2021 Farmerleaf Lao Wu Gushu

// Published January 24, 2022 by mgualt

5g/85ml porcelain pot, Geneva tap water

Two great things about drinking tea in Switzerland: 230V outlets and high quality tap water. I am drinking through some Farmerleaf samples and so I’ll delay my 2022 New Year post a bit longer. What William is doing in Jingmai is very interesting and innovative, and I think his teas (both the self-produced and the sourced) give a good opportunity for learning about young tea from that region.

  1. Green arrival, somewhat creamy and soft, and with a sweet aftertaste. Astringent finish. Interesting empty cup aroma, actually reminds me of florals and a bit of fragrant goat cheese.
  2. Good lingering aftertaste, long-lasting and slightly oily. Soft arrival, harsh greenness is toned down after the first couple of steeps. Light floral herbal tea profile, strong chamomile flavour.
  3. Significant uplift and vision clarity. fine chalky astringency coating the mouth, and a tiny menthol cooling on the nasal passages as steeps progress. The tea is a bit watery
  4. Concentrated 1:30 steep has more astringency and sweetness in arrival, with bitterness growing in the development. Green sheng taste is more intense now, but sweetness is present. The style of the sweetness is quite restrained, more like a drop of lemon juice. Within a couple of minutes becomes quite astringent. Does produce strong alertness but with breathing can relax.

Good looking material, beefy leaves with thick midrib. Processed more towards the green end. Savoury and astringent profile, would be popular with gyokuro lovers. Believable as a gushu, since it doesn’t have the rough taidi character — the astringency melts and is not sharp, and there is a noticeable subdued bitterness. It also has a complex after-aroma and aftertaste. The profile is also not similar to Yiwu or Bulang, it makes sense as a northern style tea. Light floral herbal tones, and that unusual goat cheese empty cup aroma is mostly present in the first few steeps. These will be difficult to rate as they are so young that I wouldn’t want to drink them regularly yet. 6.2

Comments

  1. Teasecrets
    January 28, 2022 @ 8:50 pm

    That swiss tap water…….

    Reply

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