Banzhang sheng pu'er from Moychay

 

I looked up this listing before trying it to clarify that it is actually sheng pu'er, since the label presents it as "Banzhang Mountain Soil."  It is sheng.  

Why would it not reference Lao Banzhang, the village?  A Google AI answer probably clarifies this, as the answer you would expect:

Lao Banzhang means "Old Banzhang," referring to a famous mountain village in Yunnan, China, that produces some of the most expensive and revered raw Pu-erh tea in the world.

Name Breakdown and Origin

Lao (老): Means "old."Banzhang (班章): The name of the village, located in the Bulang Mountain range of Menghai County, Xishuangbanna. The newer settlement nearby is called Xin Banzhang or "New Banzhang."

King of Pu-erh: 

Connoisseurs call Lao Banzhang tea the "King of Pu-erh" because of its powerful energy (cha qi), intense initial bitterness, and rapid, deep-throated sweetness (huigan).

I reviewed a Xin Banzhang version from a local Chinatown shop recently, here.  So this is probably not from near the old village area, but is tea from that general area, which would explain the pricing.

Banzhang Mountain Soul Sheng Puer (8.94 Euro for 50 grams, or $10.27 USD)

That pricing is low for standard sized cakes at this point, a $70 or so 357 gram version.  Their description:

Banzhang Mountain Soul is a raw Pu-erh tea made from old-tree leaves harvested in the Banzhang region of Bulangshan mountain, Menghai.

The tea comes from high-altitude forested areas where the large-leaf varietals grow naturally and develop a strong, structured character typical of Banzhang terroir.

The leaves are picked by hand with a standard of one bud and two to three leaves, then withered, pan-fried (kill-green), rolled, and sun-dried.

The infusion is bright golden-yellow with a firm, penetrating aroma of wild herbs, wood, and mountain air. The taste is powerful and bitter-sweet, with the characteristic “霸气” (ba qi, dominant strength) associated with Banzhang teas.

A steady returning sweetness and long aftertaste make this tea suitable for both connoisseurs and long-term aging.

It's interesting there's no year cited for this.  Maybe from spring of 2025?

Either way it sounds ok from that description; let's see.

Review

First infusion:  this is quite good.  Bitterness stands out, but so does distinctive floral range, fullness, and depth, and it's only the first infusion.  Sweetness is great.  Astringency is moderate, in a good form, positive in relation to the rest.  There is good hui gan / carried over bitterness converting to sweetness.  Even without tasting other rounds this is surely an absolute steal for tea priced at that level.

The other Xin Banzhang version I'd mentioned trying was good tea, but just a little off a most conventional form.  This is it; this is what pretty good versions of this type should be like.  

I've only tried about four LBZ versions, so I can't really conclusively pin down the right style or flavor range for there, but as far as my memory goes of that it's in the right general range.  It's marked by a distinctive warm and rich floral profile, that is intense, with notable bitterness, but nothing on the highest side of the range, that doesn't integrate well with the rest of the tea character.  Good intensity is matched by depth, and flavor range is especially positive, so heavy in complex floral tones that it almost leans to being fruity, because there is so much complexity and intensity packed in a limited floral flavor scope, carrying over to pronounced aftertaste.  Does that make sense?  Maybe not.

Moychay teas are generally solid, pretty good for matching type range, decent in quality, with range of value a little more broad, but they do offer some atypical hits and misses, outliers on both ends.  I was hoping this would be an example of the first, and it seems to be.

Second infusion:  I brewed this pretty fast; that can help with identifying flavors better, and it's intense enough that it's going to be positive and strong enough brewed lighter.  

It definitely has a lot of flavor complexity to offer.  Bitterness still stands out, but to me it's in an appropriate balance.  It may be a little higher than some LBZ I've tried, but again I'm not trying to claim to know a typical profile range, based on only trying a few versions (3 come to mind, so it's probably more than that).  

The floral flavor covers a narrow range, but it's also complex, which is an interesting effect.  It seems to pack together a set of floral flavors that match and extend beyond what one flower smells like.  Orchid might represent the brightness and sweetness, a wildflower variation might give it depth, and a warm toned flower the flavor richness.  Part of that effect could be interpreted as a hint of citrus instead, maybe as a trace of lemon zest.  You automatically "see" it as only floral, because those flavors seem to integrate and link, to be one complex experience.

It's hard to describe how the sweetness and feel contribute to that.  I've not experienced extended aftertaste that much for awhile, drinking more moderate quality sheng that can be fine in positive flavor aspects, intensity, and complexity, but that don't express all of the quality related markers that much.

Since I'm finally doing a single type tasting maybe I could identify body feel some, cha qi.  But I had breakfast before this, which seems to offset how fast that input hits you, making it much harder to identify.  The long term health of my stomach is much more of a priority than drug-like effects from tea; I don't need those.

Let's switch it up and try to cite limitations or flaws; what isn't as positive?  One could interpret that there is a dry edge to the pronounced mineral tone layer (that seems to associate; I'm fine with mixing flavor and feel range descriptions, if they seem to link).  To me that's a bit of stretch; the entire feel and flavor range is very positive.  But it probably does help define "how good" this tea is.  It's quite good, but there is room for slight improvement.  Related to even moderate aging input that might be positive; a touch of extra intensity in certain feel and flavor seems to tie to transition potential.  To me it would be crazy to hold onto this tea and see what it's like in 15 to 20 years, since it's more than fine now, but preferences do vary.

Third infusion:  a faint hint of smoke enters in; that's closer to a flaw than anything else experienced.  It's always strange to me when that picks up a few rounds in, as occurred in a very recent tasting.  If that's an external input why didn't it stand out at first?  It may be a touch of natural smokiness, just how the mineral range is evolving, even though that sounds strange.

Sweetness is still good.  It could be slightly stronger; back to the theme of looking for limitations, even in positive aspects.  Feel is rich and full but it could be a little more intense.  Aftertaste expression is pretty pronounced, that doesn't represent a thin spot in the character.  Most of the rest doesn't either; I'm describing how good teas and great teas can differ.

The brightness and flavor complexity is quite positive.  A touch of lemon stands out all the more, joining the other floral range, as it had last round, but a little more so.  This tea is really good, only limited in relation to someone hoping for "great" instead.  For someone like me, for whom basic, limited, pleasant, and interesting teas are enough, this is already better than it needs to be.

Maybe I am feeling just a little stony from this.  It would be nice to be trying it outside, but it's the rainy season in Bangkok, so the cats and I were rained out of the outdoor tasting theme this morning.

Fourth infusion:  not so different than last round.  I should keep this round's description short to make this readable, and get back to notes on the next one.  That hint of rougher astringency is gone already, evolved away, and depth seems to pick up.  Bitterness falls into a lighter balance, with lots of floral range flavors resonating into the aftertaste experience.  This is a tea experience worth taking time with, and not rushing.

Fifth infusion:  it's interesting how the forward flavor complexity has dropped, the bright floral tones, bitterness, even sweetness, but depth really ramped up.  There's a lot to taste; it's not thin.  But the effect is unusual, occurring across a broader range than you normally get.  That faint hint of smoke, which may have just been how mineral was coming across at one point, is essentially gone.  Mineral is really pronounced too in this; that's part of what I mean by depth increasing, while the most forward flavor range fades into a more even balance.  

It really fills your mouth; the feel and flavor intensity stand out, across different areas.  The lemon tone switches back to warm floral scope.  I think that kind of thing is varying based on very slight differences in brewing, maybe related to limited infusion time variation.  Temperature probably varies with how fast or slow I brew rounds, with leaves cooling to soak up more heat.  Some would also be ordinary round to round transition.

