Out of Bitterleaf Tea’s new non-puer teas, their new Plum Beauty Black Mengsong Dianhong tea caught my eye right away. This black tea is the same material as their silver grade Plum Beauty sheng. In addition, Bitterleaf Tea’s Mengsong Plum Beauty black tea goes through a roast session. An extra roasting adds some additional oxidation and aging potential.
Leaf and Steeping Method
These leaves are huge and spacious! You will need a gaiwan or a wide mouth teapot. The scent is strongly fruity.
I saw a warning to do an 80-85F water temperature. I first debating hitting 200F/92C, but then said to hell with it, moved to a smaller gaiwan and set to boil. The steeped leaf smells like muscat candies.
Tasting of 2019 Plum Beauty Black Mengsong Dianhong Tea from Bitterleaf Teas
First and Second Infusion: Plum Beauty black is light and fruity, tasting like green muscat grapes, honey, wood. Amazingly, this tea is light flavor but has a crazy high aroma as I taste a lot of it as it rises through the sinuses.
Third, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Infusion: These infusions opened up beautifully. The Mengsong Plum Beauty Dianhong texture is silky. It is fruity grapes and plum, a bit of wood and honey with a honey aftertaste. The third infusion was the best as it had a perfect balance. After that, each steeping danced dangerously getting astringent and bitter, but just my teeth feel a little dry.
Eighth Infusion: 2019 Plum Beauty Black has gone very dry to dry up the throat. It is good to the last drop with the flavor being fruity and stone fruit floral. Thankfully, this tea never got bitter.
Bowl Style: Seeing this Dianhong was said to be a bit temperamental, I went in bowl style to crack it with the lower temperature water.
2019 Mengsong Plum Beauty Dianhong Black has an even softer vibe at first, creamy, mineral, and fruity. As it steeps it gets more and more honey and a little woody. It does astringent up quickly, but the tea is adding a long fruity aftertaste. The bowl style came out quite sweet as the honey and fruits deepened, but was an overall lighter profile, lacking a touch of dark woodsiness it had in hotter temperature.
Comments
I am drinking Bitterleaf Tea’s Mengsong Plum Beauty black, a tea with some wiggle room to settle, very young, but this tea has potential. There is roasting in there, but I don’t taste it, which is usually a good sign it was done well. Either way, the strength of this black tea is its fruity, high aroma profile. If you love oolongs and fragrant teas, this is a perfect tea.
This Dianhong is slightly delicate but more so in astringency factor. I figure this black tea will be really awesome in a year, though I am basing that off experience with pressed black teas.
