2004 Mengku Wu Chi Dao Wild Large Leaf

Hi Ozzy,

What I need to ask at this point is if you have tried any other green puerhs? Green puerh is quite a different animal if Black puerh is what you are accustomed to. Almost any young green will be bitter and astringent, especially if it was not properly brewed.

How did you brew it? Try water around 195f and short, very short infusions. Green puerh does not really become smooth until it has

20-30 years under it's belt.

I have tried this tea and it wasn't bad. While they are not my favorite, Mengku teas are not substandard by any means as far as I know.

-- Mike Petro

OzzyXns976AEEDAA8352TheLoneAndLevelSands@216.196.97.1422/14/06

23: snipped-for-privacy@ng.please

Ozzy, the cake looks beautiful in the pictures, and I am not afraid of all that heavy stem, having come to know that stem can at times add a delicacy otherwise absent. Could you perhaps be a bit more specific about this tea's taste profile, and describe what it was about the cake that disappointed you? That would help, as based on the pictures, I'd buy one myself. Was it for example fruit-like, flower-like, smokey, cigar-tasting, harsh/smooth, leather-like, musty? Whatever.

A 2004 could well be most excellent, and many I'm drinking now are. Mengku is, I believe, new, but well enough respected, having roots in Meng Hai -- am I wrong here, Mike? -- and further, "affordable" is what any young cake should be, even those of good breeding.

Michael

[Ozzy] [Mike] [Michael] Good points on brewing.

Mike, a note on your last sentence here. I beg to differ, but it might be a simple matter of semantics. A green Pu'erh can be perfectly smooth from its outset, but that smoothness will more than likely lack the subtle camphor/mint/leather/plum notes -- never all together, I know -- of an old Pu'erh. The young Pu'erh of good family will present among other things flower/fruit/smoke/must/astringency/bitterness, sometimes in such balance as to make it delightful. I'm a big fan of bitter, by the way; as long as it lives happily with sweetness and other qualities I crave. See what I mean?

As I mentioned to Ozzy, the pictures certainly make it look enticing.

Michael Drinking a 1970's 7542. Mint mint yum yum and lives long and prospers.

snippage much

Let me self-correct here: Wu Chi Dao is the factory, as everyone probably knew but me, residing as it were in Mengku township. Good old Babelcarp:

Michael

I'm sorta weirded out right now. I've found all the tea merchants here and elsewhere to be such liars and fakers, that I am willing to believe that there is such a small amount of tea that's even older than 10 years old left, that it barely ever goes on market. You have no idea how many times I've been told "this tea is x" years old even by merchants that I've dealt with. So far, I've only found one guy that doesn't lie to much, and most of his tea kinda sucks.

I've stored 2 boxes of Menghai Fang Cha for 2 years and it's decently smooth now. What the hell, right? I don't consider myself to have more knowledge than anybody else when it comes to Pu'er, but this has really got me thinking how much can we really trust.

Sorry, ya'll, I forgot about the quoting thing.

I sed in relation to the above quote:

I'm sorta weirded out right now. I've found all the tea merchants here

and elsewhere to be such liars and fakers, that I am willing to believe

that there is such a small amount of tea that's even older than 10 years old left, that it barely ever goes on market. You have no idea how many times I've been told "this tea is x" years old even by merchants that I've dealt with. So far, I've only found one guy that doesn't lie to much, and most of his tea kinda sucks.

I've stored 2 boxes of Menghai Fang Cha for 2 years and it's decently smooth now. What the hell, right? I don't consider myself to have more knowledge than anybody else when it comes to Pu'er, but this has really got me thinking how much can we really trust.

Reply Rate this post: Text for clearing space

Thanks for the plug. I might as well take this opportunity to say the evidence for Wu Chi Dao being a factory rather than a brand is just the fact that Yunnan Sourcing, normally reliable, says so.

The evidence against it being a factory is that Googling for "Wu Chi Dao Tea Factory" in Chinese yields no results. Googling for Wu Chi Dao by itself in Chinese is kind of useless because the historic meaning of the phrase is so prolific on the Web.

Puzzlingly, the picture of the cake on the eBay page doesn't have the characters for Tea Factory. Maybe someone with more knowledge of the subject, or just more Chinese, than I can help here.

/Lew

was another discussion in RFDT of this cake by someone who liked it. I second the request for your brewing times & temps and what you thought of the flavors. :)

snipped-for-privacy@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com2/15/06

09: snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com

Mydnight, having a bad day, eh? Mike, whom you've quoted above, is *not* a merchant and represents no market. I'm sure his use of the word "smooth" has a specific meaning, and upon closer examination, we'll get clarification.

As for your proclamation about the availability of true Pu'erh over 10 years old, let me say this: If you're right, I'm going to shoot myself.

Michael

Michael

Linky No Worky.