I definitely feel this more than five cups would usually cause, both a heady stoniness and deeper body feel.  I don't necessarily value all of that as many others do.  It's mildly interesting, but my normal body feel and mental state effects are fine for me.  I put my time in as a stoner and it was enough.  I suppose that could also be why it all seems moderate to me; bong hits of strong weed are 100 times stonier than this tea.  I can't even imagine what that would be like today, since I quit all that 21 years ago.

Sixth infusion:  I brewed this a little longer, to see what that changes.  Flavor tones are warmer and stronger, and feel and aftertaste effects are a bit much.  I suppose I like it lighter (brewed for 10 seconds or less, even a number of rounds in).  Related to feel effect I'll probably walk around a bit; that is adding up.  

It's interesting the way heavy mineral tone comes across, brewed strong like this.  There's a continuity between lighter, brighter range, sweetness, floral complexity, and mineral depth.  It hits across a lot of levels, but it all kind of connects.  Maybe mineral and astringency don't balance as well, brewed just a little stronger.

Conclusions

Of course that tea kept brewing beyond that; that's just where I dropped taking notes.

It can be a little awkward placing "how good" a good tea version is.  Good in relation to what?  This was a lot better than most sheng versions that you would run across.  Related to as good as versions can get is too complicated and subjective a framework.  There is higher quality range, but it's more meaningful to people focused on that than it is to me.

Placing it in relation to a Lao Ban Zhang standard type doesn't go much better.  I've only tried a few versions presented as that, maybe four, and they all were really exceptional, and all similar in some ways.  Pronounced floral tones stand out, to an unusual intensity and related to a novel flavor set.  Astringency was moderate for all of them, but then the rougher edge form of sheng drops out in better versions, for whatever reasons.  They all expressed great depth, and in some cases body feel did stand out.  

This was better than the Chinatown origin Xin Ban Zhang version I've reviewed not so long ago; that included good sweetness and floral range, but mineral tones came across the strongest in that.  That's not a terrible outcome, but very pronounced floral range supported by bitterness, sweetness, and mineral depth is nicer.

It's really not fair for me to guess if this is better or worse than four other LBZ versions I've tried over a half dozen years, and it wouldn't mean much if I did.  Who knows how great or how representative those were.  As I remember most were just a little more amazing, but some of that can be about buying into the hype.

So this tea is quite good, as described, and sort of what I'd expect for the general type (as pu'er from a broader Ban Zhang area, most likely, not necessarily from right outside the older Lao Ban Zhang village).  Value is exceptional; unusually so.  

Some would turn all that around and focus on gaps in expectations instead; there is usually some room for improvement, and expectations can soar in relation to the most exceptional type ranges.  Maybe flavor profile could center on different floral range, intensity and refinement could dial up just a little, and mineral depth, and so on.  But this tea was really good; it made for an exceptional experience.

On tea market, consumer perspective, and related social media changes in China

 

a Chinese tea expo (photo provided by Cary)

I've been seeing online content about tea perspectives in China, about how producers and vendors approach tea themes, and how consumer perspective is changing. As an example, So Han Fan, the owner of West China Tea, regularly discusses this sort of thing.  It's a fascinating subject, to me. 

The questions I wrote as part of an interview form exploration cover a lot of scope.  They're answered here by a tea vendor based in China, who I've tea from, Cary of Oriental Leaf.  He has been posting a little about tea themes in China, on Reddit, which was a second starting point for considering this kind of background.  Learning more about their vendor theme and perspective probably works best through an About Us section of their website.

It's worth pausing to consider how we receive information on how tea culture works out in China in "the West."  Vendors pass it on, either those based in China, or who visit there.  The more exposure you get to that scope, especially from different kinds of sources, leads to hearing different kinds of stories and takes.  The owners of a local Bangkok Chinatown shop, with tea making and vending family in Fujian and Hong Kong, tell much different stories than actual Chinese friends, who typically aren't that into tea, in the same kinds of ways.  Vendor and producer friends living in Fujian and Yunnan convey different perspectives.  The varying input doesn't conflict; it's that tea is taken in different ways.

This interview style input drills down into that, with more focus on modern changes, variations in demand, and social media inputs and effects, than on ordinary consumer or "tea enthusiast" perspective.

Cary is a tea enthusiast.  You can tell.  There's nothing wrong with vendors picking up a commercial interest in tea without continually exploring the subject, and self-defining through it, beyond the scope of ordinary appreciation, but it's helpful when the interest leads to ongoing deeper learning.  Only a tea enthusiast would live out the cultural changes to be able to answer these questions in this depth.  I hope that readers enjoy learning from it as much as I have.

-Has the Chinese tea market remained the same over the last few years?  How would you compare it to the Western tea market (related to types preference, overall demand, or other themes)?

Market-wise, the Chinese tea market over the past two to three years—especially following the end of the pandemic—has been experiencing a downturn, with fairly notable declines across major tea categories, particularly Puer, white tea, and rock tea (Yancha), which had previously seen significant market hype. The Chinese tea market can roughly be divided into two categories: business/gifting use and personal consumption.

Regarding the first category, due to the softening of China's economy in recent years, most industries are going through a slump, leading to a cliff-like drop in business gifting demand. To give an example, the Dragon Boat Festival and the Mid-Autumn Festival used to be peak seasons for gifting, with massive shipments leaving the tea market as vendors stocked up specifically for these two periods. However, this year's Dragon Boat Festival saw very poor performance in the tea market, and shipments for the upcoming Mid-Autumn Festival have also fallen short of expectations, remaining rather sluggish. Furthermore, budgets allocated per batch of tea are now being trimmed down to cut costs.

As for the second category—personal consumption—traditional offline tea shop channels are withering away because online live-streaming has captured an increasing market share over the last few years. Live-streaming channels sell well-known premium teas at extremely low prices, though quality cannot always be fully guaranteed. A few months ago, China Central Television (CCTV) exposed a live-streaming ring in Yunnan that sold fake "famous mountain, famous village" Puer teas and faced heavy penalties, which is a prime example of this phenomenon. Aside from Puer, manufacturers of other tea categories are also aggressively deploying online channels, as live-streaming sales seem to have become a major channel for most people to purchase tea.

Regarding tea selection, Puer tea remains a primary choice for personal consumption, and of course, seasonal green teas are also vital consumption staples during their respective windows. White tea is gradually declining after peaking five or six years ago, while oolong tea—especially rock tea—still holds a relatively important position in the high-end market. Fuzhuan brick tea and Liubao tea are still considered niche categories in China, though their markets are slowly climbing. That being said, jasmine scented tea and black tea still boast massive consumption volumes; it is simply that they generate less noise in the market.

well-designed booths turn up in Bangkok, only relating coffee (Chinese expo photo from Cary)

-Can you describe Chinese tea preferences related to generally corresponding to local version preference (eg. the main local types), to often matching up with standard forms (Longjing, Tie Guan Yin), to some other types expanding in awareness and demand, or somewhere in between?  Of course this would vary by person, and individual awareness, so the question relates to standard forms of tea appreciation and broad trends, and how this changes over time.

There are no obvious tea products from a specific origin or particular tea categories showing exceptionally strong performance, nor is there any observed special consumer preference for local teas.

