Ok, so here are some pictures now that I’m sort of done with the tea, although I’m still brewing yet another infusion in my pot.
These are broken pieces of Guangyungong cakes that I bought in Hong Kong. I find them rather good and tasty, and as is obvious, long lasting.
You can see that it hasn’t been stored very well. There is obvious evidence of wetness.
I’ve got more of them… all in pieces
The tea is very sweet and smooth and mellow. The owner of the store said that it’s just broken cakes, because in storage you inevitably end up with cakes that don’t survive. Since part of the process of storage is that you have to move the goods every few months to prevent mould from developing, the movement, etc will always cause some breakage. That’s the stuff you sell in jars.
This is the first infusion:
A few infusions later:
A day and half later:
At this point I ought to be boiling the leaves in water, but I have no such implements, so keep rebrewing will have to do.
The tea is woody up front, with a good sweet taste throughout, and a bit of a cooling effect down the throat. The woody/musty taste dies after 5-6 infusions, leaving only sweet tea taste, but that lingers on and on forever. It’s really quite nice to drink 🙂
The wet leaves are rather dark, and I will take a better shot of them spread out once I feel like having finished with them. For now…
This is taken with natural sunlight.
7 responses so far ↓
kibi_kibi // March 13, 2007 at 8:15 pm |
Ah sounds like a nice tea to drink
Thanks for posting the entertaining pictures, of course there is never any substitute for natural sunlight to make good tea pictures 🙂
-vl.
skippp111 // March 14, 2007 at 3:20 am |
Are the leaves quite firm and stiff after brewing? From the picture of the wet leaves they seem to look a lot like the sample of GYG 80’s I tried.
http://community.livejournal.com/puerh_tea/114781.html This tea started a bit “muddy” but it kept going and going for a long time. And its not really expensive.
MarshalN // March 14, 2007 at 10:47 am |
Yes, the leaves are firm. It might have mostly to do with the fact that they are using Guangdong leaves for the cake. As far as I know, mine is a mix of various ages of cakes… since they have Guangdong cakes of various ages all broken up and mixed into one. Buying an actual cake that is intact is much more expensive than buying these bits.
Where did you get yours?
Mine’s never muddy though — always clear to the bottom, even if the colour is very dark. It does indeed keep going for a long time…. per infusion it’s a real bargain.
skippp111 // March 14, 2007 at 2:48 pm |
Got it from Sunsing together with some ’76 loose cooked (liked that one a lot) and some ’78 “simplified character” cake (yummy).
They quoted 1500 HKD for the 80’s GYG cake. How much did you pay for the pieces?
With “muddy” I meant the taste, might be what you referred to as “musty”, the liquor is clear from the 1st infusion. I really like that picture of the leaves in the sun 🙂
davelcorp // March 14, 2007 at 3:04 pm |
Are you doing thermos infusions with the left-overs? You can let them sit with boiling water for 6hrs or so and get the last bits of ‘juice’ out of it.
MarshalN // March 14, 2007 at 4:21 pm |
No, unfortunately, I don’t have a thermos. What I ought to do is to get a glass teapot with one of those candlelit heaters…. and cook the leaves. It gets a lot of juice out of the tea that way and can go for a few more. Oh well.
The price I paid for this tea is far less than the 1500 HKD per cake you got quoted, skippp111 🙂
skippp111 // March 14, 2007 at 4:43 pm |
Well I figured the 1500 HKD wasnt bad for a nice 80’s cake, lol. I probably dont want to know what you paid 😉