A bit of “gushu” smell from teapot and dry leaf, disappearing quite quickly.
After a bumpy start (very astringent compared to low thickness), very centering Qi hit me very quickly and stayed through.
It being a XZH I was expecting a soft “pulong” but this is nothing but! It’s “in your face” bitter and astringent powerful puerh.
From mid-session it becomes progressively more pleasant, the astringency a bit tamed.
A bit drying, astringency remains in the mouth much more than aftertaste or huigan, no doubt this will transform with age.
I picked this tea randomly from my XZH sample box, not knowing what it was. After the session I find out what the tea is, at a whopping $1480 for a 400g cake. Good I didn’t know earlier, I might have saved it until forever 🙂
Fun high-Qi learning experience, I find myself looking for other Tian Men Shan (maybe coming at a more reasonable $1.5-2ish a gram instead of this almost $4)
Storage: House XZH, something between dry or natural I imagine
Overall: T4
Aging potential: T4+ minimum and easily, I’m really unsure about further aging but T5- seems achievable, full T5… maybe?.