What HeiCha are you drinking

Puerh and other heicha
Andrew S
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Thu Jul 01, 2021 7:44 pm

Now trying my sample of Daxue Jiadao's 1980s muxiang liu bao. It felt appropriate for a rather foggy start to the day.

This is completely different in character to the 1988 wild liu bao that they offer, consisting of small buds, and feeling more like the usual profile that you might expect from a 1980s liu bao (I don't want to call it more 'traditional', because traditions change, and it may well be that the 1988 wild one is closer in character to the raw liu bao of the 1950s).

It is rich, smooth, simple in flavour, but with a refreshing quality in both the underlying flavour and the aftertaste which adds some complexity to the experience of drinking it, transitioning from being cool and minty at the start to being a bit more spicy and 'savoury' later on. The overall character is that of a well-aged tea; simple, but not 'flat'.

It is a much more subtle tea in terms of the feeling that it gives me, with a mild calming pressure that builds slowly (for the qi believers out there).

It would be fun drinking this at yum cha.

@TeaTotaling: it seems like our experiences of these two teas were quite similar. I look forward to hearing more of your adventures in liu bao.

Next stop, the 1960s laochapo sample, after which I'll be all out of these lovely teas, and will have to consider putting in an order for more...

Andrew
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wave_code
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Fri Jul 02, 2021 11:59 am

Really looking forward to trying those teas, and curious to hear what you make of the 60s one @Andrew S

Pretty grey and sleepy day but felt like celebrating things a bit. Had some T1101 for breakfast which made for a nice start and realized I still hadn't tried out the Ma Bao I got from Chanting Pines a while back, so it seemed fitting for the afternoon. Description is hard because its not so complex, very much on the red tea side of things, long lasting sweetness, and mainly just very smooth and super easy - the kind of tea I'd be happy to drink all day every day and you can just gulp down. Not super satisfying out of its complexity, but you keep noticing that the cup is empty and you wish there was more. Incredibly clean storage, lots of nice big twisted and still very hearty looking leaves - this was stored and treated well. Almost instantly calming, but in a very mild way, slightly warming but not brain fogging or making one overly sleepy. Never got that dark, but these nice big leaves needed to be in a much larger pot than I was cramming them in, and probably deserve better clay and water too, but still was basically impossible to mess up. Switched to boiling after about 6 rounds and that got much darker, so the leaves clearly still had a lot to give. Will try a bigger pot to try and get some darker rounds out of it next time. The boiled tea after half an hour also could clearly have kept going - this would be a nice one to do all boil because the result was also a lot cleaner and more pleasant than other liu bao I've boiled even once brewed out, and easier on the stomach. Looking forward to revisiting this one.
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debunix
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Fri Jul 02, 2021 6:25 pm

wave_code wrote:
Fri Jul 02, 2021 11:59 am
you keep noticing that the cup is empty and you wish there was more
There's a lot to be said for that.
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Balthazar
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Sat Jul 03, 2021 8:39 am

Whoah, wouldn't have guessed that those leaves were from a liubao @wave_code.

I woke up earlier than usual today and for some reason decided to start the day by getting out the hacksaw and cut of some slices of the BSX shiliang for easier breaking up of leaves. And so I did.

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Worked well and made it a whole lot easier to pry off suitable chunks without stabbing your hands a thousand times.

Odd thing I noticed is that there's actually (sparse) growth of jinhua in this thing. It's not the intention of BSX. I know it can grow naturally even for something as tightly compressed as these huajuans if the conditions are right, but I wouldn't have thought less than a decade of Taiwan storage would be enough. Huh.

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I was underwhelmed by this tea the first two times I tried it. Today's experience (first a gongfu session, then a boiling one that's still ongoing) was much better. Two things I've come to realize are particularly important for these teas: Breaking them up sufficiently before brewing and high heat over longer time. The second point is why I think the experience was much better with a larger pot than my earlier sessions with smaller ones. I know some people swear to silver or tin for these huajuans precisely due to the heat factor (plus wanting as little muting as possible).

Boiling it (as in straight from dry leaf, not after having already spent most of them through a gongfu session) gave a particularly rich brew though. Kept adding tetsubin water fresh off boil to the cooking pot (I have an iron one that's only used for tea) to refill. A low effort process, but probably not something I'll be doing a lot when I'm making tea only for myself.
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Victoria
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Sat Jul 03, 2021 3:51 pm

Gorgeous posts @Andrew S, @wave_code, and @Balthazar. Wish we could have a session together. Likewise, I wouldn’t have guessed those wet leaves are liubao. The solid dry chunks look like petrified wood. Where’s the power saw 🍃
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wave_code
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Sun Jul 04, 2021 12:02 pm

