I recently acquired two new cakes of tea, with many thanks to the generous help of Tony of Origin Tea. They are the two new productions that Zhou Yu supervised, and I believe these are the first new teas he’s made since about 2007. They are the best new teas I’ve had in recent years.
The first of the two teas is called Zhenren yufeng. This one’s hard to translate properly, but roughly, it means “Regal style of the enlightened man”.
I bet you the name wasn’t conjured up by Zhou Yu himself – it’s very pretentious, and is mostly a marketing ploy, I think. The run is only about 1400 cakes, so at 380g each, it’s 532kg, so they collected maybe something like 800kg of raw maocha to get this much stuff. It’s not a big run. I don’t know where the tea is from, but it’s somewhere in Banna. It says it’s from nationally owned forests in Yiwu, but that’s actually quite a big area.
Then, the second one, is called Yuema wangong. Of course, this is a play on words – the literal meaning of this name is “Jumping horse, bent bow”, with a man suitably doing exactly that in the picture. The real point is that this is Wangong tea, also a small village in the greater Yiwu area that’s been getting a lot of attention these days. This name is something that the actual maker of the tea (Zhou Yu took a supervisory role), an outfit called Baohongyinji, has been using this name for their Wangong tea for at least the last two years, I think.
Taste wise, the second is more immediately appealing – nice aroma, etc, but the first is the better tea. The first tea has relatively mild taste, but it has strong body and good qi. It will age well. Not that the Wangong will age badly, but given a choice, I’d pick the first one.
Too bad the cost of the tea, at over $200 a piece, is rather high. The first second cake is slightly more expensive, but neither are easily within reach. That said, there are way more expensive teas out there that are terrible, like this 5000 RMB monstrosity that is basically green tea puerh. Thank god I didn’t pay for it. There are few people out there who have more experience with puerh than Zhou Yu, and these two cakes show (not that he needs to prove anything) that he knows what he’s doing.
6 responses so far ↓
origintea // July 26, 2013 at 12:10 pm |
>I bet you the name wasn’t conjured up by Zhou Yu himself
Yip, the name was 100% BHYJ’s doing.
coraxrax // July 26, 2013 at 12:49 pm |
he is also a lovely person. i am glad to be reminded of him. thanks for that, and for these great photos and very interesting text.
nicolastang // July 31, 2013 at 3:08 am |
I agree with your observations. These cakes have the most powerful qi. Too bad they are expensive otherwise I would seriously consider getting a jian of each. I can imagine they will taste very good in the future.
psychanaut // August 1, 2013 at 3:43 pm |
Humm..I met him and hung out with his daughter on a few occasions.
Ironically enough, she told me that neither she nor her brother had much interest in tea or inheriting “the empire.”
She suggested that maybe I could do so instead.. :[]
Here, there, and everywhere, at the same time | A Tea Addict's Journal // September 3, 2013 at 2:52 am |
[…] it tasted like some Bulang area tea and nothing like a tea from Xishuangbanna, and compared with Zhou Yu’s Wangong, which I also had recently and also from 2013 – it’s not even close. Yet, the tea from […]
Adrian Loder // February 1, 2021 at 1:53 pm |
Great info to have, even if it is several years old. I found this post after searching based on an older, 2007 post re: the 2003 Zi Pin sold by Wisteria. Looking at their online store (which even has an English version) neither of the two cakes in this post seem to still be available, but the 2003 Zi Pin is. At < $100 US for 100g or < $300 for a full cake, it is certainly not cheap but at the same time is not crazy expensive, considering what else sometimes sells for more.
They seem to offer a lot of interesting things – some of them with English descriptions that make me wonder (one mentions 1000-year-old trees…really? Did they saw one down and count the rings?) but the few posts you have had on them suggest their tea is quite good and right now the conversion rate is on my side so may have to give some a spin, or at least samples.
I really appreciate the info on non-Western vendors that I come across in reading your blog. It is genuinely helpful (even when it is to steer people away from, rather than towards a vendor).