Wistaria Puerh Ranked/ Overview

I am grateful to have received some of these top picks from the Wistaria Tea House which I really enjoyed sampling this winter.  In this post I will simply rank them in order of enjoyment not considering price with a brief statement about their old school cred…

1-      2003 Wistaria Zipin Tuo- highest old school cred out of these samples with a distinct old school processing and feeling mixed with a bit of factory feeling, the qi and bodyfeelings are substaitial, this one is widely thought to be the best of the bunch by many others… and I concur.

2-      2007 Wistaria Lanyin –This is very bitter and ehas a very strong Qi and bodyfeeling, overall a strong puerh in an old school sense but produced more in line with newer processing, very clean and spacious tastes, this puerh is all about the Qi that takes you places

3-      2007 Wistaria Hongyin- very muich a new factory style that we saw coming out of China at this time, this purerh is all about the very complex layered sweet taste experience with stronger Qi layered in.

4-      2003 Wistaria Qingteng- has a strong robust Qi sensation and a compartmentalized dry stored sweet and pond taste.  Not much old school feeling here other than the Qi sensation maybe.

5-      2006 Wistaria Taihe Maocha-produced in more of a way leaning to modern gushu type productions this is a really enjoyable puerh with a very interesting mouth numbing feeling.

The prices of these, like many other Taiwanese Botique puerh vendors, is strongly controlled by the vendor and the prices of these are of good value for what you get compared to other things out there these days.  I think mainly you have to be alright with the dry storage of these puerh.  All of these are pretty enjoyable for me and I think it’s completely possible that I do a purchase of many of the above cakes and put them to a speed test to find out which I really prefer… they are all so enjoyable, I really don’t know which would come out on top…

Peace

2003 Wistaria Zi Pin (Purple Lable): Old School Purple Haze!

2003 Wistaria Zi Pin is a popular pressing from Wistaria that has had many reviews from famous puerh bloggers (see below).  This 2003Wistaria Zi Pin 100g tuo goes for approx. $83.00.

Dry leaves smell of sweet candy and rose floral over a pondy marshy odour.

The first infusion has a buttery and smooth creamy almost but not really sweet onset.  It finishes watery and pond in the mouth.

The second the tuo is still opening up… with pond sweet pea vegetal tastes almost woody and watery with a creamy not very sweet taste with lingering talc cherry finish in the mouth.  Nice dry storage tastes.

The third infusion has a buttery creamy sweet woody, pea, kind of forest-not-really-incense and almost talc cherry finish.  The mouthfeeling is becoming a strong full chalky feeling with a long and deep cooling throat which pushes a smooth creamy talc almost cherry sweetness out long on the breath.  The Qi is very relaxing and strong focusing with a strong chest thumping and extending to arms Qi sensation.  There are candy like suggestions minutes later.  Nice complex dry storage tastes.  A strong body sensation in the chest and arms.

The fourth infusion has a creamy buttery almost woody subtle complex taste.  The mouthfeel is thick and full chalky powdery there is some layered woody tastes and a deep cool throat.  Big Qi in here with a strong chest and Heart thumping with strong excitation and focusing energy.  A fine candy finish on the breathe. 

5^th has a creamy buttery almost sweet that kind of expands in the mouth through a mid-section of woody, foresty, talc kind of sweet cherry and faint candy marshmallow finish.  Big Qi and a full powdery mouthfeeling.  Minutes long creamy candy finish with faint pond.  Nice complexity in here and strong Qi.  Nice dry storage.

The 6^th has a smokey incense with slight creamy buttery and soft savory tastes onset that has a bit of talc sweetness and some dry wood forest over a thin powdery aftertaste.  There is a thin deeper cooling in the throat with pond and faint candy.  Nice focusing Qi.

7^th has a sweet pond taste with a creamy buttery and woody and incense onset.  The relaxing Qi is powerful and alerting and exerts a strong bodyfeeling.  There is a long talc cherry and powdery candy like breath over a chalky/powdery mouthcoating.  The aftertaste is elegant and long and pungent sweet with a touch of incense smoke.

8^th is a thick woody almost syrupy incense with a slight buttery and creamy edge.  The buttery taste reminds me of Youle.  There is a long deep pungency in the throat that teases out woody-incense, some floral and even faint hard to grasp candy tastes.  Big focusing Qi.

9^th has a smoky incense creamy almost woody forest tobacco juicy initial taste.  The mouthfeel is oilier here with a slightly cooling foresty woody incense finish.  This infusion has lots its sweetness but still feels condensed, somewhat complex and a bit oily in the mouth.  The Qi has a relaxing sustained focused feeling.

10^th has a woody, oily tobacco, incense taste in a faint deep cool pungent mouth.  The mouthfeeling in oily and a bit chalky.  Qi is still big. 

11^th has a smoky incense woody oily taste with a deep faint throaty coolness.  The Qi continues to build more in the mind and less in the body.

12^th has a brown sugar very quick moving faint sweetness over woody tastes.  The mouthfeel is becoming a slightly grabbing chalkiness and it pushes a faint coolness down the throat with an almost brown sugar and slight cinnamon taste.  There is still an interesting and changing complexity to this puerh.

13^th has a bit of a sweet spicy woody onset with a deep faint cooling breath.  These infusions are a nice spicy cinnamon.  With a Qi that is moving to more relaxing.

I mug steep out the rest and it gives off mainly moderately bitter, incense with a creamy underbelly and a low deep throaty cool pungent that finishes a marshmallow on the breath.

Overall, this is a nicely dry stored and Qi powerful puerh with lots of complexity and nice movement through the infusions.  It has an older school feeling and I think I would probably place this as a very nice Xiaguan tuo if I had it blind.  It has a factory sensibility to it but is a bit more.  Overall, I like this puerh quite a lot.

Pictured left is the 2007 Wistaria Hong Yin which days long steeped is still very sweet and a bit oily.  Pictured right is this 2003 Wistaria Zi Pin which days long steeped is still very nuanced and complex with forest tastes, long coolness in the throat and breath with a nice retuning sweetness over wood and decent incense smoke.  These are both very different puerh.  The 2007 Wistaria Hong Yin is very common with some of the newer factories coming out of mainland China in the mid-2000s.  The 2003 Wistaria Zi Pin has a very old school something in between a factory production but better kind of older school production with the heavier smoke.  Both are quite dry stored.  Both have fairly strong Qi with the 2003 Zi Pin having very strong body sensations as well.

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

Marshal’N (A Tea Addicts Journal) Tasting Notes

Shah8’s and TwoDawg Tasting Notes can be found here

Marco’s (Late Steeps) Tasting Notes

Hobbes’ (The Half-Dipper) Tasting Notes

Peace