but adjusting it all a lot in relation to what is expected.

That's barely a sketch of differences, but it seems like enough to help place how the limited variations I've described in regional US perspectives compare.

ITea World Liu Bao

I'm trying the first of a dark tea / hei cha sample set from ITea World, a newish China based vendor, who sent these teas for review.  It's hard to place them in relation to standard Western outlets, but they seem to be in between a typical high volume vendor and curator vendor, selling teas that are above average in quality for good value pricing, but not the same as small-outlet curator versions, who sometimes offer unique quality range but at much higher pricing.  

The teas are these:

That amounts to 100 grams of tea (20 in 5 gram samples), selling for $19.99, so 20 cents a gram.  That's pretty reasonable.  Hei cha doesn't tend to be as costly as many other general types but for pretty good quality hei cha 20 cents a gram is still very fair.

Hei cha is one of my favorite ranges of tea, even though I drink a lot more sheng pu'er, and have had a lot more oolong over a long period of time.

The one detail that comes up in this review, related to this Liu Bao version, relates to age.  It's from 2018, so 5 1/2 years old now, not old enough for a "raw" / sheng version to age to where it seems to be, necessarily, but that's plenty of age for a well pre-fermented version to settle.  I don't know which it was, and this review covers more on that type divide.

Review:

#1:  that tastes just like Liu Bao; that seems like a good start.  The general style of tea can come in two types, as ripe or raw, shou or sheng, matching pu'er forms.  As with sheng and shou pu'er the tea is either extensively pre-fermented, wet-piled to process it in a way comparable to aging effect, or else not.  There must be more to it than that, since raw / sheng Liu Bao is nothing like sheng pu'er, not at all like a green tea, or variation of that.  I don't think I've written a post here on the differences either.

This version is smooth and rich; it would seem to either be a shou equivalent form or else significantly aged.  I have a lot of a raw Liu Bao version that a friend from Malaysia shared that has been settling and mellowing out for something like 5 years now, and it's not there yet.  Flavors are clean in this, nothing off or challenging.  Often a wet cement block sort of lighter mineral range comes up in Liu Bao, and this has underlying mineral, but not that.  It's intense and complex enough I could do a flavor list review but I'll hold off until next round.

#2:  I let this go a little long; my wife interrupted me during brewing.  For breakfast brewing I would brew another round very light, a flash infusion, and mix the two, but for this I can just say what it's like brewed strong.  That's not idea for breaking down a flavor list but it makes the feel and other character stand out more.

Warm mineral tones did pick up, common range for Liu Bao.  It doesn't taste exactly like cement block, more like slate.  Another part leans towards rich dried fruit, along the line of Chinese date (jujube).  It's odd how clean, full, and smooth this is; a touch more rough edge really is normal for Liu Bao.  This could actually be a well-aged version, something a decade or so old.  Or it's pre-fermented and that went well, and some aging removed the different musty or earthy tones that come along with that.  

Sweetness is pretty good in this.  It's moderate, not as sweet as sweeter range shou pu'er tends to get, in versions that can also taste a lot like fruit or cacao, but it has a toffee like sweetness that balances the rest nicely.  Of course earthiness is a main aspect range too, non-distinct enough in this that it's hard to describe.  It does have a touch of root-cellar depth to it, but it's clean and subtle, and integrates well with the rest.  We actually had a root cellar during my childhood, a dark and musty place we loved to lock each other in.  It was nowhere near as clean in scent as this.

#3:  It changes quite a bit, cleaning up.  Often for Liu Bao this would relate to it becoming more drinkable, but in this case it's just a style difference.  That touch of dried fruit shifts to become more like spice.  Maybe even a range of spice, possibly covering root spice and bark spice, two ranges I'm not great on separating further into sub-types, particular scents or flavors.  Some of the earthiness and mineral base seems to shift to a warmer and sweeter tone too, a little towards cacao.  

I'm making this sound different than Liu Bao, right?  I mean that the base of mineral and earthiness I've described is still there, still the main part of the experience, but the more subtle flavor tones that go along with that are shifting to these ranges.  That point seems to get lost in reviews where a new flavor tone or two are added for each round, so that teas sound like a half dozen completely different styles across the whole review.  It's natural to focus on the changes, on the evolution, and to not keep repeating the description of the flavor base.

