This past week I attended another private tea tasting with Liu Laoshi, or Teacher Liu, about whom I wrote a few months ago. Last time, we drank some truly wonderful old pu’er. This time, the focus was aged oolong. And the group was a bit larger— a total of eight people.
Most of what we drank fell into two categories: Anxi Tieguanyin from the 1970s, ’60s, and ’50s, and Wuyi yancha from the 1950’s and earlier. I drink quite a lot of aged oolong, but little as old as this, and mostly Taiwanese oolong, which of course is more common in Taiwan. There are huge amounts of aged oolong here, especially in the 30-40 year age range. But finding teas that are older than this, and well-stored, is more difficult, not to mention magnitudes more expensive. This was an exciting opportunity.
Throughout the day, Teacher Liu offered much guidance for how to appreciate these teas. Considering he drinks old teas almost exclusively, and for quite a few years now, it was fascinating to hear his very detailed take on the subject.
We started with Anxi Tieguanyin. He described a distinguishing characteristic of Tieguanyin— “guanyin yun” (觀音韻), sometimes also simply called “guanyun” (觀韻). This can be identified by how the sourness of Tieguanyin hits your mouth— it will be in the lower part of your cheeks, approaching your throat. If you feel it more on your tongue or within your throat, that’s more likely yancha. Sometimes it’ll also coat your teeth in a way that feels a bit like you haven’t brushed them for a few days, and can create a feeling of astringency there. It also frequently resolves into an orchid-like sweetness (蘭花香 or lanhuaxiang). He mentioned that in the past, Tieguanyin was reserved for dignitaries in China— it wasn’t available to regular people— so the feeling of guanyin yun is associated with that of being someone important.
He went on to discuss how you judge the quality of Tieguanyin. Typically one of the first things you notice is its sourness— how quickly does it go away and transform into something else? It should quickly dissipate and leave a slight dryness in the mouth. If it transforms really slowly, this is a flaw and there are a few possible reasons for it. Perhaps the tea is too new, or the leaves just aren’t very high quality. Or it was picked outside of the preferred harvest times. This tends to result in leaves with higher water content that take longer to process, and the tea becomes more bitter and astringent, with a flavor that’s less savory, and more watery and thin.
As Tieguanyin ages, it moves along a transformation from sour to dry to sweet. So when it’s still younger, it’ll be quite sour, and also less thick. At the next stage, it’ll still have sourness upon entrance, but this will more quickly dissolve into dryness. It will also start to have increased huigan. In the final stage, the initial sourness will dissolve almost immediately into sweetness, and the finish will have become even more sweet. Also, as it ages, its salivating effect (生津 or shengjin) arrives faster, and gets stronger.
He also mentioned that, as a tea ages, the way the tea soup’s temperature affects your mouth upon entrance will gradually change, and become less hot. It will have less of a scalding effect and its heat will decrease more quickly. And that, as a result, you may feel a cooling sensation with older teas.
Teacher Liu told us that when he’s drinking older teas, he prefers to take slightly larger sips than with younger teas, because you’re consuming its energy and qi. As a result, you’ll feel your body gradually warming up, and you’ll start to sweat. But it’s not a heavy kind of sweating. Rather it’s a subtle perspiration, as described in traditional Chinese medicine as “pearl sweat” (珍珠汗), where you sweat gently from within. This can manifest on the hair of your arms, for instance. He believes this is also a sign that the tea has been stored well, in relatively dry conditions.
He also shared his thoughts on re-roasting of oolongs— he didn’t have much good to say about this. It most often happens because at some point the tea has been exposed to too much humidity, and re-roasting helps to “fix” it. But once you’ve done this, you can no longer truly count its age from when it was first harvested, because re-roasting effectively resets the age of the tea. So it should really only be considered as old as the re-roasting. He finds it also weakens the tea, making it more watery and monotonous in flavor. It also frequently introduces a sticky rice flavor (糯米香 or nuomixiang), which is undesirable. To him, the most precious part of an old tea is its initial state. Once it’s been re-roasted, this is lost.
1970s Anxi Tieguanyin
This first tea we drank was nice enough, but also reminded me of a lot of the more accessible and less-expensive aged oolongs out there. It was quite sour, really tugged at the cheeks. The sourness didn’t resolve very much, it was rather a very strong and dominant trait. It was nice and perfectly drinkable, with a decent aged oolong profile, but didn’t really stand out to me.
1960s Anxi Tieguanyin
The next tea was fairly sour upon entrance, but more manageably so. This sourness seemed to reduce more quickly in subsequent steeps, too. It was also quite a bit more thick, and with a more engaging mouthfeel. It had a noticeably strong and fast salivating effect. This in particular was the highlight of this tea for me.
