It is time for the 2022 April Old Ways Tea Club!
In this box, Tian Geng “Comfortable” Zhengyan Rou Gui, Winter Tea (2021 Da Hong Pao), and White tea cakes! Let’s dive in.
Tian Geng “Comfortable” Zhengyan Rou Gui
A friendly Rou Gui – this sounds up my alley these days as I drink a lot of my teas on the go or I get distracted with knitting. The leaves smell of fruity rambotan and roast.
I used a gongfu ratio of 1grams of leaves per 15ml of vessel size, steeped at a boil. The rinse opens up a fruity roasted scent – I also burnt my nose hairs.
First, Second, Third, and Fourth Infusion: Zhengyan Rou Gui is sweet and fruity with a depth of roasted wood over the rambutans and lychees. Some sips are caramel raisins, others open up to be plum over lychee. This rou gui is aromatic and full of flavor with a buttery texture that leaves a caramel sugar aftertaste.
Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth Infusion: Zhengyan Rou Gui shifted into a salted stick of butter in flavor with the plums and rambutans as an aftertaste. At this point, it got a little bitter stewy, but it took quite a beating to get here as I steeped it for more than 15 minutes.
Lazy style: Comfortable Zhengyan Rou Gui starts off quite buttery in flavor, leaning more buttered caramel than fruit. As it steeps, it goes roasty wood and caramel, with an aromatic lychee plum. Delicious!
Starting off this Old Ways Tea club strong! Zhengyan Rou Gui is super easy to steep and flexible Rou Gui. This tea takes a lot to get bitter, but it never gets dry, and resteeps well. The flavors are pleasant and comforting with buttery, roasted, and fruity notes. I’d love to take this tea when traveling or office or thermos as it is little fuss.
Winter Tea – 2021 Da Hong Pao
I recall the previous Winter Tea is a fan favorite for superb daily drinking. The leaves here have a sweet roasted plum scent. After a steep, the leaves open up more powdery sweet plums.
First, Second, and Third Infusion: Winter Da Hong Pao is soft and tastes like buttered rocks and juicy meaty plums, with some waves of nutty pecans. The texture is silky and the heavy aftertaste is lingering plum skins.
Fourth and Fifth Infusion: As Winter Da Hong Pao steeps up, it gets honey wheat before going wet stones minerals, with the main flavor fading away.
This is a solid Winter Da Hong Pao with pleasing flavors and a long aftertaste. It doesn’t steep that long, but that seems normal with this type of tea. A good daily drinker tea I’ll probably leave by my office kettle.
White Tea Cake
Sadly, you only get 2 cakes that are 5grams each. The scent is faintly woody. Well, mine actually weighs 5.9g, so score. I’m going to crack the cake in half so I can keep my preferred white tea ratio of 1gram per 20ml.
Breaking up the cake likely will make this tea steep out faster too. After a rinse, the tea smells of old cherry wood.
First, Second, Third, and Fourth Infusion: I can taste the age on this tea – sweet oak and powdered honey. This tea steeps up a dark peach too.
Third, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth Infusion: As this White Tea Cake opens up, it tastes of bruised stone fruits, woodsy, old carpet, and squishy dried dates. Each steeping tastes more aged, carpet, and darker dates.
Ninth Infusion: I let this steep for 30 mins while I went to eat a snack. This cup looks like black tea! The long infusion is a bit astringent, but is deep, woodsy, and back to juicy dates.
Old Ways Tea club’s highlight is likely this white tea cake as it’s a lovely aged white tea with fruity flavors.
Everything this month is pretty chill, easy to steep but high quality teas. As much as the White Tea Cake is excellent, I really enjoyed the Comfortable Zhengyan Rou Gui.