Marketing plays a massive role in tea selection, especially when it comes to choosing specific types of tea. The rise and fall of Puer tea over twenty years ago, the rise of white tea over a decade ago, and the decline of Tie Guan Yin ten years ago all saw marketing play a huge part. Every year, roving tea expos are held in dozens of Chinese cities, with some cities hosting two a year. These serve as a great window for observing trending fashions in Chinese tea, where one can clearly sense that Puer and white tea have been on a downward trend in recent years. Although there are indeed very good, high-quality white and Puer teas on the market, people always harbor a sense of suspicion due to market chaos and a lack of information transparency, meaning these two types of tea do not make as much noise at the expos as they did a couple of years ago. 

When it comes to choosing tea, consumers are quite diverse: some prefer local green teas out of long-standing taste habits, while others are influenced by internet information, chasing after the types of tea that everyone is recommending, especially on platforms like Xiaohongshu (RED note) and Douyin.

-Is tea used as an investment?  Does this apply at all beyond pu’er type scope?  How has this changed over the past few years?  There’s an understanding that a tea investment bubble of sorts collapsed in the last year or so; is that accurate?

Puer tea is frequently used as an investment vehicle, particularly in places like Fangcun in Guangzhou and Yiwu in Zhejiang. White tea has had an impulse in recent years to be crafted into an investment product, but it hasn't been as "successful" as Puer, while other tea categories are rarely viewed as investments. 

Among brands, Da Yi has received the most criticism in this regard, often dubbed "financial tea." A few years ago, the secondary market prices for Da Yi tea would fluctuate dramatically even within half a day. Over the past year or two, along with the softening economy, many people who previously stockpiled tea have been dumping their inventory, triggering a crash in the Puer tea market. This is indeed the case: the Fangcun market in Guangzhou, which was previously the hottest speculative hub for Puer tea, is now exceptionally quiet.

-How are hybrid styles or production of different teas in different places developing?

Such attempts are very common. For example, Fu brick tea now comes in "Golden Flower" versions across almost all six major tea categories—Golden Flower green tea, Golden Flower oolong, and so on—though the taste leaves much to be desired. Of course, there are also items like peach oolong, jasmine-scented black tea, Yunnan oolong, and chenpi white tea. I believe these are efforts made by tea factories to boost sales; every factory is innovating in the hope of igniting a specific market growth point, which might appeal more to young people, especially those who primarily buy tea via the internet. 

Oriental Leaf Fu zhuan (hei cha, with golden flowers fungus)

However, looking at the current landscape, it seems that no single blended or crossover category has achieved massive success yet. On the other hand, regarding production in non-traditional origins, some teas may have been produced elsewhere for a long time—such as Longjing tea produced in Sichuan or Wuyi rock tea produced in Yunnan. But since this kind of practice is inherently deceptive, nobody talks about it openly.

Henan origin Dong Fang Mei Ren (OB) from Wanmu (from this review post)

-If tea demand has decreased has this related to decrease in production?  Is there a change-over in demand type and forms produced instead (eg. expanding Chinese matcha production)?

According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics in 2026, China's tea production in 2025 reached 3.92 million tons, a 4.8% increase. The production end of tea does not appear to have decreased. I believe the decline in demand is primarily driven by economic factors. Furthermore, aside from personal consumer purchases, various modern milk tea/boba tea chains now consume massive quantities of different types of tea. Recently, CHAGEE (a Chinese milk tea brand) launched a Fuzhuan brick tea milk tea in the five northwestern provinces of China, which received quite positive reviews. The milk tea industry indeed consumes a substantial amount of tea.

-How do you place the Western emphasis on Gongfu ceremonial brewing in relation to standard Chinese tea appreciation?  Are there equivalent “tea enthusiasts” in China, who use a different range of brewing approaches, or embrace aesthetic themes differently, or is tea known of and approached differently in certain areas (eg. in tea production areas)?

Tea-drinking methods in China are diverse. Gongfu tea originally only popular in South China (such as Guangdong and Fujian), and it has only been adopted nationwide for about ten to twenty years. Even now, many Chinese people still brew tea in simple glass cups. In the pre-internet era of the last century, different regions truly had distinct brewing methods: the Northwest boiled brick tea with milk, Yunnan and Guizhou roasted tea over open fire, and Fujian and Guangdong practiced Gongfu brewing. Naturally, these traditional methods still exist today.

Many people also share their tea spaces and pursuits of tea aesthetics on Douyin, exhibiting drastically different aesthetic orientations, with each style enjoying a massive following.

I think the Western emphasis on the Gongfu tea ritual is quite normal, as people seek to capture the truest essence and flavor of the tea through ritual.

By comparison, I know some Chinese coffee enthusiasts who own a whole mountain of brewing gear—their grinders, powder distributors, filters, timers, and scales are extremely professional, likely surpassing the equipment sophistication of many Americans and Europeans. Many people in China criticize this approach as going overboard, even circulating videos of Italians making espresso very simply, without all these complex tools. I suppose the Western discussion around the ritual sense of tea is much like the Chinese debate surrounding coffee brewing.

-Can you describe how social media posting, online tea group discussion, and tea blogging work out in China; are there equivalent forms?

As we've discussed before, blogging is essentially dead in China, and BBS platforms or Discord don't exist there; social media is the main channel for tea-related discussions. Moreover, based on my observation, the atmosphere in Chinese tea communities is far inferior to that of Instagram, Reddit, or Discord. There is almost no serious discussion, and the space is saturated with marketing and metaphysical pseudoscience. 

Platforms like red note, Douyin, Kuaishou, Zhihu (which is similar to Quora), and WeChat Official Accounts feature a massive number of tea-related bloggers, but it feels largely one-way—meaning bloggers transmit information to their audience, and user participation goes no further than leaving comments, while online community engagement remains relatively weak. Discussions among tea enthusiasts probably take place more often in offline gatherings or through word-of-mouth among friends.

-Can you describe how your business focus relates to a specific form of tea appreciation, and how it goes connecting with a consumer base with similar interests, or developing type awareness?  Does that go differently in China and in the West?

If I were running an online tea business in China, it feels like I’d only have one real choice: live-streaming sales. I would need a mature streaming team to pull it off, and it would be utterly exhausting every single day. Offline business, on the other hand, relies mostly on acquaintance networks and suffers from severe homogeneity, making it hard to offer truly differentiated products and services. Both paths are draining, which isn't what I want.

livestream tea sales (photo credit and background article)

That’s why we chose to build an online business geared toward the international market. It allows me to reach global tea enthusiasts quite naturally, acquiring customers by sharing written content and imagery, and connecting with a broader community of tea lovers through niche influencers like you, and through online platforms. I much prefer my current state.

Regardless of whether it's domestic or international, I feel the tea business ultimately relies on reputation and repeat purchases. Good tea speaks for itself, driving customer retention and satisfaction. That’s precisely why we started with a relatively niche category like Fuzhuan brick tea. Being right here in its origin region gives us direct access to exceptional Fuzhuan, which is our core advantage.

The same logic applies to our Puer and Liubao teas. Years ago, I tasted some poorly stored Puer and Liubao teas, so I know firsthand what clean, natural dry storage actually means for dark tea. Because of that, we make it a point to convey this philosophy—and the superior tasting experience brought by dry-stored dark tea—directly to our customers.

My take on all of that

It seems very well-informed and insightful.  The parts about tea practice being different in different places, and exploration of hybrid and new styles, all match what I've heard from others.  My favorite Chinatown shop owners have mentioned following those online streaming tea sales before, commenting on how the teas can seem interesting, especially a time-dependent theme like early Longjing sales.  But they also commented that you really can't tell what is what from on-screen appearance and description, so it's a gamble buying anything from them.  The subject of some streamers being more reliable didn't come up in that limited discussion.