There was also a distinct grittiness in the texture of the tea, you could really feel it on your teeth. The sourness lingered a fair bit into the aftertaste though, resulting in a somewhat unsatisfying finish.
1950s Anxi Tieguanyin
When it comes to these kinds of comparisons, I find that while the oldest tea may be the most rare and expensive, it isn’t always the best. But in this case, the oldest was most certainly the best.
It opened with some sourness but this quickly dissipated. It had this nice creamy vanilla note, very sweet, and quite distinctive. Quite a special tea, with a flavor I haven’t encountered many times before. In a way it was almost oaky. Another of the participants mentioned that the sweetness reminded him of licorice. The room got quieter as we drank this tea. It was very engaging.
The aftertaste was very pleasant and dominated by a pervasive sweetness, much nicer than the first two teas, and also quite floral. This was the orchid fragrance that Teacher Liu had earlier alluded to.
Interestingly, this tea was less thick than the 1960s one, but it was in just about every way a better tea. It had very strong and fast salivating effect. The aftertaste lingered beautifully, its sweetness seemingly never-ending.
This was definitely my favorite so far, and on a normal day I would’ve been perfectly content to stop here and languish in the satisfaction of drinking this tea. And yet, onward we went.
1950s Wuyi Baijiguan
At this point we started in on the old yancha. First up, a 1950s Baijiguan. Teacher Liu is particularly passionate about old yancha, and it really showed. He commented that in the world of yancha, Dahongpao is the “tea king,” and Baijiguan is the “tea queen.”
This tea had some initial roughness, scratchiness, though by the 2nd-3rd steeps this had largely resolved. It was noticeably more tannic than the Tieguanyin, with a bitterness that built in the back of the mouth. It also resolved more strongly into sweetness.
I found it rather drying in the throat, and generally didn’t reach as deep into the throat as the 1950s Tieguanyin we’d just finished. The tannic activity in the mouth was nice though, it sat in the back sides of the mouth and had a strong presence. Salivating effect here was slow to arrive, but still nice.
This tea made for an interesting contrast after so much aged Tieguanyin, its bitterness more pronounced and with less of the sourness of Tieguanyin. It was quite a nice tea, though of all we drank this day, was not in my top picks.
1940s Anhui Tunxi Green Tea
Here we took a slight detour, I suppose to remain in keeping with the theme of stepping back successively older with each tea. This was an aged green tea from Anhui, and interesting and different, but not a favorite for me. Personally, I find aged green teas to be an interesting and educational experience, but not something I really reach for.
This tea had a strong ginseng fragrance and tasted more medicinal. It had a grassiness to it, too. It was thinner and had less throat feel than the oolongs— it very noticeably stopped at the back of the mouth rather than reaching any deeper. There were hints of bitterness that didn’t resolve very fast. It had rather little salivating effect. The empty cup fragrance was quite nice and complex though, and sweet in a way that was unlike anything else so far.
It brewed for quite a long time, and eventually got nicer, with more balanced savory and sweet notes. It got thicker too, though still didn’t reach very deep.
As we drank this, we talked about ginseng flavor (人參味 or renshenwei). Teacher Liu mentioned that all aged green teas develop this note. As lower-oxidation teas age, green teas in particular, they will initially develop a “raw bean” taste, kind of like soy milk. They then begin to develop a floral quality, which eventually transforms into something more medicinal and ginseng-like.
He was quick to point out too, that with aged teas in general, the ginseng note is not a good thing. It often implies wet storage. This is common with baozhong for instance— it’ll develop ginseng flavor even when it’s not that old, because storage conditions in northern Taiwan tend to be too wet for properly aging this kind of tea. Well-stored aged baozhong does not have ginseng flavor.
Interestingly, this tea brewed into a very inky black liquor, more so than any others so far. Teacher Liu pointed out that the texture was very sticky, it had more guabei (掛杯). This is a term that comes up fairly often in discussion of older teas, and most directly translates to “hanging from the cup.” It refers to the way the thick oily tannins of aged teas cling to the walls of the cup, even after drinking. It’s a signifier of age; younger teas don’t have it. He mentioned too that this is a hard detail to fake. If a tea is very thick but doesn’t stick to the walls of the cup, then it’s possibly been aged artificially, such as by using humidity and temperature to accelerate its maturation. With this tea, you could see how the tea oil literally clung to the sides of the chahai and tea cups.
1930s Wuyi Dahongpao
This tea was quite strong and made a big first impression. It had some ashiness at the start, though Teacher Liu said it was not as heavily-roasted as the Tieguanyin we’d had earlier. It was a bit scratchy in the throat at times, and had a slight sourness, though this dissipated quickly.