I was just cruising the net a week or so ago in search of some lower priced Pu'er since it has been some time since I tried and gave up on Pu'er and came across this same seller and almost bought. Would this be a good starting point in Pu'er? I also would like to possibly have my father get into Pu'er because his cholesterol and blood pressure etc. could use some help.

- Dominic Drinking: Shirakiku Brand Sencha.

darn it. search for "wu chi dao" using the

page and it comes up.

I haven't tried that particular puerh, but I have noticed that larger leaf green puerh tends to be more mild and drinkable young than some smaller leaf varieties. Even then, it varies. I found that the Green Label organic cake from Six Famous Tea Mountain was good young, buttery like having green tea and a croissant. I reviewed it on LJ here:

, also milder and easy to drink was the "Yi Wu Zhengshan" cake (CNNP?) .

There are a couple of cakes I thought were difficult and bitter when young, and if you or your father like the bitter flavors they would be a good choice. Of course, shorter steeps and lower temps usually lead to less bitter tea...so possibly any cake might be a good place to start. Tuo cha is where most people start, and it seems to be the most affordable. Anyway,

has some of my and others' reviews if you care to look at them.

What I don't know is if the studies that support puerh's medicinal uses for cholesterol/blood pressure focused on the effects of young green puerh, cooked puerh, or aged puerh. I think pu-erh.net has a "medicinal claims" page, but I haven't perused that particular batch of links yet.

Mike also lists some recommendations on pu-erh.net , too, and I always think getting a few samples from Jing, Hou De, or wherever you can find them is a good way to play the field and see what you would like more of. In fact, I just received about 10 samples from Jing today and about

6 samples from Hou De last week. So far, Hou De's samples show they lean towards more ageable (i.e. strong flavored and/or bitter) cakes, but I really liked their "2004 6FTM Limited Yi Wu Zheng Shan Wild Arbor" cake, which was so floral it was like having jasmine tea! I think you can find it much cheaper on ebay from yunnansourcing, but shipping is from china and can take a while, but Hou De ships from Texas so if you're in the US you'll get it quick.

Anyway this is dragging so I'll stop.

~JFinLA

I've been wondering about this same thing. The Chinese tea industry in this area was never organized and controlled like the French wine industry. Then a lot of the factories seem to have started recently. I'm reluctant to try something expensive without a lot of confirmation that I'm actually getting what I thought I was based on the merchant's ads.

Maria

[Maria on upstart Pu'erh factories]

Hi Maria,

Here's my tourist advice: Climb the *second* highest mountain, visit the

*second* most famous city, hang out awhile. That's it. Why? Because, from the secnd highest peak, you have a spectacular view of the highest, and all the other tourists are crowded together in their tour groups well away from you. Likewise, the city advice. Likewise tea, perhaps.

Michael

Fully agreed, and fully correct. I have ried some very expensive wines and teas and more often than not walk away not seeing the allure, value, or hype. Generally it is because of all the build-up it can only be a letdown.

Just like when I'm in a new city my mother always taught me to ask an older local what their favorite restaurant is, and it has always been exceptional, out of the way, low priced, and high quality. Cost and popularity are never a true factor of greatness.

You are correct Michael, I did not express myself very well there. The analogy I had in mind was "when does the smoothness of a typical Green puerh approach the smoothness of a Typical Black puerh?" Green/sheng/raw is such a different animal that it is difficult to convey the differences to someone who has only know Black/shu/cooked. It sounded to me like the original poster may have only tried black puerh in the past and I was looking for an analogy that would make sense to a newbie, I obviously failed.

Mike

Mike snipped-for-privacy@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com2/16/06

12: snipped-for-privacy@mikepetro.org

Not necessarily failed. I wasn't thinking at all of shu when I made my statement. That's another thing. It really is semantics because there are so many styles of smooth out there. What I like about a really good shu is its creamy loam. That's smooth.

Michael

Get them guns ready because it's really difficult to find such tea. I'm in China and right in the thick of things...I got friends all over in the tea industry here, and most of them say to find real 10 year old tea is not an easy thing to do. There are so many copies and copies of copies that even most merchants aren't sure about what they have.

I know Mike isn't a merchant...where did it sound like I said he was?

snipped-for-privacy@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com2/19/06

09: snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com

I'm wondering what we can glean from the taste. Isn't it possible, in your opinion, to taste the age, at least in broad strokes? Or are you saying that, while we can find old Pu'erh, we can't rely on the information we're given in terms of who made it, or where it originally came from?

I'm sorry if I misunderstood. Something in the original post, I suppose. Anyway, the reference is forever lost, so I acknowledge an error.

Michael

>

Mydnight, that is a surprise, don't you trust your tastbuds? Or have you been jaded by the unscrupulous vendors on your travels? A vendor can tell you that his tea is 10 years or older but from the look of the tea you can judge roughly its age, or brew it to tell if it worth that old. Try Hongkong or Macau next time when you get the chance to go there from China on one of your weekends. You will learn a lot more there.

Danny