All weekend I was down with a wee bit cold so my plans for a proper tea tasting was blown with an impaired olfactory system. Even the lovely shus I felt good about earlier this week tasted just like boring old shu- comforting yes but without the ability to pickup the layers of sarsaparilla and caramel notes, I just felt like an old Chinese man quaffing restaurant tea to clean my pork loving greased up pipes.
Then a light bulb when off in my head. Your olfactory receptor cells degrade as you age- almost everything in the body appears to do so except a sense of humor. Perhaps it's not worth waiting even a decade for your sheng to age. You should taste aged shengs when your taste buds are their height because the flavors may not be as vivid when the time comes around. Maybe in the world of sommeliers- like professional athletes- there must be a peak to their olfactory prowess. As our bodies fall apart, you might have to start taking pharmaceuticals and suffer "dry mouth" and other indignities and perhaps not be able to enjoy the nuance of a ripe sheng. I had better present this new brilliant argument to my husband and procure some aged stuff pronto!
Then a light bulb when off in my head. Your olfactory receptor cells degrade as you age- almost everything in the body appears to do so except a sense of humor. Perhaps it's not worth waiting even a decade for your sheng to age. You should taste aged shengs when your taste buds are their height because the flavors may not be as vivid when the time comes around. Maybe in the world of sommeliers- like professional athletes- there must be a peak to their olfactory prowess. As our bodies fall apart, you might have to start taking pharmaceuticals and suffer "dry mouth" and other indignities and perhaps not be able to enjoy the nuance of a ripe sheng. I had better present this new brilliant argument to my husband and procure some aged stuff pronto!
Welcome back, Hster - it's a delight to read your articles once again. :)
ReplyDeleteToodlepip, and best wishes,
Hobbes
Dear Hobbes,
DeleteThank you so much. I have been cheering myself up immensely catching up on the Half-Dipper. There is indeed something very lovely and romantic about an Englishman loving tea in Oxford and composing gems of haiku. Your entries are truly a pleasurable part of my day.
Hster
Not to mention all the things that can potentially go wrong with ageing. While there is nothing wrong with setting aside some teas to age and hope for the best, one should always enjoy their best teas today when they can enjoy them as their is no promise of tomorrow.r
ReplyDeleteHello John,
DeleteI'm saving up my allowance for splurging on the best cakes but for now I think I drink shu. I think you are the serious shu drinker I see everywhere on the web? Could you kindly recommend me some excellent shu which is somewhat different from the Menghai recipes?
Hster
Hster,
DeleteExactly that is why I focused upon shu from the start it is more affordable tea that I could enjoy today and not in 15 to 30 years if everything went right as my stomach never could handle young sheng well.
What exactly do you consider good for a shu? Or maybe better put what don't you like about Menghai shu? Have you ever had any Hong Kong wet storage sheng and if so did you enjoy it?
John
John,
DeleteI have no shortage of every day shus but would like a "special occasion" shu. My daily shus I drink with my porky meals or have with my late night chocolate bar but I would love to have a more complex shu which merits serious brewing. I enjoyed Menghai Golden Needle White Lotus and am considering getting a cake but I vaguely remember you posting that there were better shus out there.
Also another trick I recently came to was adding just a few sheng leaves to liven up my shu so I may just go down this route and embellish the shus I already have. Combinatorially this explodes my collection so I have years of new blends to try.
I don't think wet storage taste is my cup of tea. How about yourself?
hster
Menghai Golden Needle White Lotus is regarded as one of the best shu puerhs on the market by many people. Another Menghai cake that I like a lot is Adorned In Red (sometimes called Red Makeup by some American vendors), which in my opinion is a little better than Golden Needle White Lotus and is not hyped up as much. The main problem that I have with GNWL is that it is a good tea without a doubt but the hype over it has driven up its price beyond what it is worth in my opinion.
