Until very recently, I was not at all familiar with the idea of “aged green tea”. A few days ago, our guest blogger @journeywithacup posted about a 9-year-old Long Jing tea. But I have tasted an aged green tea just today at least knowingly!
This tea comes from Sanxia in Taiwan, which has a relatively lower elevation of 400 meters compared to other tea growing areas for which Taiwan is famous for (e.g. Alishan). It comes from a boutique organic tea producer. 2016 was a good year, and they produced a big batch of green teas and could not sell them all and decided to store the rest according to the seller’s website. Aged green tea is not everybody’s cup of tea (in other words, the common belief is that the fresher the green tea, the better) and this tea stayed in storage for about 4 years with the risk of losing its value. The producers then decided to compress them into cakes like pu-erh cakes, and when they tested it, they were fascinated by the result and decided to put the batch on the market, and some of it luckily reached me.
I did not know what to expect from this tea, and I could taste the lively energy of a young sheng pu-erh and delicate notes from a fresh green tea. The tasted fruitiness which I would not normally associate with green tea, but this tea is possibly everything but a standard green tea. Happy to have tasted it!
Tea profile:
Type: Green
Origin: Sanxia, Taiwan Harvest time: 2016 Leaf colour: Tones of green with some white fuzz Liquor colour: Vibrant yellow
Tea Aroma: Aromatic with fruitiness
Tea taste: Interesting like a young sheng pu-erh with a fruity sweet finisg
Steeping: Place 5 g of tea leaves in a gaiwan/teapot. Add 100 ml water at about 90°C. Steep for 5 seconds and rinse the liquid out. Steep for 30 seconds. To each consecutive infusion add 10 seconds. You can infuse up to 4 times or until the taste is lost. Shelf life: Can be aged.
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