This is a tea that's reasonably priced and generally gets good reviews, so I decided to give it a try. At $4.40 for 125 grams, it's the cheapest of the batch of teas I'll be covering over the next few days, and not one I was expecting much from.
Well, this is actually a surprisingly good tea. The dry leaf is dark and wiry, with a dark sweet aroma with cocoa and smoky notes. The liquor is a fairly dark red-brown, and is a bit darker than I typically associate with Fujian congou. The aroma of the liquor is fairly full, with a bunch of things going on. There is a dark berry aroma there that reminds me of a combination of fresh and smoked cherry-flavored pipe tobacco, a dose of cocoa powder, some funky barnyard stuff, and a balancing, but noticeable smokiness that seems more a result of a long, full baking than any smoking over pine. In the mouth the tea seems fairly robust, with medium-to-full body, and flavors that I'd expect based on the aroma: dark berry, cocoa, barnyard, and smoke. I'd expect a tea at this price to be a noticeably flat and dull, but they've done a pretty good job here, with just a hint of the flatness. The aftertaste is fairly decent, with a dark berry note, some smoke, and cocoa.
This tea is a good example of how crafty processing can do a lot with decent leaf. This is not a terribly pure tea, and probably won't appeal to those who value handmade delicate teas, but if a stout tea with a bunch of funky complexity sounds appealing to you, try this one.
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