Tea vendors developing new business themes in China is also fascinating, mentioned somewhat indirectly here, related to their own experience.  Not much about that carries over to Western exposure, so it's interesting when it does, and all the more interesting when it relates to positive new source options.  

It makes you wonder why there aren't more commercial ties between Chinese sources and a Western market; that has been slow to evolve, in any form.  Social media content sources never overlapped.  There's the "great firewall" as a factor, but you can talk to people in China if they use a VPN, or possibly more directly if there are other connections (eg. they follow a Western blog).

It's all too much to summarize as conclusions here, or extend, and I don't have the expertise to do so anyway.  I've appreciated learning from these ideas, across a lot of different tea oriented scope.

Thai tea, the Cha Tra Meu orange colored version

 

I'm reviewing Thai tea, the standard orange colored, flavored, black tea version.  I'll drink it as hot tea, with milk and sugar, but it's more common to drink it iced, or blended with ice instead.

I've reviewed a relatively identical version of this tea before, here, in 2018.  Here was my input from that review:

Thai tea tastes like mild black tea with star anise and artificial flavoring added. It's not that far from orange creamsicle. 

a DQ Thai tea blizzard; it's for the best for my health that they don't sell this often

Review:

it's more colorful in real life

It's good; it tastes like Thai tea.  A little astringency stands out, related to brewing chopped black tea leaves for over 5 minutes, at a pretty high proportion, maybe 4 grams for a 14 ounce / 300 ml amount.  All that is a guess; this is weighed, and the volume is an estimate.  But the flavor is good, and that feel input is softened by milk being added, so it's not at all negative.

In describing it I'll be describing a standard Thai tea flavor; the review would be the same for almost any decent version.  Cha Tra Meu is the standard brand, so in many cases people would just be drinking this.  That translates as "hand brand tea," or literally word by word as tea brand hand, for what that's worth.  There is a "gold" version, and I've reviewed both in the past, the original and the gold, but they're not so different.

It tastes like there's a floral input in this, and some depth that's harder to place.  I've heard before that the original version was black tea, orange blossoms (flowers from an orange tree), and crushed roasted tamarind seeds.  I wouldn't really know if it tastes like that.  It might resemble vanilla a little, but to me it tastes more like star anise.  

The flavors are somewhat artificial, I think, although I should take a photo of the package to confirm that.  According to a label image cited in that much earlier review it was:

It's not so different if they are natural flavors, extracted from different inputs.  In that case they're just not completely made in a lab, from chemicals, but some of the same compounds would be included.  I suppose it would be like the case of vanilla, where the main compound can be synthesized using chemical inputs, or the real spice input includes a lot of that and also other range, so it should be more complex.

I suppose if one could discuss the "roasted tamarind seed" range more that might work as a flavor description.  It's hard to place though.  There's no other roasted seed range, or the like, that I can compare this to.  It's not completely different than roasted pumpkin seed, but also not that close to that.  I've considered trying to roast tamarind seeds before, since it's a common fruit type here (sold as a dried version, usually), but I don't think we have a good version of a spice grinder for processing something that durable.  It's not like a coffee bean; those have a shell that resembles wood.

I don't drink much Thai tea, even though it is pleasant.  There's a branch of Cha Tra Meu in my office building, and in lots of other places.  I could have this every day, without making it, but I've never bought it there.  I think I skip it because I don't want it to become a habit.  The flavor is fine, and it's not that unhealthy, probably, but sticking to plain, good quality tea just makes sense to me.

My son drinks a good bit of this sold through Cafe Amazon, a main coffee chain here.  Of course Starbucks is also prevalent, but there are probably more Cafe Amazon shops.  A standard drink costs around 60 bath there, with around 70 baht converting to $2, so it's inexpensive.  Starbucks charges more like 150, or around $5.  For something like Thai tea or matcha drinks there may not be that much difference in different versions, and how much coffee drinks vary would depend a lot on subjective preference and perspective, on judgment.  I buy coffee from Cafe Amazon from time to time, but not Starbucks.

It's interesting how where people get drinks seems to vary by social class identification more than the drink quality or type.  There's another level above Starbucks, presented as higher in quality, that's usually reflected quite a bit by well developed shop aesthetics.  A very clean looking off-white interior is common now, although industrial looking coffee shops based on more grey tones also come up.  The old theme of wood panel and plant input is mostly finished.

the Flat+White coffee shop in Bangkok (their FB page)

I might add that I often have Thai tea in a slushy form, how my son drinks it.  We went to a suki place that had this (suki is a soup version that you cook yourself, adding ingredients they provide, like meat and vegetables, or dumplings).  Maybe it's a little better blended with ice?  It's good hot too.

These ideas I've presented bring something to mind.  Am I not drinking Thai tea because of some social positioning input, maybe not as a class theme, since I'm just kind of middle class here, but because I see myself as more developed or sophisticated in relation to tea preference?  It could be that, instead of the health related input.  But I'm concerned that I already eat some ice cream, most often from Dairy Queen here, and more often Ben and Jerry's or else Breyer's in the US, and don't want to add other high sugar, significant artificial flavor input to that.  The dairy part should be fine, but in shops it's usually sweetened and condensed milk, so not a very natural form of that.

If I were to drink this even every other day then a significant part of my diet would move to this minor sugar and flavoring input.  I see specialty tea as probably being healthy, and positive (more whole leaf, naturally grown, etc.).  In moderation, drinking one or two of these a week, it probably wouldn't shift the balance that much, but those choices can add up.

Is this relatively low quality, mass produced black tea probably made with a good bit of chemical pesticide and fertilizer?  Yes, that's my guess.  But you never really get to know.

It works to conclude that Thai tea is one of my favorite flavored tea versions, or maybe my overall favorite.  I like it so much that I avoid drinking it, if that makes sense.  It could shift to become a regular habit, and I'm already using my own self-imposed unhealthy foods allocation on ice cream and donuts.

Mental approach and state related to long term water fasting

I'm on day 4 of a 5 day water fast now, four full days without eating, counting that I started on Sunday evening and it's Thursday evening now.  For some people that's not that long a duration; they can extend it into multiple weeks.  5 or 7 days is pretty common for significant length water fasts though.

I'll get into what I consider to be a water fast, but I'll start with the point here.  Fasting requires an interesting mental approach, and it's interesting how your mental state plays out over 5 days, or more or less time.  Maybe it's what one would expect; it would depend on what you would expect.

Back to the definition of water fasting; there are a few, but the way I'm using it I will drink tea or herb tea, or diet soda, but nothing with any calorie content.  Of course some people limit it to water; that is implied in the term I'm using for it.  Some people drink coffee, but I drink mine with milk and sugar, and don't want to try to switch over on a very empty stomach.  

I don't drink a lot of diet soda when fasting, but I might have one or two.  I drank one so far; that will be it.  A local Thai producer, Singh, makes a nice diet lemon or orange soda that's a pleasant break from tasting nothing but tea for days.  I usually only drink herb tea a couple of times, but not because I see it as a negative input.  Related to tea I've found that I can only drink shou pu'er, some hei cha, and aged white tea, because those are easy on your stomach.  Shou is best.  Not because I like that type, because it's definitely not a favorite, but it works best.

Not to go too far into the how-to scope here, or probably at all into why to fast, but for the most part the only other thing I ingest is sodium, potassium, and magnesium electrolytes, or salts.  I use the chloride compound version of all of those, because they are readily accessible and the cheapest.  I don't eat much for vitamins; I did just take a multi-vitamin, but hadn't up until then.  The magnesium I take as a tablet (gel coated capsule, I guess that was), and the other two I mix into water and drink.  What dosage to take is pretty complicated; I'll skip that here.  I will say that it takes forever to get a decent input range sorted out, and it probably varies by person, and by what that person is experiencing.