The texture was quite thick, giving it a concentrated and dense profile. Beautifully balanced tea. It was pretty tannic, sat heavily in the throat. Salivation started almost instantly and lingered very nicely afterwards too. Just in general it had a nice finish, with strong lingering aftertaste. Just a wonderful, wonderful tea.
It was also very warming and strong in body feeling. Heavy, sedating. Tingling in shoulders. The feeling sank into the legs and feet. This tea was a strong contender for my favorite of the day.
Teacher Liu mentioned that a characteristic of good aged tea is that, even when brewed lightly, the tea remains sweet, making you want to drink more. This is referred to as “light and flavorful” (淡而有味). If it’s of lesser quality, it’ll be “light and flavorless” (淡而無味). For an aged tea to be “light and flavorful,” also indicates that it has a high amino acid content. I’ve found it’s somewhat common when discussing old teas for amino acids (胺基酸 or anjisuan) and polysaccharides (多糖體 or duotangti) to come up. He believes that without a high content of both, a tea cannot age well.
Teas that are lacking in these areas will likely reach their peak much earlier. This becomes evident as they lose complexity and become more one-note. You’ll also notice that while the tea’s energy might feel strong, it’s lacking in depth. For him, the energy of good aged tea comes in waves, like ocean waves, with each wave pushing the previous one forward. But for a tea that’s reached its peak, as strong as it might feel, this fades quickly.
1920s Wuyi Dahongpao
Our final yancha of the day was an approximately 100 year old Dahongpao. Teacher Liu noted that this tea had a savoriness and mineral-like flavor in its finish, which are defining aspects of yanyun. And that it also had a very thick soy sauce-like texture (醬香味 or jiangxiangwei).
The tea started out quite thick, oily, concentrated. It had the slightest ashiness at the start, and a more noticeably plum-like profile than the previous Dahongpao. Someone mentioned that it reminded them of suanmeitang, a fairly thick and sour medicinal-type drink that’s made from smoked plums.
It had quite nice tannic activity in the back of the mouth, that resolved pretty quickly into long-lasting sweetness. Salivation started quickly too, especially from the sides of the mouth. It had decent throat feel, though at times a bit scratchy. Some of its sourness remained throughout the session though, as well as lingering hints of ashiness. Its initially thick texture didn’t maintain as well as that of the previous tea. It was a very nice tea, and it was quite special to drink a Dahongpao in the area of 100 years old, though overall I felt it wasn’t as well balanced as the previous one.
1900s Chongshicha
We finished our marathon session with a Chongshicha (蟲屎茶) made from yancha, from around 1900-1910. The basic concept behind Chongshicha, which translates to “worm excrement tea” and is sometimes called “dragon pearl tea” (龍珠茶), is that tea leaves are piled up, and a special type of caterpillar is encouraged to eat them, at which point its droppings are collected and dried. So the resulting tea is composed of small pellets and is rather powdery. Because of its fine consistency, Teacher Liu brewed it in a tea bag, placed within his teapot.
This tea was hard to describe, quite different from everything else. It was savory, slightly mushroomy, and generally very earthy, almost like soil or compost. It had a slight smokiness too. Very thick in texture. It also was quite bitter, and the bitterness kept coming, relentlessly. Eventually this did resolve in a satisfying way, though it was slow to get there.
Teacher Liu emphasized that this tea had the strongest qi of anything we’d drank. And the feeling was pretty significant from this tea. At times it was a bit spacey, almost euphoric, with energy pulsing through the chest, arms, legs.
This was perhaps the oldest tea I’ve ever drank, and I’m grateful to have had the experience. But to be honest, for me it wasn’t as enjoyable as the 1930s Dahongpao, or 1950s Tieguanyin. Those teas were just generally more engaging, with wonderfully satisfying huigan, and the kind of lingering aftertaste that I’m always searching for. This very old Chongshicha was quite special, no question, but also not something I’d feel an urge to drink that often.
As we approached the end of our tasting, Teacher Liu commented that, for him, drinking aged tea at its highest level is not about chasing how long the tea can be steeped, or how fragrant or sweet it is. Rather it’s the level of relaxation you feel after drinking it— of your body being in a state of extreme balance, that allows you to feel calm and satisfied.
This day turned out to be quite the memorable experience, and pretty different from our previous pu’er-focused gathering. I’m so grateful to have had the chance to try these wonderful and rare teas. And I agree with Teacher Liu— whether it’s aged oolong or any other kind of old tea, the overall feeling of full-body relaxation that comes from these teas is quite special. It’s soothing and satisfying in a way that younger teas can’t quite achieve. I think it’s this, more than anything, that keeps me coming back to old tea.
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