This is a Spring 2025 raw puer from Farmerleaf.

Brewing setup: 7g in a gaiwan brewed at 95C

Dry leaf aroma: super fragrant the moment it’s unwrapped. Strong dried apricot aroma. 

Wet leaf aroma: dried apricots, jasmine flowers, grass clippings, some earthiness

Tasting notes: intense jasmine florals, dried apricot sweetness that lingers in your throat, some grassiness on later steeps. Very little bitterness or astringency, though there is some drying mouthfeel when pushed. 

Overall, this tea is very tasty and elegant, but still easy to drink on a daily basis. I got the full cake on a whim without trying a sample just based on the reviews of the tea and the relative affordability ($45 for a 357g cake), and I’m happy I went for it. I’ve had it for a couple of weeks now and it’s great both grandpa style and in the gaiwan. This is the first raw puer that my partner has really enjoyed due to the low bitterness and astringency. She said that before I told her it was a puer, she would’ve guessed it was an oolong based on how floral and sweet it was.

This is a black tea from white2tea.

Brewing setup: 3g grandpa style with boiling water

This is a delicious tea that is very forgiving and perfect for grandpa style or thermos brewing. It’s very sweet, with no bitterness or astringency. The name of the tea may be influencing me here, but it really does taste like strawberry jam mixed with butter, just missing the toast. Also quite an affordable tea too at just $6.50/50g.

I shot this photo-essay ages ago and thought it might be appropriate for here. Note that in one of the pictures the ISBN is provided, for those who might want a copy of their own.

No, really. That's its name. And it's not an "unfortunate translation artifact" either. It's just as crass in the original Chinese.

This is a 2025 raw puer from white2tea. I’ve had it in the gaiwan, but today I am having it grandpa style since I’m traveling without my tea equipment.

It’s a tasty tea grandpa style with a decent bitterness, vegetal notes, and some sweetness in the aftertaste. Not quite as delicate as when brewing in the gaiwan, but still tasty.

Little red cup is all fair trade tea! This is the only fair trade Puerh I've found so far, and it is quite good!

Leaf smell:

Dry: Chocolate, Fish, Graham Crackers

Wet: Brown Sugar, dry erase marker

Tasting notes:

• First brew was light and leaned towards dry erase marker with a bit of chocolatey richness.
• After that brews either tasted quite chocolate with a syrupy background or quite brown sugar esk with a steamed milk background.
• Each brew got a bit sweeter
• I pushed brew 6 kinda hard and got a really sweet brown sugar taste.

Tea high: very balanced. Decent energy, but very smooth. Not relaxing, but in some sense I do feel a bit calmer than when I started my session.

Price notes: I got the 3.75oz canister for $16.75. That comes to 15¢/g. So this session of ~5-6g was 75-90¢. That's a fine price for a very solid puerh.

Overall: This will likely become my go to puerh. It is fair trade, tasty, and a nice price. It doesn't have my favorite flavors of leather and wood, but it more than makes up for that by being fair trade. I can have puerh from worse paid workers here and there as a treat.

This is a 2014 raw puer tea from white2tea.

Brewing setup: 7g tea ball brewed in a tall glass with boiling water.

Tasting notes: good bitterness up front, leading to a fruity huigan after bitterness fades. Later steeps have a more fruity floral note to them.

Overall quite a tasty slightly aged puer to have while traveling for work. Not too fussy and does well grandpa style.

This is a 2021 sheng puer tea from Crimson Lotus Tea.

Brewing setup: 5g tea ball grandpa style with boiling water

Tasting notes: some bitterness and astringency, vegetal notes, refreshing

Tea high: normal caffeine alertness, nothing crazy as expected by the name/description of the tea

Overall, this was a good raw puer. I’m brewing grandpa style this week because I’m traveling for work and don’t have my gaiwan. I was looking forward to getting my gourd smashed by this tea, but unfortunately I didn’t experience that. Maybe I'm not someone who’s super sensitive to cha qi.

This is a raw puer tea from Farmerleaf.

Brewing setup: 7g of tea in a 125ml gaiwan brewed at 95C

Tasting notes: this is a very soft tea, low bitterness and astringency, some vegetal notes, fresh tree bark, and some fruity floral notes in the later steeps.

This is a raw puer tea from Farmerleaf. It is maocha instead of a cake because apparently they had a small harvest this year.

Brewing setup: 7g of tea in a 125ml gaiwan, brewed at 95C

Dry leaf aroma: super fragrant, smells like a cool wet forest in the Pacific Northwest with apricot notes.

Wet leaf aroma: vegetal, cool forest, apricots, freshly shredded tree bark.

Tasting notes: some intensity in the earlier steeps, PNW fern forest, fresh tree bark, minerality, mint, apricot, floral notes, good huigan.

Mouthfeel: intense on the early steeps, then leading to refreshing, cooling, and juicy feelings on later steeps.

Tea high: happy, energetic, heady.

