I am in love with Essence of Tea’s 2017 Secret Forest Wild White tea that I had to buy it again when 2018 batch came. Sadly, 2018 Secret Forest Wild White Tea is in loose leaf only so I ended up with 2 monster bags of fluffy white tea totaling 200 grams.
Leaf and Steeping Method
The dry leaf is spaciously nutty with a strong scent of fruity floral candy.
I jammed 1 gram of tea leaf per 20ml of vessel size. In this small gaiwan I used 3 grams of leaf. I’ve drunk this tea a number of times and I found it is better to use a wide gaiwan as it fits the leaf better.
Look at the size of this one!
Pouring the hot water in and the scent is powerful. I used boiling water as I know this tea can take it. The hot leaf smells like a juicy masticated floral explosion.
Tasting of Essence of Tea’s 2018 Secret Forest White Tea
First and Second Infusion: I would call the first infusion a rinse, but I still drank it. The leaves barely got wet, but I tried to bend the leaves once they got more supple, but still had some crunch to it like jamming long pasta into boiling water.
Secret Forest Wild White tea has so many things going on. It is juicy, succulently sweet, and clean. This tea has an aloe taste, but also tulip, cream, and stalky vegetal. The sip settles to a mineral and sweet licorice cream. I’ll just keep vomiting random tea notes as this just keeps piling on. The finish is cooling and refreshing with an aftertaste of sweet bamboo. I can breathe in that crisp mountain air of mint after each sip.
The body is thick and dense, I can feel a solar plexus punch of trying to slam Pepto Bismal thick tea at each tea gulp. The energy is hella popping, I am back to being a kid grazing on juicy daisy stems like a chewing cow.
Third and Fourth Infusion: This bracket is sweet, juicy, salivating. OMG pour this tea down my gullet I am ready.
I was thinking how this is a KILLER white tea, but I also had another killer white tea, the Myanmar White gushu, which is also high energy and thick up the wazoo, but also SECRET forest wild material. Secret Forest Wild White tea is like that Myanmar White but on some drugs. This forest has seen some things – crazy parties, grizzly bear ho-downs, lightsaber battles, I don’t know. That wild Myanmar White is wise and elegant in comparison.
Fifth and Sixth Infusion: Secret Forest Wild White Tea is sweet and juicy. It developed a honey, milk, tulips, and linen note, bringing me back to being a baby sucking on washcloths in the bathtub. To be honest, I’m so full-blown tea drunk so this makes writing a review hard. This tea regresses you to the past, and soon I’ll be punching placentas.
The 6th infusion got weedy tasting. This forest certainly had some troublemaker teenagers. It also felt like I lost 30 minutes of my life to zoning out tea drunk with the number of things I did and thought up, but it was only 5 minutes that had past.
Seventh, Eighth, Ninth, and Tenth Infusion: This tea got cooked as it is weedy and peppery tasting, with a side of astringency adding tickle to the tip of my tongue. My jaw is also numb too. The tea is still linen and sweet and floral.
Eleventh and Twelfth Infusion: This tea has a lot to go, but it is very dry that my cheeks feel like they want to peel off. It sips in sweet, floral, stewed green peppers and a whole lotta dry.
I am also tea drunk and control time and space. How have only 20 minutes have gone? I can hear my brain rattle in my skull. The last steeping I did around 15 minutes. It was very dry but also sweet and somewhat woodsy mellow honey. It reminded me a touch of the 2017 but with a whole lot of astringency.
Gut Rot level = High. I could go for eating mayo straight out of a container.
Comments
Don’t skip Essence of Tea’s Secret Forest Wild White Tea as it is epic quality, taste, and feel. I can see why they left it loose as it retained a more fresh taste over a dark honey that came from pressing the 2017 cake. In its youthful state, Secret Forest Wild White tea has a lot of energy.
I mean to age this tea but I can’t keep my hands off it and I keep sharing it with local tea friends. This tea is great to share as it is I want to buy more but I have so much bloody tea and this one is not cheap not including a hefty shipping price. It also seems a tea up there on “If you stockpiled this, you need an intervention.”
