Feb 01 2009
A tea older than me
Well, I promised at the start of the year that I’d post more often about tea, which was really one of the reasons I started this blog in the first place. So here we are, just one tiny month later, with a post about tea: it’s almost unbelievable…
The tea in question is slightly mysterious. It’s a very generous free sample from Nada – my thanks go to him for this experience. I got this a few months ago, but haven’t had the right opportunity to try it. Today it’s a cold Sunday, the start of February; Jill is “recovering” from her hen night yesterday; I’m on holiday tomorrow; and so this afternoon is a free (and guiltlessly free) one, almost designed for a serious tea session.
The handwritten insert with this small sample simply says “60s loose leaf sheng”: essentially it’s an aged Chinese puerh tea, without artificial fermentation, although I’m assuming from the description that it was always loose leaf and has never been compressed into a cake or brick. The dry leaves certainly don’t look as though they have, although after at least 40 years, it’s probably difficult to tell. It’s quite humbling to have this tea which is older than I am, perhaps by several years. That is one of the pleasures of exploring a tea like puerh which lasts.
There’s about 4g of leaf, so I used a small (100ml) pot, the smallest I have. The aroma of the dry leaf in the pre-heated pot is interesting: damp earth mustiness, with faint hints of spice or cinnamon. A curious mix.
After a first flash rinse (not drunk) of the leaves, the aroma is more mushroom-like, with that same damp earthiness. The first drinkable rinse of 10 seconds gives a resultant liquor of a glorious deep-amber colour, verging on ruby red.
The taste is smooth, earthy and relatively “creamy”, for want of a better word. Hard to describe.
I’ve enjoyed young, green puerh for a while now. It has a crisp, refreshing and biting taste that I really like, particularly if you can find a good quality tea. On the other hand, I’ve yet to taste an aged puerh, and moreso any fermented (shu) puerh, that I really like. MarshalN posted a great piece on his blog recently about what it is we may actually be tasting in the first few infusions of an older tea: those infusions of an aged puerh which I have trouble getting through. The initial taste might be effect of how the tea has been stored.
Given the age of this tea, and based on MarshalN’s observations, I wondered if I would start to taste a difference round about the fifth infusion and thereafter. The infusions had been: 10s, 7s, 12s, 15s and 20s up to that point. From that fifth infusion, and the next (30s), I didn’t notice any perceptible difference. Perhaps it was slightly less earthy and more drinkable, but that could have been that I was used to the taste. I felt the tea liquor coating my mouth, in a not unpleasant way. I didn’t notice any massive qi with this tea, but I generally don’t for some reason. Perhaps I’ve never had good enough puerh!
I kept going with seventh and eighth infusions (45s and 75s) but again didn’t notice any change in the tea. It certainly kept going too! As the infusions went on, I got a slightly fishy note in the aroma, which wasn’t pleasant. I’ve read about people experiencing that before – I hadn’t up to this point.
The session with this tea was an unusual one for me. I don’t know how much of that is born of disappointment based on my own desire for this tea—after all, a 1960s sheng, for goodness sake—to be delicious. I am going to keep it until tomorrow and try longer infusions to see where that takes it.
I’m grateful to Nada for this experience – I just don’t know what to make of it! Did I actually enjoy it? Possibly not, but it gave my some interesting insights into what I like in tea and what I know I don’t. I just hope no one thinks it’s a lack of respect for my elders!
I would love to get a sample of tea like this. It’s also older than me. Earthy, creamy…I’m hanging on every word used to describe it. I’d definitely like a “creamy” Puerh Tea. I’d be willing to pay for a small amount of tea like this too of course but I’m not sure the best way to guarantee it’s truly that age.