Yishan Hairpoint Imperial (Upton Tea Imports)

The Upton description for this tea is a bit heavy on the superlatives, so I just had to give it a try.  Besides, how can you pass up the opportunity to try an "Imperial" tea that costs just $9.80 for 80 grams?  Anyway, I opened my tea sample at my decidedly downscale "Imperial Court" and this is what I found.

The medium-to-long twisted dry leaf is a fairly uniform medium-dark color.  Once wet, it appears to be made of primarily medium-sized whole leaf, with a few smaller whole leaves and several pieces of larger leaf.  The leaf is joined by a fairly small percentage of buds, at least in my sample.   The quite aromatic liquor has a pleasant, clean, and slightly vegetal aroma with a mineral note and a medium yellow-green color.  In the mouth the tea is balanced and smooth with a pleasant vegetal taste that finishes on a sweet floral note.  The aftertaste is moderate in intensity and a little better than average in length, but it seemed just a bit flat to me.  With sufficient leaf, this Mao Jian makes a nice second steeping, and a third that's still decent. 

This is a good Mao Jian that is arguably a notch better that Upton's Gu Zhang tea and it is certainly one I could enjoy on a regular basis.  Unfortunately, Upton's glowing description raised my expectations too high and left me expecting slightly more.