
2020 Farmerleaf Gulan
5g/85ml Geneva tap water
The dry leaf is a bit darker than I would expect. Small leaf blend. Aroma has some fresh sheng sweetness, with a floral background which I could see as orchid. Wet leaf is dark grassy/hay/farmyard.
- Green-yellow liquor. Quite thick, very green profile but not bracing or sharp, quite thick and mellow. Strong digestive effect immediately.
- More yellow coming in and less green. Good resin-sweet empty cup aroma. Quite thick, with plenty of bitterness and greenness. Like an ultra concentrated green tea. mild astringency showing in the finish.
- Strong effects. Alerting yes but also a bit stoning. Not a sharp grassiness but very green. Not so umami either but intense green taste. Very faint sweetness coming in very late aftertaste.
- Stoning effects continue, very thick concentrated green profile. Empty cup aroma doesn’t persist.
- Growing astringency, more aggressive in the later steeps,
The material looks to be of higher quality, and the impact of the tea is quite strong, not only alerting but also ultra-focusing and towards stoning. The taste profile is not too aggressively bitter or rough, but a concentrated and thick green. It’s not particularly umami and the sweetness is quite fleeting, with only a small amount at the beginning of the session and faint hints of sweetness in the long aftertaste. The resinous empty cup aroma is very short lived. My main issue is that this has a profile which is very much skewed green and it seems to be missing an essential part of what sheng puerh should have, this kind of resinous sweet-wood aspect. Maybe it’s just too young to show it, but I had a difficult time seeing it with this tea in this session. 5.0