This is a delicious and complex tea. Even though it was a bit pricy at $38/80g, I’m happy I got it. Looking forward to trying the other teas from them in my order.

This is a black tea from white2tea.

Brewing setup: 1.5g of tea in a mug with boiling water

Just having some black tea grandpa style today. This one is tasty and comforting. The tasting notes I’m getting are: milk chocolate sweetness, cream, slightly herbaceous. I’m on refill #3 right now and I think it can probably go for at least one more time.

I finished my session with Glider yesterday a bit prematurely because I was feeling over caffeinated. So I took the leaves and put them in a jar with water and stuck it in the fridge overnight to make cold brew tea.

The cold brew tea still had a decent amount of flavor in it. The tea tasted sweet, vegetal, and a bit fruity.

This is a sheng puer tea from white2tea.

Brewing setup: 7g ball of tea in a 125ml gaiwan brewed at 95C.

Tasting notes: green grapes, fresh cut grass, apple blossoms, balanced astringency, good returning sweetness.

I like this tea, I think it has interesting flavors and good huigan. However, my partner is not a fan — she says it has a sour or astringent aftertaste that doesn’t sit right with her.

This is a shou puer from white2tea.

Brewing setup: 7g tea ball in a 125ml gaiwan brewed with 95C water.

Wet leaf aroma: dry wood, campfire ash.

Tasting notes: starts out with dry wood, campfire smoke, bitterness, and I guess a camphor taste. After a few steeps, the bitterness fades and it becomes sweeter, with some nuttiness and leather; the dry wood and ash notes are still there.

Overall a good tea with a good value at $26 for a 200g cake. I’d consider buying a full cake of this tea.

This is a yancha oolong from white2tea.

Brewing setup: 5g of tea in a 125ml gaiwan with 95C water.

Wet leaves aroma: very floral and tropical sweetness.

Tasting notes: super floral, juicy tropical fruits, slick mouthfeel, and some herbal notes like thyme or oregano.

Overall, this is a very tasty tea. It was a bit tricky to brew, some steeps got a bit too punchy / perfumey if I let it go just a bit too long. I ended out dropping the temp a couple degrees down to 90c to help with that.

This is another lightly fermented shou puer pressed in 2022 and released this year.

Brewing setup: 7g in an 125ml gaiwan brewed with 95C water

Tasting notes: river rocks, damp forest floor, a bit of cocoa powder in earlier steeps, some raisin sweetness on the later steeps.

Overall, this is a very drinkable shou. It isn’t as interesting or complex as the Fleet I had yesterday, this it more like a standard smooth shou that is maybe a bit lighter and has a bit more sweetness. At just $22 for a 200g cake, it would be a great option for a daily drinker. I’d consider buying this tea.

This is a lightly fermented shou puer tea pressed in 2022 and released this year.

Brewing setup: 6g of tea in a 125ml gaiwan, brewed with 95C water.

Tasting notes: 10s rinse 

10s steep: antique books, forest floor, some brightness. My partner says: straw in a barn on a hot day. 

Wet leaf aroma: hot cocoa and fruit jam

10s steep: old library books, cocoa powder

10s steep: forest floor, cedar incense, slightly drying finish. Slight sweetness lingers in the mouth 

10s steep: hot cocoa, old books, cedar incense

10s steep: nectarines, old books, sauna essential oils. My partner says it’s dusty in a good way, fruity tartness, and aerating it reminds her of a petting zoo on a hot summer day.

15s steep: more fruity now, blackberries and dusty library books. 

20s steep: juicy, woody

30s steep: more dry wood with juicy mouthfeel

45s steep: raw yeast dough, dry firewood, blueberry, juicy but drying mouthfeel. 

1min steep: dry leaves, grassy, honey sweetness

2min steep: dry leaves, cocoa, blackberry

5min steep: dry leaves, incense, berries

10min steep: sweet and woody

Overall, this is a very tasty and complex shou. I believe the intent of this light fermentation is to try and mimic an raw puer; and while I haven’t had the pleasure of experiencing well aged raw puer, I can say that this is a lot more interesting to drink than most other shous I’ve tried. We would likely buy a brick of this tea. Now I’m interested in trying a couple of his other light ferment shous that were released this year for comparison.

This is a dancong oolong tea pressed into a brick. I got this as a freebie in my order, so I’m not sure which year this one is (it looks like they have one from 2023 and from 2025 on their website).

Brewing parameters: 4g in a 125ml gaiwan, water at 95C.

Tasting notes:

• 15s steep: light florals
• 15s steep: slightly stronger florals, juicy mouthfeel.
• 20s steep: very punchy, perfumey, slightly astringent. Need to dial it back
• 10s steep: floral and juicy, but even still a bit too strong.
• 7s steep with water dropped to 90C: perfectly steeped this time. Like walking in an a field of magnolia trees. Juicy mouthfeel. My partner is detecting some earthy notes. I smell the leaves now and they’re also super floral with a savory, umami note that I associate with oolongs.
• 7s steep (x3): three more steeps in a row keep delivering beautiful bouquet of flowers and juicy mouthfeel.
• 15s steep: starting to lighten up now, still very pleasant though.
• 30s steep: even lighter florals.
• 60s steep: perfumey, light, pleasant.
• 5min steep: perfumey, light, and pleasant. probably gonna finish up here.