Mental state

Someone on Reddit mentioned that the added mental tension or stress from not eating is part of the reason you benefit from it, which I found very interesting.  Their idea was that if you feel a constant tension for several days, and could resolve it completely just by eating, but don't, then the rest of your life feels that much less tense or stressful, because you conditioned to experience temporary but sustained stress.  I can't say for sure if that works, but maybe, or probably.

I really wanted to pass on more subjective experience description here, not theory on how it plays out, to say what it's like.  It changes as you gain exposure to fasting, so the first three times it's very different than after a number of fasts.  

This might be about 12 for me; I'm not keeping track (maybe just over a dozen, thinking it through more, or it could be 15, since I fasted a lot that first year).  I try to fast for 5 days 4 times a year, but this year I've only done it once earlier this year, so far, about seven months ago.  I spent about six months with my kids, in Honolulu and then in Bangkok, the two places where we live, and I limit activities like that while I'm around them.  It's nice eating with them, and cooking for them, so I just skip the practice, until later.  I'm living with Keoni now but not my daughter; he just graduated high school, so he's back in Bangkok, not returning to Honolulu for now.

a full sized child, kitten, and tea; these are important parts of my life now

In the beginning it's very stressful, and you experience more severe hunger and energy level disruption.  You think about food a lot more, and it causes more stress.  After a half dozen fasts you don't think about food very often, but an emptiness persists, and some degree of stress.

That's already pretty much the short version.  Somehow it seemed deeper than that, more complicated.  The form of the stress is unique.  People into fasting claim that you experience an unusual mental clarity, and I agree with that.  I can get way more work done if I'm on days 3, 4, or 5 of a fast than normal.  But I'm a little edgy too, prone to being short with people, so it comes at a cost.

I guess in general the starting points seem more important, and valid.  Why fast?  If it's just to experience stress then there would be lots of ways to add that to your life.  There is a list of conventionally accepted benefits, but those are impossible to verify, both by personal experience and through research.  They center around autophagy, a body process that clears out damaged cell material to use as resources, which is triggered by exercise, but all the more so by fasting.  All of this is conventional understanding; it's not easy to verify.  Supposedly it reduces risk of cancer and diabetes, and who knows what else.

There's not much that personal experience completely supports.  I feel a little mentally clearer since taking up fasting.  I seem to experience more energy when I run.  That would relate to metabolic flexibility, another benefit, related to your body adapting to use fat energy better.  I'm in ketosis right now; fat or muscle tissue is all the energy there is to keep my metabolism going.  Reserve glycogen seems to run out on day three, but again that's just another guess.

One very odd positive result occurred, that I can't fully connect:  around when I started fasting the grey hair I had then mostly returned to being colored again.  It seems a stretch, doesn't it?  And could even relate to improving general health, making limited changes to diet and exercise, or getting a bit more sleep.  There's no way to track the cause and effect.

So I may be fasting for nothing; the supposed benefits may not be real.  For plenty of others it's easy to accept what random web sources contribute, but for me it's not.  There's research on autophagy, but not so much on fasting effects.  It would be all but impossible to separate cause and effect in studies too.

Taking up another tangent, people might wonder if there aren't clear signs that the stress on your body is negative.  Wouldn't someone get sick more often, while not eating?  Kind of.  I get a minor sore throat sometimes, and sometimes taking some vitamin C clears that up, and at least once I've quit a fast because that seems to be a sign to.  In general not though.  

You feel stress, and hunger, and get a bit grumpy.  Energy level can vary some, but not at all like the crazy shifts for the first two to three fasts.  It would be better to start gradually, to minimize all of that, but of course I didn't.  I tried to fast for 5 days the first time, and figured out that not supplementing electrolytes wouldn't work.  I experienced common side effects, like problems sleeping, muscle cramping, and even perceived irregular heartbeat.  

Of course I quit that first fast when all of that came up.  I think that's an important part of it; striking a balance between being really committed to the fast and also being ok with giving it up if you feel sick, or if stress level goes too high.  I've been busy at work before and stopped a fast early; you have to keep track of how much stress still makes sense.

Now I can sleep fairly well, not so different than normally.  That is a bit odd, that not eating for days doesn't affect my sleep, at all.

Of course it makes you wonder if you aren't as sharp mentally, and might make some sort of mistake, driving, in work duties, or whatever else.  I minimize work impact by fasting on Wednesdays, normally, so the end of the fast is on the weekend.  I just said that the first half is worse, earlier on, but the first day is fine, and really only the second relates to more hunger.  Day three energy level varies, which isn't ideal, but starting a fast on Saturday would cause that on a Monday, which also wouldn't be great.  This week I'm fasting Monday to Friday, because my son stays with me, so I want to eat when he does on the weekend.

Update after the fast; how it went

It's Friday evening now, when I was scheduled to end the fast.  I'll often pull the plug two hours early, related to the time I took the last bite five days ago, going from dinner to dinner over those days.  It often works out that I ended eating at 7:30 or 8 to start, and it makes no sense to wait until 8 to eat to really fulfill that 120 hours (5x24).  Plenty of people approach it that way though, which is fine.

Today I ate at lunch; it might have only been 112, so hardly over 4 1/2 days.  Work has been really intense this week, involving a lot of productivity, meetings, and need to think a lot, and I wanted to be a little sharper for Friday afternoon.  I already knew that within the first hour or two after eating your body is kind of focused on digestion, with blood sugar from that only becoming available as it gets processed, so you don't snap right back to normal.  But it sort of worked; I could do work that last half of the day without counting down to when I would eat.

This fast seemed a little harsher than usual.  Taking 7 months off seemed to leave me less acclimated.  Or so I'm guessing; the busy work-week probably didn't help.  I was in a car accident the day before I started the fast, which was minor, so not a concern, but the stress level from that didn't make for a great start, going into it less relaxed.

I walked a lot less than I usually do.  Often I'll see a fast as a great time to get lots of steps in, because any energy used comes out of fat, and I'm not mainly doing it to lose weight, but I could use to lose a few pounds.  I'm up close to 80 kg or 180 pounds now, maybe a bit under both, and at 1.7 m / 5' 7" that's not so heavy, but it's more than I weighed in my 40s and earlier 50s.  I run, and less body weight is better, less stress on everything.

I'm not running now, for the last two weeks, because my right foot isn't ok, experiencing what seems to be an early start on bone spurs.  I've been running on it for three months anyway, just cutting back, but for pretty much every running injury I get that pattern plays out, that I cut distance and intensity back, and then only heal when I take a break for a few weeks, or a month.  So I'm not walking that much now either, but some.

What lessons did I learn?  Even after dozens of days of fasting, maybe 60 to 80?, the experience can still vary.  It's great if you can experience very little stress, and some unproductive time.  Ordinary life is harder during fasting.  I think it helps a lot with my mental clarity the rest of the time, and general health, so it's probably still a positive trade off, across lots of dimensions of my life.

Bao Zhong and Dong Fang Mei Ren from Moychay

 

I'm reviewing a Bao Zhong and Dong Fang Mei Ren (Oriental Beauty) from Moychay, more from a set of samples.  I'll skip the background story part here, since I've covered that before, and get right to their site listing descriptions, and the review notes.

