Thursday, March 18, 2021

2003 Wistaria Qing Teng vs 2004 NanQiao Bulang King


 This cake goes for approx. $240.00 for 357g cake or $0.67/g.  It has been heavily reviewed and is usually favorable...

The dry leaves has a sweet dry bubble gum candy with a slight dry woody odour and faint pond/fishiness.

The first infusion has a mild watery pond/marshland/fishiness with ghostly faint quick to disappear white sugar and a building and expanding saltiness.  The mouthfeel is flat chalky in the mouth.  Weird faint salty surgary tastes play out in the aftertaste.

The second infusion has a clear sugar sweet onset with fishy pondy taste and subtle faint incense with dry wood.  The taste is really clear but light.  The candy like aftertaste takes a while to expand in the throat it turns into something kind of fruity/vegetal.  It comes and goes over a backdrop of pond tastes, not really bitter dry wood and saltiness.  The tastes are really clear and pure and almost singular in their presentation.  The Qi is really gentle in the body and has a faint body relaxing bodyfeeling.  The Qi is gently reassuring in the mind slowly bringing me out of my morning fatigue.

The third infusion has a sweet woody incense pond onset with an expanding white granulated sugary taste that is really long and turns into an almost fruity/floral taste and then in the aftertaste into more of a candy sweetness.  The sweetness isn’t dense or complex but evolves in the seconds and minutes after swallowing.  The initial mild bitterness and almost flat slight gripping tongue feeling opens the throat deeply to create space.  The result is an almost gripping mildly bitter mouthfeeling but long clear simple but evolving sweetness.  The Qi is really a slow slumbering and gentle feeling like a slow clear sunrise.  The bodyfeeling is very mild.



The fourth infusion has a woody incense onset with faint sugar which expands in the flat mild gripping tongue coating.  There is some movement to fruity and candy but it is faint.  The throatfeeling is deep but faint and empty feeling.  Faint, light qi sensation.

The 5th has an incense woody faint bitter which pushes out a more clear sugar sweet taste which expands in the throat to something fruity and then evolves into the aftertaste with a candy like finish.  The taste is really fine, clear, uncomplicated.  It is all about following the thin but obvious sweetness, move in the mouth, change, and evolve in the aftertaste.  Even minutes later there is candy.  There is a salty base taste to this puerh.  Calming and soothing soft Qi in the mind with a subtle relaxing bodyfeeling.

The 6th infusion has a woody salty incense taste with a fine thin surgery sweetness that turns to a building and more distinct longer candy floral taste in the breath.  The mouthfeeling is thin and slightly gripping chalk.  Peaceful Qi.

The 7th has a more distinct longer chalky talc bubble gum finish that presents long from start to finish.  Its really very satisfying.  There are very faint suggestions of fine dry woods and incense but these are so faint as the long show of sweetness dominates here over a chalky slightly gripping tongue coating and a deeper simulating throat feeling.

The 8th has a woody almost faint coco bitterness with almost a plum taste underneath which turns to floral candy in the aftertaste.  This infusion is a bit bitterer and much less sweet with an aftertaste which is less long.

9th is pond/fish woody with not much sweetness nor bitterness.  10th is a bit bitter woody.  11th is bitter salty pond/marshland wood… it’s a bitter profile here now.

I mug steep out the rest…



Not sure how this compares to older puerh productions as it just doesn’t seem to have too much of that feel to me… it has the strong robust Qi sensation for sure but in the dry storage and clear compartmentalized tastes it really had to compare to older styles of puerh… but it’s pretty damn good Mengsong!

Compare to 2004 NanQiao Bulang King it really tastes similar especially in the later infusions.  Very similar location (Bulang & Mengsong), storage (Dry Taiwanese and similar tasting storage taste), and age 2004/03.  Bulang King is more powerful for sure. The Qingteng is much sweeter and clear flavours.  The stronger sweet taste adds a certain complexity that the 2004 Bulang King will never actualize because of its near lack of sweet taste although in some ways the Bulang King is denser, nuanced and layered in taste.  Overall, the Qingteng is the more complex choice but the King is still the King of Qi!

James’ (TeaDB) Tasting Notes (here and here)

Paul’s (white2tea) Tasting Notes

Marco’s (Late Steeps) Tasting Notes

Jakob’s (T) Tasting Notes

Peace

 

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