Will the real 7542 please stand up.

Will the real 7542 please stand up.  If you are a serious pu erh tea drinker.  The 7542 raw pu erh cake would need no introduction.  This raw cake is produced by the famous Taetea (aka Dayi) tea factory. Very old 7542 are highly sought after by both tea drinkers and tea collectors.  

I myself have been drinking and buying the Dayi 7542. The pix showed a tong (7 cakes) in their original packaging. The paper wrapper stack is a 2008 production while the bamboo wrapped one is the most recent 2025 production. 

If I am not wrong, the 7542 is a yearly production offered by Taetea tea factory. I noticed over the past 15 years, the tea factory used fancy wrappers to wrap their tea cakes. There is nothing wrong as there are tea collectors that might be persuaded to buy the tea because of the fancy wrappers.   Not a joke. 

I  will try to sample the new 7542s when they are out.  This is where the mystery of the 7542 appeared.  Yes, every yearly batch of 7542 would taste different in terms of taste and aroma as the tea are from different yearly harvests.  Well, if you are a serious tea drinker of 7542 like me, I would expect that there would be a signature taste and aroma in the tea albeit the different years.  This was not the case in those 7542 I had sampled for the past 10 years. 

In my personal opinion while I sampled the tea, I found the 7542, produced in the different years, was a different animal altogether. Some tasted very green and light almost like green tea, some 7542 had a slightly woody and herbal taste. I believed that the newer 7542 were produced in such a way that the tea was drinkable now, no need for storage.  The 7542 over the past 10 over years were to me generally lighter in taste and aroma.  This is a deliberate decision by Taetea. The 7542 recipe had been adjusted yearly for reasons I cannot understand.   I personally believed a new light tasting tea cannot age to a strong tea with time in storage.  

I bought a tong of this year's 7542. This offering is different.  This tea is mildly smoky and lightly sweet. It is moderately strong.  Although Taetea tea factory is an innovative Chinese tea factory. I am not sure if they should be 'tempering' with the 7542 recipe. 

My 2 cents worth. 

Sow Mee White Tea

 

Sow Mee otherwise known as Shou Mei is a white tea.  This 100g box is an inexpensive white tea that are sold in many Chinese grocery stores. I had seen them even in San Francisco and Chicago chinatown shops.  A very inexpensive tea. 

Shou Mei tea looked very unappetising. The tea looked brown and unsightly.  However when I brewed this tea, there is a light floral fragrance.  The tea tasted lightly and delicately sweet. This tea is good even when chilled as well. 

I had bought several boxes and the tea is already 10 years of old. An enjoyable drink. I recommend. 

2004 Xiaguan Jincha Mushroom

Once upon a time, Xiaguan tea factory started a brand called 'Tibetan flame', which produced pu erh tea specially for export to western China. This tea was normally brewed with milk and spices and this tea was an important dietary requirement of the people there.   With no proper transport in the olden days, this tea was delivered by horses that traverse the mountainous terrain.  Pu erh tea had to be compressed to shapes that make transporting these tea easily. 

Today tea is easily transported to these neighbouring areas.  However, we still get to see thsee various shapes of compressed tea today.  Tuo or nest shape, cakes and bricks and even mushroom shaped.  My guess mushroom shaped tea could be an auspicious shape to the people there. 

I opened a 2004 Xiaguan raw mushroom. This 250g tea was easy to break open. This tea originally came in a pack of 3.   This tea is woody with a nice medicinal aroma and taste. The tea is very dark amber in colour when brewed. Strong and mellow. Very nice.  Wicked stuff.  I will brew the tea for Christmas for my tea drinking guests.  

Tea of the year 2025

 

The tea of the year 2025.   It is a raw pu erh, a Banzhang. Unknown factory.   Produced in 2005, this tea was stored in the hot and humid climate of Malaysia. 

When I first sampled the tea, I assumed it was a from the Bulang region of Yunnan. The tea was very strong and aromatic. It had a light fruity aftertaste with a lighty bitter background.  I was shown the cake and it was a banzhang tea. Banzhang pu erh is located in the Bulang region. as well and there are many similarities in taste and aroma. 

The tea was produced in 2005 just before the pu erh price bubble broke in 2007 and just before banzhang became a craze in the pu erh tea market. 

