The theme of 2022 October Old Ways Tea Club is Tea Master’s Set, an educational tasting of teas throughout its development. It seems the 2021 October Old Ways Tea club box was also an educational box.
Maocha from 2022 October Old Ways Tea Club
This Mao Cha has huge long leaves with plenty of sticks. For me to make a 8g serving, I removed almost 2g of sticks. I didn’t separate the different leaves, but you could for further experimentation. The scent of the tea is strongly fruity stone fruit.
The early infusions are sweet and mellow. Even as raw maocha, the tea has a thick creamy texture and oily feeling on the lips. Flavor wise, it’s a gentle fruity medal of bruised stone fruit, coconut, and flavors that is more in the aroma in the aftertaste.
Though after the first couple of infusions, the maocha quickly goes astringent, drying my throat. Flavor wise, it’s tangy, under ripe nectarines. The last infusions are immediately bitter stew but with a potent nectarine flavor in the aftertaste.
Zou Shui Roast
The scent is a juicy and roasted.
Zou Shui Roast has green juicy peach, buttery, bitter peach skins, and wisps of nutty roast flavor. It is a bit watery, but the aroma is high in sweet stone fruit. The aroma is strong and sticks to the mouth.
This tea does go astringent fast, feeling dry on the tongue and throat, but increasing the lingering flavor. Though, with this tea being fairly green and light in roast, it is also getting bitter and stewy.
Charcoal Roast Shui Xian from 2022 October Old Ways Tea Club
This tea is very nutty butter scented.
Charcoal Roast Shui Xian is harsh, I would want this tea a year later or so for the roast to settle down for my tastes. The flavor is buttery, sharply toasted walnuts, and driftwood. There is some peachy stone fruit aroma still present. The flavor is strong and leans to bitterness.
The fire in this roast is just too fresh for me as it’s harsh, bitter, and intense, but this tea has an amazing buttery peach aroma.
In all, the 2022 October Old Ways Tea club was a fun experimental tea club month to taste every stage of a tea roast. There is also plenty of maocha that you can pick from the different leaves or roast yourself.