Hopefully possible some day :D

Yeah I've had quite a few larger leaf liu bao, usually older ones or those trying to copy older style processing, but this one had the biggest I've seen by far. Also was very nice that while there was some stem and a bit of bigger twigs in there it was by and far large and twisted in-tact leaves. Usually the wild style and larger leaf ones I have had tend to have a LOT of stems and a lot of very broken up leaf.
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LeoFox
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Mon Jul 05, 2021 7:52 am

First time trying a "shou" liu bao, "2004 wine fragrant aged liu bao" from three bears:

https://www.threebearstea.com/collectio ... ed-liu-bao

Overall, reminded me of a drinkable, sweet shou. At first, I didnt get anything similar to wine unless I searched for it. There was a little red wine plumminess in the back. But then as steeps progressed, this plumminess became more dominant. I wonder how this is achieved by the processing.
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Bok
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Mon Jul 05, 2021 8:48 am

@LeoFox “drinkable shou” that is exactly what I thought of my first Liubao!!
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Balthazar
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Mon Jul 05, 2021 9:05 am

@Victoria, @wave_code +1
LeoFox wrote:
Mon Jul 05, 2021 7:52 am
First time trying a "shou" liu bao
A sure indication that you're part of the tea elite, drinking "raw" liubao (which many people don't even know is a thing) before ripe :lol:

I'm drinking the CNNP "Xuefeng Golden Classic" fu brick again today, reliable as always.
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Balthazar
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Wed Jul 07, 2021 12:09 pm

Revisiting a 2018 GJS Fu brick for the first time this year. I liked it back in November when I had it last, but felt like it’d benefit from a bit more resting time. I like it even more now, but it might be due to brewing it differently this time around rather than those 7-8 months having made a big difference.

The big difference is the pot size and hence the heat retention particularly towards the later long steeps.

230 ml nixing pot, about 15 grams of leaf. Flash rinse, before steeping times of approx 15, 10, 20, 20, 30, 60s and then more arbitrary durations. Above average endurance.

Taste wise it’s really quite clean (nothing funky going on, not very likely to offend anyone), strong in the huigan department too. In short: This “Deer step landscape room” brick lives up to its slightly cheesy name. Blind bought this when I saw the cute deer wrapper, and am glad I did.
Andrew S
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Fri Jul 09, 2021 7:13 pm

Playing with my sample of the 60s laochapo liu bao from Daxue Jiadao today. As I say, wet days require old tea.

I have no idea why anyone would have wanted to press old liu bao into bricks, but apparently that is what happened to this one more than a decade ago. At least it hasn't been pressed very hard, so it was easy to pry apart without damaging the old leaves.

Silky mouthfeel, persistent flavour, subtle 'old' aroma, a refreshing savouriness to the taste, and a cool aftertaste. There's a very nice bright buzz to it for me which feels more like old pu er than liu bao, if that makes any sense (though all of that is obviously a highly vague and subjective concept).

It is perhaps simple in flavour and not especially thick in mouthfeel compared to some other old liu bao, but it feels very nice to me, and offers me a pleasant overall experience.

Out of the three that I've tried now from Daxue Jiadao (88 wild, 80s muxiang, 60s laochapo), I think I prefer the 60s and the 88 slightly over the 80s, although each is quite different in style. Perhaps those who enjoy complexity might prefer the 88, while those who enjoy mouthfeel might prefer the 80s, but they're all good teas that are worth exploring.

I look forward to hearing from anyone else who has had the chance to try them (especially since I'm not very good at describing flavour or aroma, so my comments might not be very useful for others around here).

Andrew
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Bok
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Fri Jul 09, 2021 7:19 pm

@Andrew S I’ve never really gotten into Liubao and related teas, but your reviews make it sound worth exploring more!

Liubao seems like one of those teas where people are either really passionately into them or not at all.
Andrew S
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Fri Jul 09, 2021 7:31 pm

@Bok: thank you; I used to assume that liu bao was the poor man's cooked pu er (which itself is the poor man's old raw pu er), but trying good old one liu bao changed my mind quite quickly.

Perhaps there's a bit of irony in the fact that the old pu er that I'm drinking at the moment is not as impressive (or as expensive) as the old liu bao that I'm drinking.

But of course, bear in mind that my focus in drinking old teas is to enjoy the nice relaxing feelings that they can give me more than things like the mouthfeel, flavour and aftertaste, and that's a subjective personal experience at best, spiritual wizardry at worst, and more likely just elusive for some and more apparent for others I think.

I look forward to seeing what you think of them if you do try them, though.

Andrew
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LeoFox
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Fri Jul 09, 2021 8:06 pm

Waiting for a special time to open these.
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Andrew S
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Fri Jul 09, 2021 8:15 pm

@LeoFox: I look forward to hearing about your experiences.

To me, any wet and miserable day spent indoors with a bit of spare time is a special enough occasion (so, hopefully you get some bad weather soon).

Andrew
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