Baozhong Oolong Tea, (22 Euro for 80 grams, $25.55, or 32 cents per gram)

Baozhong Oolong Tea is a high-mountain oolong produced in Sanming, Fujian Province, at an average elevation of 1100 meters.Co-developed with Taiwan in 1998, this tea is harvested around the Dragon Boat Festival, a time considered challenging for tea production. What makes it unique is the natural bite from small green leafhoppers (Jacobiasca formosana), which triggers a biochemical transformation in the leaves, releasing aromatic terpenoids that give the tea its signature floral-honey profile.

Baozhong tea is "younger sister" of Oriental Beauty oolong tea, also made from the Jin Xuan cultivar and picked entirely by hand, using a one bud and two leaves standard. It undergoes a multi-step process: sun withering, shade withering, repeated tossing (浪青), semi-fermenting (60–80%), fixation, a second fermentation, rolling, loosening, and drying. This yields a visually distinctive tea with curled strips and a five-color mix of red, yellow, white, green, and brown.

The brewed liquor is golden amber, with a mellow, clean, and honeyed flavor. Layers of fruit, flower, and gentle vegetal notes unfold over multiple infusions. The tea is smooth in texture and long-lasting in taste, known for its clarity and richness.

I wasn't familiar with the tie-in between Bao Zhong and Oriental Beauty / Dong Fang Mei Ren; most of what I've tried is processed to be less oxidized, and not like that.  It's interesting reading this after the notes; they're mostly about how close this is to DFMR, and how it differs.

This works as a reference for what is more typical of what I've tried, two origin area themed versions from Tea Mania, another favorite vendor.  On to the second tea's site listing description:

Oriental Beauty Oolong Tea (Dongfang Meiren Wulong Cha), (36.24 Euro for 80 grams, $42, just over 50 cents a gram)

Oriental Beauty Tea is a traditional semi-oxidized oolong produced in Sanming City, Fujian Province, at an average altitude of 1100 meters. Co-developed with Taiwan in 1998, this tea is harvested around the Dragon Boat Festival, during a narrow seasonal window considered particularly challenging for tea production. Its distinctive character comes from the natural bite of small green leafhoppers (Jacobiasca formosana), which triggers a transformation in the fresh leaves, producing natural floral and honeyed aromas.

The tea is made from the Jin Xuan cultivar and picked by hand, following the standard of one bud with two leaves. Its production involves withering under sunlight and shade, repeated tossing (浪青), semi-fermenting (60–80%), fixation, a second fermentation phase, rolling, breaking, and slow drying. The final leaves are twisted, down-covered, and display a five-color appearance—red, yellow, white, green, and brown.

When brewed, Oriental Beauty Tea yields a bright golden liquor with a rich and mellow flavor. Its aroma carries layers of honey, fruit, flowers, and freshness, with a soft and sweet body that lingers on the palate. It is known for its smooth, clean profile and complex fragrance, often referred to as “beauty fragrance.”

I thought that OB was usually made from an older Qing Xin local cultivar (local in what sense I don't know; the plants surely came from China at some point, but Jin Xuan is the product of a much later breeding process, a hybrid).  Let's check on Wikipedia's opinion on that:

Dongfang meiren is produced from a variety of cultivars of the tea plant, Camellia sinensis, that are grown without insecticides to encourage a common pest, the tea jassid (Jacobiasca formosana), to feed on the leaves, stems, and buds...

Because of the need for J. formosana feeding, the tea must be grown in warmer areas. In Taiwan, it is primarily grown in Hakka areas of the hilly northwestern part of the country at lower altitudes (300–800 m or 980–2,620 ft) between the mountains and the plains.[1] Beipu and Emei in Hsinchu County are noted centers of production...

The tea bushes are planted on the leeward side of hills in areas with sufficient humidity and sunshine.[1] The tea is only harvested in the middle of summer, only about 40–50% of the leaves can be used, and the harvest is susceptible to drought.[1] Therefore, the annual yield is low and the price is relatively high.

So according to what random people wrote there plant types vary; fair enough.  I must have written at least a dozen posts on other OB versions here, but I'm not going back through any of that, or developing this issue further here.  The tea experience is the thing, so on to the review notes.

Review:

Baozhong:  that tastes like Dong Fang Mei Ren alright (with all of this comparison between types written before I read those descriptions, and their take on the connection).  

The dry leaf definitely looks like it, instead of being a lighter oolong, as is common.  I can't say how atypical a more oxidized version actually is, since I'm not that familiar with the type, but if it works well then it works.

It has those nice sweet cinnamon and fruit notes common in DFMR / Oriental Beauty.  There's a bit of citrus, but the depth and complexity imply I'll be able to list out more flavors once it gets going more.  I brewed this for over 30 seconds, to get it started, but the leaves are only completely wetted now.  Feel is pretty good, and aftertaste expression is pleasant, especially that cinnamon note carrying over.  This is quite good.  Not the style I expected, but one I like even better than that.

DFMR:  in the same range as the first, including warm tones, some cinnamon, great depth, and plenty of complexity.  There's a brandy or cognac like flavor quality to this that's better than the other, but the first expresses better aftertaste at this stage.  There's a lot going on in this, but I think it might be easier to unpack next round.  Sweetness level is great, warmth works well with the rest, and deep mineral tones ground it well.  It's also a pretty good tea.

I was just thinking going in that if these are just ordinary range that's fine, and I should emphasize how not every tea needs to be an amazing version of a type.  It's nice when that comes up, but for a basic type like a blended Da Hong Pao you aren't really looking for that.  I just tried a Da Hong Pao from Moychay that I won't write about, that was fine, but not amazing, just decent.  And a Bai Rui Xiang wuyi yancha (rock oolong, Wuyishan area Fujian oolong) that wasn't that good, that fell well below the norm (don't buy that from them).  

I only write about teas I like, in general, from any vendor, unless the flaw or limitation tells a story, something like a Lapsang Souchong that is finally too smoky.  For these Moychay teas some were more exceptional than others, but that pair was the only ones so far that I've not posted the notes as a review for.  They're solid in general.  But these seem great, so far, so it's the other kind of case, where they really do seem to define the high end of a range.

Baozhong #2:  it hasn't really evolved.  Flavors were quite positive the last round, so that's not so bad, but it seemed like these might push on to being even more distinct and intense.  I'm kind of judging this as a Dong Fang Mei Ren, since it resembles that style, and in a sense that's not fair.  Related to what I had expected of type-typical Baozhong style this shouldn't be this fruity, or taste this much like cinnamon, and shouldn't be this oxidized to begin with, (which could be an error on my part; the normal range could be different from or broader than I thought).    

It's pretty good.  Cinnamon is pleasant, the hint of citrus works, and it seems to include general spice and fruit tones beyond that.  As a best-case DFMR the flavors could pop a little more, but it would still stand up as a pretty decent version of one of those.  Feel and aftertaste could be slightly more pronounced but they're in a very positive range.  Mineral depth is good, and overall complexity.

DFMR:  cinnamon really develops in this; it grounds the rest in that warm, almost earthy range.  Fruit is pronounced, but again not as distinct as it could be, so there's some citrus, and other dried fruit, but it would require imagination to pull that apart as a flavor list.  Some vendors would be happy to add another half dozen aspect descriptions, and for as complex as this is it would be justified.  But it all kind of mixes together, so it's not that apparent.  

Some of the fruit range reminds me of banana bread, or cooked banana.  The citrus is mostly just orange.  Mineral depth adds a lot.  This is so oxidized that the warmth and feel is essentially the same as for mild black tea, which is fine, to me that works.  The other tea doesn't include that astringency structure, and touch of dryness; it's more like a well-oxidized oolong (which makes sense; it is that).  