DeleteOther ones that I really like are Puerh Old Tea Nuggets (loose or in bricks) which tend to have a stronger more silky brew to them. If you are not familiar with them puerh nuggets are a byproduct of post-fermentation as at times some of the puerh leaves will clump together into hard nuggets which are picked out and either sold loose or saved until there is enough to do a nugget brick run.
For a more unique tasting shu look for Mengku factory ripe puerh, personally I like Mengku more than Menghai but sadly it is harder to find. As to looking for more complex shu puerh, you will not find the same range of complexity in shu as you can in sheng. To a certain extent it gets to the point that all shu blends together, sure there are some lighter or darker fermentation levels, some are more mellow and others are more earthy and some are more smooth and others are malty. Some people will mix together ratios of different shu puerhs together to brew or mix in some sheng like you have but outside of that there is not too much variety.
The reason why I asked about if you ever had any wet storage sheng is because there is a difference between "good earthy" and "bad musty earthy" when it comes to wetter puerh. Nor Sun Puerh is sold in tins of loose tea and is actually a blend of wet storage shu with a little wet storage sheng - this falls into what Marshaln calls traditionally stored puerh or "good wet storage". Quite honestly Nor Sun shu/sheng blend is better than some of the more expensive wet storage shengs that I have had and tends to be my special occasion puerh.
Thank you John. I will definitely give Adorned in Red and Menku shus a go. I found the Menku shus on yunnancolorful.com- have you ever ordered from them?
DeleteSo you recommend Lao Cha Tou? The word "silky" definitely piques my interest. I had been always afraid to try the nuggets because Geraldo on CHA DAO had given nuggets a so-so review. Can you recommend a specific Cha Tou to try since not all nuggets are created equal I assuming?
No I order mainly from Jim's PuerhShop.com except for the time I got a cake of Menghai Golden Needle White lotus from Jas-etea.com to see if it was worth the hype and once from Yunnan Source where I got a tong of a Six Famous Tea Mountains shu cakes.
DeleteThe biggest problem when it comes to Lao Cha Tou is that when they come out they seem to sell out very fast and what survives the initial rush soon becomes insanely overpriced just like the Golden Needle White Lotus shu cakes. Whenever a new run of Lao Cha Tou bricks come out I quickly buy as many as I can afford before they sell out or the price goes up. At which point you are better off buying aged sheng which is more affordable than most people realize if you buy from the right places and are open to the wet storage option.
For a more complete list of what I've been drinking and what I think of it check out my steepster account which has pretty much replaced my tea blog. If there are any teas that are still in my cupboard that you have interest in trying let me know and we can work out a tea trade. http://steepster.com/JohnGrebe
The real WNGL (White Needle Golden Lotus) that most tea cognoscenti agree as one of the top 2 best shu puerh's will never be found in a cake/beeng form. The reason for this is that's when these tea masters are saying the WNGL is the best shu they are talking very specifically about the 1980's WNGL ONLY! This 80's WNGL only comes in a loose tea form with very small and young golden haired "needle" buds interspersed. I am not trying to say that what you had is not the same "recipe" of WNGL but if it is in a cake form and sometimes even also in loose form you are getting a very recent years harvest of WNGL which lacks the aging, complexity, smoothness, plummyness (lol), and possibly talc powder nuances that makes the 80's WNGL one of the best shu teas out there if not the very best!
ReplyDeleteI've heard many say that Haiwan's Lao Cha Tou are the best to be had when it comes to those shu nuggets. I picked up some from the Red Lantern ebay store not long ago. Not a bad tea, but I've had better when it comes to shu. Some of my most favorite shu's are among Linda's offerings at Bana Tea Company. The Tang Xiang is one of my favorites, along with the 2009 Denong Wild bricks (sold out now, I think). Verdant Tea has a couple of shu nugget offerings. I had to pick up some of the Yangxin's Reserve after reading that it tasted like angel food cake (serious sweet tooth here). It was good, but in a decidedly fleeting, ethereal way. Can't help but feel that this tea is long past it's prime and very near to disintegrating into mere tea dust. An interesting one to sample though.
ReplyDelete