For once I'm not reviewing two teas at once here, so I could focus more on feel effect.  I had a long, rough day yesterday, and came back to sleep another hour or two after dropping Kalani off at school, so I'm a bit groggy for baseline.  I don't feel the same light rush of energy sheng tends to contribute, but a mellow and calming lift works well for this context.  Just as vendors seem to overemphasize strong, clear, uplifting cha qi, sheng pu'er hitting hard, I get caught up in expecting and valuing that.  There's always lots to do, right, and we often need that pure, aggressive energy.  I'm taking a relaxing day today, even though Eye keeps mentioning one thing after another I can do while I have extra time.

#4:  more of the same transition, but very limited in form; this is leveling off to where it will probably stay.  I'm brewing a 5 gram sample, not the usual 8 or so I use for maxed out Gongfu brewing, so the related longer times will make this fade faster.  At this rate I might get another 4 infusions, but they will be less intense than the first 4.  It would've worked to brew this a good bit lighter and those could add up to 10, but to me this works well brewed on the strong side, as I like shou pu'er.  Or I might have brewed 10 grams instead, two samples, and used quite short infusion times brewed even stronger.  I don't tend to finish teas in one session brewing that way, which isn't much of a trade-off, since I can have a few rounds later.

#5:  The light spice note has shifted towards a marshmallow flavor; that's nice.  I've experienced that in 2 or 3 other teas across the years, and it's typically quite pleasant.

I've not been mentioning how I see this in terms of quality, trueness to type, or in relation to personal preference.  I think it's pretty good Liu Bao, quite a bit better than I expected.  You would have to push it a bit to get intensity out of it; it may have mellowed with age, or somehow could've started out as less intense to begin with.  Liu Bao is often a little edgy and challenging, and very complex, and this is closer to the opposite.  Even the "ripe" / shou versions can have intense and slightly harsh edges, just warmer and earthier than the light mineral and more astringent edge than younger raw / sheng Liu Bao, and this never did, from the beginning.

It's fine in relation to my preference.  I'm a sheng pu'er drinker, and can relate to shou pu'er and Liu Bao perhaps a little more directly than green tea, but it's still not my main preference range.  When I feel like it I drink that type.  People tend to claim that warm-toned teas match well with cold weather, that the warming feel--extended to Traditional Chinese Medicine internal context claims--is more suitable then, or for people with a certain body character type.  It's not as hot where I am now (Honolulu) as it always was in Bangkok, but the current 25 C / 75 F weather outside isn't cold.  It's a little cool to me; I run cold.  I suppose this would make more sense on a cool spring or fall day, or during an English summer.

#6:  hanging in there.  A bit more savory tone picks up, like sun-dried tomato, but not so pronounced that it seems like that.  Some of this transition relates to it being pushed more, using longer times.  If there had been heavy warm tones or astringency those would really stand out more now, but as it is this stays quite smooth and rich, very approachable.  A touch of mineral tone comparable to how volcanic rock smells did pick up, a bit warm and iron intensive.  That's not exactly like how a crow-bar smells but close enough, to pass on an idea that doesn't tie to having smelled volcanic soil.  I suppose volcanoes aren't uniform in character, mineral content, or smell; I guess that I mean here.

This seems like a good place to leave off; this already ran long.  One part had related to conclusions so I'll skip going further with that.  

It's a good start for their Liu Bao range, better than I expected.  I suppose for people seeking out edgy and intense Liu Bao experience this could be a disappointment, but for me it being approachable, smooth, rich, multi-layered, and light on rough edges and aggressive earth tones was all positive.  Pushing it a bit would draw out more intensity, but it is what it is.  Flavor complexity is fine, not bad, but there is room for improvement.  I've ran across a list of type-typical flavors recently; maybe I'll do more with passing that on later on.

Aging could've brought it to this aspect range, and I'm not sure how else Liu Bao would ever be this moderate in intensity.  It will be interesting seeing their take in a product description, and that background.  [later edit]:  they mention the production year, end of 2018, but nothing further about processing input, to what extent it was pre-fermented in original processing.  It is what it is then; pretty decent, maybe not the most exceptional or complex version of Liu Bao, but quite approachable, well-balanced, and pleasant, fine for quality level.