Yesterday I tried those other two Moychay oolongs, the Da Hong Pao and Bai Rui Xiang, and the plants around me shared more than I had, but I'm reluctant to give them any of this.  Maybe once it brews out more I'll share more.

These kinds of teas work well brewed lightly, so that you can really pull apart the flavor range, and savor the experience, but it might be nice to try them a little stronger, to see what that changes.  I'm still not going to brew them over 20 seconds, to avoid wasting the tea, but at around that timing they'll be quite strong, at this proportion (7 grams in a 100 ml gaiwan).

Bao Zhong #3:  not changing much.  Interpreted as an ordinary, more oxidized oolong this is really favorable.  Feel is fine (better than that, really; it's rich and full), flavor complexity is pretty good, taste range is positive, and it balances.  Trying to get it to match a Dong Fang Mei Ren standard type and outcome doesn't work as well, but it's not that.  As an OB / DFMR it doesn't pop quite enough, with specific flavor intensity a bit muted, but it is expressing cinnamon and fruit.  It's still quite good.

DFMR:  this is quite good too, just in a different character range.  The maxed out oxidation level would be familiar to people who drink a lot of DFMR, or have tried a good number, a half dozen decent examples.  It can be like that, and other versions are close enough to it.  Feel structure softens, and it feels fuller; it's interesting that it would transition like that so fast.  The most intense fruit has faded already, and warm tones and depth stand out.  Cinnamon is still really pronounced, the main thing that stands out.  

For someone most excited about fruit range these both might already be declining.  That's a little fast, but brighter tones extracting first isn't so unusual.  I'll probably write notes for only one more round.

Bao Zhong #4:  again pretty solid, but some of the lighter and more interesting flavor has faded, the more intense cinnamon and citrus.  This is still good; the flavor range and depth is nice.  More vague floral range picks up, and a more subdued fruit tone supports that, something like dried longan (a personal favorite; that fruit note is limited, but what is there is nice).  

DFMR:  pretty much the same as the last round, so there's not more to tell.  It's still quite positive.  It might be interpreted as holding up to more infusions more positively than the other, which is a good sign for quality level.  Or on a different read they just transition differently, not better and worse.

Conclusions

Really solid tea versions!  It will be interesting seeing the vendor descriptions.  I wouldn't be surprised if I didn't completely match some of that, especially related to the Bao Zhong, since interpretations can vary, and I doubt that they emphasize a match to DFMR style [I was wrong; they did].  

It will also be interesting to see pricing.  These were good, and unusual, so it wouldn't be so easy to place a market value on them.  DFMR tends to be pricey, for above average versions, and this wasn't unusual and particularly exceptional, but it is pretty good.  [later edit]:  the second, the DFMR, was priced higher than the other, and that seems fair, related to the type difference, and a possible quality level difference.  30 and 50 cents per gram for these seems fine; that's good value, for oolongs of this quality level.

Hua Xiang and Da Shu hong cha / floral and big tree black teas

 

I'm reviewing two more teas from a set of samples from Moychay, this time promising looking black teas.

These were shared by Moychay for review, as thanks for limited help with editing.  I've tried plenty of Moychay teas in the past, and find them to be sort of comparable to Yunnan Sourcing, as a market style vendor carrying a lot of different types.  An order of magnitude less range than Yunnan Sourcing though; maybe a little closer to a conventional, broad type sourcing vendor.

Back when the world was different, I think in 2017, my family and I visited Russia, and I went to two different Moychay shops there.  Beyond trying "regional" Georgian teas the quality of some of those really changed my view on some scope.

Their take on these teas follows, as usual added here after writing review notes:

Hua Xiang Hong Cha Black Tea (45 grams for 22 Euro, or $25.50; 57 cents a gram)

Floral Black Tea This wonderful "hong wulong" (red oolong tea) is made from the high-aroma cultivars Jin Guanyin, Jin Mudan, Huang Guanyin, and Zi Meigui, grown in sustainable agriculture certified tea gardens in the southern foothills of the Wuyi Mountains, Fujian Province. At an altitude of 550 meters, these gardens provide the ideal environment for producing premium black tea with a distinct floral profile. 

The tea is hand-picked in the spring season (March–April), selecting one bud with two or three leaves. The production process includes withering, oxidizing, rolling, fermentation, drying, and refining. This meticulous craftsmanship results in tightly rolled leaves with a vibrant appearance and a rich aroma. 

When brewed, Floral Oolong Black Tea produces a bright, clear infusion with a sweet, mellow, and full-bodied flavor. The enzymatic oxidation during production reduces tea polyphenols by over 90%, resulting in a tea with red liquor, red leaves, and a smooth, sweet aftertaste. It is highly durable, yielding consistent flavor over eight or more infusions.

It's interesting that this is described as being made from four different plant input types.  The flavor is quite complex, which could tie back to that varying input, but the character seems pretty limited in range and consistent, as narrower input versions tend to be.  It doesn't taste like some sort of blend.  One part of this tasting relates to mixing the last of these two for one round, going into how blends differ from narrower input versions.

I don't do much with the theme of a "red oolong" here.  Those are essentially a variation of black teas, oxidized to the same level, just drawing on different processing inputs to get there, resulting in a slightly different form.  I reviewed a Thai "red oolong" version recently here, with a second black tea for comparison.  There are some parallels with these two versions, but a comparison with them wasn't informative enough to go into here, and I didn't identify this as oolong related until after taking the notes, and adding this description.  

That tea was a little closer to what I expect of this type, very mild, but intense in flavor, typically centered on flavors like cherry, berry, cacao, and cinnamon.  This version started out quite floral and moved more into fruit range later on.

Black Tea DA SHU HONG CHA (Big Tree), Chinese tea from Jingmai Mountain, Yunnan Province (Red Tea), 60g  (8.26 Euro, $9.58, 16 cents a gram)

Da Shu Black Tea is produced from the ancient tea trees of Jingmai Mountain, located in Lancang County, Pu’er City, Yunnan Province. Jingmai Mountain, recently recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2023, is home to over 28,000 acres of ancient tea gardens. These gardens, where tea trees grow alongside native vegetation, provide a unique environment that contributes to the tea’s exceptional quality.

The tea is hand-picked between March 20 and May 30 each year, selecting one bud with three leaves from Yunnan Da Ye Zhong tea trees. Grown at an altitude of 1200 meters, the tea benefits from the region’s rich biodiversity and favorable climate. The production process involves traditional methods, including withering, fermentation, and sun-drying, which preserve the tea’s natural sweetness and aroma.

Da Shu Black Tea brews into a bright, amber-colored infusion. Its flavor is marked by an immediate and lasting sweetness, complemented by a distinctive orchid aroma and a pronounced mountain freshness. The tea’s smooth texture and long-lasting aftertaste make it ideal for multiple infusions.

The difference in cost is striking; the first is around four times the per gram cost of the second.  It seems like better quality tea, in a more distinctive, rare, and in-demand style, but I really like the character of the second tea type, so it's much more even than that for my own preference.  

There's an early round flavor inclusion in the second that's more or less a flaw, but beyond that it's quite solid.  The first includes a bit of tartness, a least favorite flavor aspect in teas for me.  Or taste; that could be coming from tongue based sensation, with some people using flavor to describe aroma based sensations, which really overlap experientially as we process the experience.  Common use of these terms is typically vague; you can call all of it flavor or taste, as you like, or break it down otherwise.

Review:

Hua Xiang Hong Cha:  a little light because it's just getting started, but this is exceptional.  It is sweet and floral, with good mineral complexity.  A bit of spice joins the floral range, which is rich and complex enough that it probably relates to more than one flower, maybe orchid on the lighter level and something richer like lavender beyond that.  The flavor is so complex that this will probably evolve to include other range as it transitions across rounds.