20 years of storage is a long time to wait for the tea to ferment or age to a sweet and mellow drink.  A tea expert in USA.... in his own opinion thinks that a 21 year old cake stored in Seattle might only be a rough equivalent of a 7 year old cake store in Guangdong.   I am more generous as I think it is a 2 to 1 ratio. That a 20 year old USA stored tea is equivalent to 10 years of Guangdong storage. 

This banzhang tea had 20 years old of Malaysian storage. . It would meant that the tea would take 4 decades of USA storage to reach the taste and aroma of the local storage here. 

Too mind boggling. I am thirsty. 

Fukien Teashop Shui Hsien

 I had stored this tea for about 10 years and decided to start drinking this shui hsien this week.  Fukien teashop is an old tea shop located in Sheung Wan, Hong Kong.  They are most famous for their Tie Kuan Yin, an oolong they roast for more than 40 hours. They also sell other teas like pu erh and white tea which I had written about in my earlier posts.

This shui hsien is also high roasted. I remember that when I had opened a newly bought Fukien shui hsien, the tea was a bit rough as the high roast was overpowering the taste of the oolong. Now with 10 years of storage, the tea has mellowed. I can sense the 'high roast' but it is does not take centrestage when I had a session of this tea. This oolong is mellow and mouth watering. This mellow smoothness; I believed can only be achieved through time in storage. This is the reason why old 'high roast; oolong are highly sought after by the Chinese tea drinking community.  

I think I will have another tea session of this tea tomorrow as well. 

Malaysia Tea expo

I was at a Malaysia tea expo over the weekend. This time, the expo was held in Johor Bahru at a convention hall at Mid Valley shopping mall.  This was an attractive location as this expo was just across Singapore and I needed an hour to travel from home to the expo. 

This expo was a food and Chinese tea expo. The food offered was interesting as many of the food booths were operated by young Malaysians. The food offering was refreshing to see as well.  There was fancy coffee, instant congee and desserts to even organic blended juices. I applaud these younger entrepreneurs that were willing to chase their dreams when the economic outlook remained uncertain. 

Back to tea. The usual suspects were all present. Taetea, Xiaguan and Wuyi Star brands were all represented.  The surprise to me, was that Liu Bao tea was back in the limelight. Nearly every tea booth has liu bao tea.  I was simply spoilt for choice in selecting a liu bao.  

I enjoyed myself at this tea expo.  Xiaguan had a variety pack of six raw tuos for sale with an average age of 8 years  (I bought 2 sets).  I managed to lay my hands on a tong of old pu erh. The bunch of dried leaves and stems in that pix is yiwu raw pu erh carefully processed to keep the leaves and stems intact. The 2 classic boxes of liu bao tea made by China Tea would be fun to drink. The boxes were made five years apart and it should be fun to compare this tea. I completed my purchase by getting some Dayi tea and a few tins of Wuyi Star.  A small haul.  And one teapot.   I am happy. 

Breaking up is hard to do

 

Breaking up is hard to do. 

I am talking about pu erh tea. Pu erh tea drinkers will have pu erh tea in their collection which are extremely hard to break apart. The compression of the pu erh tea cake, brick, melon or tuo can be very high. Dangerous too as a slip of your tea knife or tea pick can hurt your fingers. Xiaguan brand tuos and some iron cakes are some examples. Same for Dayi especially those raw cakes produced around 2005-2006. 

I had suggested that using a plier might help in the breakup of your pu erh cake. It is easier to use a plier on cakes but for tuo, it's another adventure for your fingers. 

Once you have broken up your tea, let the tea rest and your tea would be ready to brew in a couple of weeks time. 

There is still another problem. 

Some of these smaller chunks of broken up tea remain as chunks in your teapot after a few infusions. This may mean that for your tea session, later infusions of the tea may result in a stronger tea. These tea chunks may only start to 'open up' after 6 infusions making your tea stronger in taste. There may be tea reviews on the internet that ignored this phenomena misinterpreting that the tea was still very strong or stronger in later infusions. 

I would recommend to look inside your teapot or gaiwan after 3-4 infusions. Try to pry open the tea chunks with a pick. This would, I believe help you have a more enjoyable tea session. 

This tea chunk issue only occurs in those  pu erh tea that have a high compression.  I hope this observation wlll help pu erh tea drinkers to make the necessary adjustments when they brew super compressed pu erh. 

I looked forward later this year to visit my close Malaysian tea buddy for a meal and a traditional tea exchange.  

My two cents worth.