Beijing Yan Li Xiang Tea Company

Had this lastnight after Dinosara and I got tired of drinking the sticky rice puerh (on the 25th steep, or so!), and for the special occasion that I learned the purl stitch! It is clearly not enough that I’m a convert to her tea obsession, I must now also absorb her knitting obsession!
Anyways, this is a super lovely tieguanyin. On the first steep the florals are so spicy that they seem halfway to the Magnolia Oolong in intensity- from an unscented tea! Also, a very buttery mouthfeel.
The second steep presented a much more sugary taste, so, so, so sweet!
The third steep was a bit more buttery, but with all the previous flavors.
The fourth steep had a greener character, and the sweetness switched from plain sugar to rock sugar.
The fifth steep was even greener, with less rock sugar.
Overall a really fine, delicious example of a tieguanyin!

This was my tea of choice at work today. I’ve decided that I have tons of pu’erh in my house and I’m not drinking it very often. Need to be taking some of it to work. Black is easier for me at work – need to be really careful not to let pu’erh over steep. Anyway I took this sample that Sil so generously sent to me (and I think she got it from dinosara ? – another traveling tea?).
This is a decent shu pu’erh. It’s nice and smooth, rich with out being over powering. A little subterranean with out being too earth. I don’t think it has the complexities of some of my favorites, bit I quite liked it.
Thanks Sil for sending some of this my way.

Sipdown, 117. I received this tea as a free sample when I bought a bunch of Tieguanyin from a tea seller in Beijing. I love the Tieguanyin, but I’ve been putting off trying this, which is a puerh, because, well, puerh. Not my favorite type of tea. I think this is officially the last puerh in my stash, and now it has been drunk!

What can I say. It’s a nice, smooth shu puerh. No fishiness, and really not even that “dirty.” It’s mostly wood and a tiny bit of hay. Seems like a good puerh, if you’re into that kind of thing. :D

mmmm thanks dinosara! this is a nice puer. I’m enjoying the strength of it! there’s no fishiness or even mushroomy taste. I’ve been drinking this in the afternoon while i work on things. tasty!

Same as last year, this tea (#101) is still out of order on my cupboard, even though it too was purchased in Beijing in March of 2012. I guess I added it much later for some reason. I wish we could put “date purchased” on teas in the cupboard so that things like this wouldn’t be a problem, but then again there is a lot I wish about the cupboard page.

Anyway, I have several small vacuum sealed pouches of this tea, so one could say it is aging very well. It still tastes very fresh; sweet and floral and buttery and delicious. This was a tough purchase because the vendor spoke absolutely not a lick of English, but it was worth it. Yum.

This one is out of place in my cupboard (a page later than it should be), but it was obtained at the same time as the previous two teas, so I’m having it now.

This particular cup is made from half a pouch (the tea was doled into vacuum sealed ~5g pouches at purchase) that has been open for a while, so it may be a little lackluster. It does seem a bit off for some reason… steep time or temp? There are more vegetal notes, and they are swamping some of the floral fruitiness. Still, a delicious cup of TGY.

Just kidding, I wasn’t done with Gande Tieguanyins yet. I forgot I had this one, which I brought back with me from Beijing. This is a somewhat older tea, but it’s been in vacuum sealed pouches all this time, so I think it should be fine.

Immediately this tea smells greener and leafier. This one has definite spinach notes in amongst the florals, which present but somehow more plant-like and less frilly. The texture is nice and smooth, but it doesn’t have as much of the straight up butter notes. It’s also one of the few I have that actually has slight fruity/apricot notes, and a real tang to it. It has a hint of sweetness, but it’s moderated by the tanginess and the vegetal notes. I love how these TGYs are all different in subtle ways, but I love them all.

This is the tieguanyin that I brought back from Beijing. Again, I had a tasting of this one, and this is actually the middle-grade TGY that I tasted. I actually liked it better than the top grade! This is also the inaugural tea for my new Ru kiln tea set. No tea tray yet, so I’m not doing the whole ceremony of washing everything, etc, but I will get to chinatown to pick one up eventually. The woman at the shop packaged this tea into little “normal” sized gaiwan gong fu packets for me, so I wanted to brew this one gong fu style.

The leaves on this tea are tight little bright green balls, and even the quick rinse I did immediately released some amazing aromas, very floral and buttery. After a 10 second first steep a peak inside my tiny pot shows me that the leaves are already very well expanded. This is such a floral TGY, like fresh lilacs or maybe gardenias. It’s got a lovely, rich, thick buttery/creaminess to it, and oh my god so sweet! It is amazing.

Second steep, about 20 seconds, is a little more vegetal but also a little more buttery, I think. Still sweet and delicious. I’m not going to write about all the steeps because they are pretty consistant, it seems, and it’s mainly just growing in vegetal flavors. It’s a really, really nice oolong and I am so pleased with it. I bought more of this than I did the Tan Yang (it packs better!), so I am not quite so angry with the fact that I like it as much as I do.