It's a style that anyone could appreciate, very complex, balanced, and refined.  All the same it's a higher end, forward flavor range style of black tea, along the line of how a recent Mi Lan Xiang version came across, a black tea made from a plant type usually used for Dan Cong oolong.  And I really love the other flavor range (cacao and roasted sweet potato or yam), depth, and warmth of Yunnan style black tea, even when you give up some flavor complexity and refinement to experience that.  

This isn't tart; I'm not saying that, although there is a trace of that as an input.  It does include a hint of cacao, so that's not a gap.  I'm just saying that I have a favorite black tea style, even if it's often more basic than this, so it could come across as lower in quality level.

Da Shu Hong Cha:  that was a decent lead-in for saying that this version is exactly like that, but it's not, even though it overlaps a lot with what I was discussing.  It does include more warmth and depth, so it's mostly that the flavor range isn't exactly what I was thinking of.

It's important to be able to appreciate what a tea offers, instead of comparing it to some abstract type or quality norm, and seeing gaps instead of what is there that's positive.  At least in terms of what I've written that's what I'm doing here.  These teas are really good though; they're much better than I need tea to be to like them.  So I'll need to be careful to describe the experience as I really interpret it, as gratefully appreciating what is positive, which is essentially all of this experience.

This tea does include a flavor aspect that's unusual, sort of woody, or perhaps along the line of spice.  It's taking a little longer to fully open up than the other, but there is also plenty of positive range.  It's probably as well to do a more complete list style description next round though.

Hua Xiang #2:  even better.  That hint of tartness is fading already, and flavor range picks up.  This will probably be better yet next round, really hitting its stride.  There's a lot going on in this.  It tastes like floral range, still in a complex form, as more than one flower type.  You don't notice cacao for that blending in with the rest, but it seems to be there.  Warm mineral grounds the experience.  There's not a lot of spice range, but there is more warm tone adding to complexity.  Interpreting one part as dried dark cherry works.

Feel is pleasant, sweetness level is good, intensity is good, and refinement is fine.  I suppose someone who is picky enough could find that the balance doesn't work for them related to tartness being a component, and for feel being a little dry along the back and edges of your mouth.  But to me that's splitting hairs, extending personal preference for style into not being able to appreciate a really good tea version.

Da Shu:  it's interesting how this expresses so much warmth and depth.  You don't really notice the other tea lacking those things, but the contrast makes them stand out.  I can relate to this tea better, as I've described personal preference here already.  There is a funky sort of note in this, which I think it could be reasonable to regard as a flaw, although I really see it as a distinctive flavor input that one may or may not like.  It's a balsa wood sort of flavor, not so far off cardboard, but not that.  It's as pronounced as the cacao and other range, making it hard to identify the rest.  I suppose it also includes flavor like roasted butternut squash, or it could be sweet potato.

The first tea sounds better, from my reading of the lists I'm writing out, but I can still relate better to the second.  Personal preference is a funny thing.  In a couple of different senses the first tea is better.

Hua Xiang #3:  not so different than last round, but it is evolving slightly.  The balance of what was there before shifts a little, in ways that would be hard to describe.  Tartness isn't pronounced, but it is still present.  To me a fruit note resembles dark cherry most, but it would be natural to interpret it as cranberry if one combined those flavor identifications together.  Floral range still stands out quite a bit.  The rest is subtle, but it passes on an impression of complexity, the cacao and mineral.

A hint of mint might be picking up.  That should sound familiar to many, from a Red Jade / Ruby Taiwanese black tea type, that includes a good bit of that.  If this didn't include tartness, and had a bit more depth, it would be one of my all time favorite black tea experiences.  As it is it's pleasant.

Da Shu:  the best this has been.  That unusual balsa wood note more or less dropped out, or faded to be hard to notice.  It picks up a creaminess, which works well with the rest of the character.  Cacao really stands out.  A fruit note could be more distinct; it's somewhere between dried longan and dried berry or dark cherry.  The difference between these, them covering completely separate ranges, and flavors (although those do overlap), makes me wonder how they would be combined.  I'll mix the last of this round to see.

It's better than both in a sense, but it gives up a lot in terms of the aspects being distinct.  That's the general trade-off between well balanced blends and more individual types, that can have strengths and weaknesses, a gap in some character, but that can be appreciated differently.  The feel, flavor profile, and overall effect balance really well, but the flavors come across as more muddled, less distinct.  

Somehow the aftertaste range ends up being very pleasant; what trails after really works.  The cacao and fruit inputs of both combine there.  Feel is probably better than either tea individually.  I was curious about that but it's not for me to routinely be mixing teas.  It prevents them from expressing their individual characters.

Hua Xiang #4:  I've been brewing these relatively quickly, at 15 seconds or so, and I'll give them more like 25 to see what that changes.  When I write in these posts that I don't measure proportions but have a pretty good idea of how much is there that relates to this kind of experience.  These are 7 gram samples, and I often use just a little more, even though these fill a 100 ml gaiwan fairly well.  7 grams is perfect, to me.

This again only changes a little, but the change is positive.  This much cacao, fruit, and creaminess cover part of the range of a chocolate covered cherry.  There's still plenty of floral range, but to me it has shifted more on to fruit.  The other version had been even creamier, with a good bit of cacao as well.  Of course someone else might not interpret it as that at all; that could seem like a spice input to someone else, or just a part of the fruit or floral range.  Or like a mild malt, or whatever else.  If you think of Ovaltine / Milo / malted milk ball while drinking these--probably both--the comparison would seem to work.

There is still a faint hint of tartness, but feel switches to an impact in the front half of your mouth instead.  That doesn't mean anything in particular to me.

Da Shu:  creamier, deeper, with more cacao, and richer overall feel and flavor.  But it lacks the up front / higher end punch of the other version.  Aftertaste is even more pleasant.  Cacao and a richer dried fruit note carry over, even though flavors are less intense while you drink it (than the other; still pretty intense in general).  

That warm mineral fullness and depth is a personal favorite part of black tea experience, for me.

These teas aren't finished, but that's enough to get the main story across, and at most they might transition some for a couple of more rounds.

Conclusions:

Both were good, both representing two very different styles.  You could tell that the first was higher in quality in some conventional ways, more intense, distinctive, and complex.  The second is essentially a Dian Hong version, meaning a Yunnan origin black tea; it's definitely from there.  Some style limitation within that implied, which seems to apply; the character falls within that expected type range.

Given I liked the second as much it seems a better value (it costs a fourth the per-unit price of the first).  But for people who prefer that style of the first tea the difference would stand out more.  It's definitely a lot harder to find teas like that.  Dian Hong is around, sometimes with a minor gap in flavor range, as this shows in the first couple of rounds, but it commonly has that pleasant flavor profile and great depth.

To me this second style of tea (the Da Shu) is great for owning a good bit of, to use as a daily drinker, a fall-back tea to have with breakfast over and over.  They had sold 150 grams of it as a third option, beyond 60 and a 7 gram sample, but no longer list that.  I've bought a kilogram of somewhat related style teas a few times; from the right kind of source that can be a really good value.  

Some might think that they could blend that with other types, or add some sort of tisane flavoring, but I wouldn't.  I might alternate between brewing it Gongfu and Western style, and that's about it.  Or it works well to brew in a tea bottle, "grandpa style," an especially favorable approach for drinking during travel.

The first tea, the Hua Xiang, is too pleasant and intense for that; I wouldn't even brew that Western style.