Overall a beautiful tea, mostly just displaying really strong magnolia aromas with a juicy mouthfeel. The flavor and the juiciness linger for a long time after finishing a cup. The W2T description of this tea talks about it being tricky to brew, and it is indeed pretty tricky even though I dropped to their recommended 4g of leaf. After dropping the temp to 90C and keeping the steeps real short at 7s, that seemed to be this tea’s happy place once the leaves opened up after the first steep or two.

I ordered a bunch of W2T samples and have been going through them trying to figure out which cakes we wanna buy. Today we tried the Charing Cross. This is a roasted white tea.

Started with a 20s rinse and waited a few minutes for the ball to open up since it’s quite dense.

10s steep - fig jam aromas, just as promised

15s steep - more fig jam, slightly stronger

25s steep - rich roasted fruits, gonna dial it back a bit

15s steep - figgy, fruity, floral

15s steep - more of the same. Smelling the wet leaves now and I can sniff these all day; getting strong tropical fruit punch and floral notes.

30s steep - getting more floral perfumey notes now

60s steep - violets, cedar

120s steep - violets, blueberry, cedar

Overall a very tasty tea. It feels like it has similarities to white teas, oolongs, and black teas all at once. We’ll probably order a brick of this one. We’re finding we like white teas and the hybrid white teas (W2T Blood Moon was also one of our favorites so far).

This was an interesting one. I may be able to brew it better in the future.

Brewing Parameters:

5.7g in my 80ml gaiwan 205°F/96°C

Tasting Notes:

Dry smell: Somewhat weak, cardboard, wood, pepper

Wet smell (post rinse): woody, peppery, sweet, clove

Steeps:

0. Rinse (x2)
1. (Flash) sweet, weak, clove, wood.
2. (20s) Chocolate clove, rich smell.
3. (30s) Rich clove that touches on leather.
4. (35s) Chocolate, leather, clove, permanent marker?
5. (40s) woody permanent marker.
6. (1m 10s) woody permanent marker. Bright and punchy.
7. (2m 10s) balanced woody clove, very clovey

Ending lid smell: leather & clove

Tea high: Very smooth. I feel the impulsiveness in my body. My leg wants to tap, but my mind has very few jitters. Cozy.

Overall: A very fun mix up for me. Tasty and interesting. I love clove. Maybe if I brew it lighter next time it'll keep from entering permanent marker territory. Those permanent marker tones scare me a bit. I hope it is just some smells ending up too dense and overwhelming my nose, and not anything dangerous

Price comments: At $62/250g or $0.248/g this would be a slightly higher end daily drinker price for me. This gongfu cost about $1.40. However, realistically if I cake this tea, then it'll be a occasional treat. Maybe more because vibes than price.

There are a million reviews for this banger of a tea online, so I'm choosing to keep mine short here. $17.50 for a 200g cake is fantastic. The taste is fantastic. Pure wood. It's beloved for a reason. It's no super complex evolving tea, but it does wood right.

This is a daily drinker if I've ever seen one. It's good to have a lumber slut cake on hand.

This is one of the numerous minis I've received. I have been very excited to try this as it seemed pretty spot on for my palate, and slightly higher end than the super cheap stuff I tend to stick with. A 200g cake is listed as $47.

Brewing Parameters:

7g mini in my 125ml gaiwan. 205°F/96°C.

Tasting Notes:

Dry smell: Natural fertilizer. In a good way lol.

Wet smell (post rinse): Wood barn, hay, campfire.

Steeps:

0. Rinse
1. (Flash) Menthol & barn with pine trees around. Creamy mouth feel.
2. (Flash) Woody, hay, fertilizer, pine in the background. Dark cholocate richness.
3. (10s) Super woody and musky. Very rich.
4. (15s) Bright leather, barn, and smoke. Very rich.
5. (20s) Roasted leather belt. The aroma has a lot of staying power. Many breahts after my sip still smell of this tea.
6. (30s) Leather belt continues. Richness is gone.
7. (45s) Leather belt continues.

Ending lid smell: Perfectly balanced leather.

Tea High: Decently balanced. Solid energy, but also very little jitteryness. Good smoothness.

Overall: I really enjoyed the musk and pungentness of this tea. Awesome tea in my book. Though I imagine the barn yard tones might put some folks off of it.

Price comments: At $47/200g or $0.235/g I could definitely see myself caking this. I have a lot of samples still to try though. My usual gongfu is 6-9g so this would come to $1.41-$2.12 a session. Not bad, but we are just on the top edge of what I'd call a "negligible daily cost" for tea.