Click here to open infographic in bigger size and click here to see blog post explaining the infographic.
Note: “ShunShiXingHao” is the name given to cakes made by the same group of people that made the ’94-’97 Zhen Chun Ya Hao, with the same type of leaves (uncultivated old tree Yiwu and processing.
- Old and ancient tree Puerh (on a 1999 cake! this is exceedingly rare)
- Elegant, strong, patient, deep Yiwu taste and mouth conquering aftertaste
- Fully comfortable and strong Qi
- Perfect dry but well-matured taiwanese storage
- Factory-style processing close to the legendary 1950s Red Mark (Hong Yin) and later
I can’t speak any higher of this tea and of its extremely friendly price.
This is a tea that among a few others (the real ZhenChunYaHaos, ShunShiXingHaos and 2001-2002 ChenYuanHaos) would change the course of Puerh history, first bringing back the 100% pure old tree cakes (which had been almost stopped since the late 70s), and later giving us the single estate purity masterpieces we can enjoy today.
Unless you were up in Yiwu in late 90s-early 2000s with Chen Huai Yuan and the others, you just can’t find a tea like this. If you want to understand ancient tree puerh and how it ages (in perfect conditions), this is the tea.
Cakes of this quality and pedigree are very rare, but I got to try quite a few of them. The thing is that the vast majority of them are not available to buy (or have a price in the high 4 digits or 5 digits), so being able to offer this cake is really exciting. The very best cakes made in the last 10-15 years by serious producers like CYH are purer (they use older, more selected trees from smaller areas) than the ones made in the 2000s, but this cake is one of the best of its era, with much better quality than the ’03-’05 CYH, ’04-’06 BYH, ’05-’07 XZH etc and of course there’s no comparison with big factory tea of the era that uses just plantation leaves, this is way better.
There’s a remarkable amount of gan (sweet-bitter) and power in this cake, you’d easily mistake this aspect of it for a Menghai, if it wasn’t for how smooth, silkily covering the throat it is and how it conquers mouth and nose with the aftertaste. In few words: elegant, full, strong, long.
And the Qi? Not just strong, but fully comfortable. Not (just) a stoning blast but a strong, solid, peaceful presence that’s enveloping yet gentle. If the pure Yiwu old tree quality somehow wasn’t clear from the strong-and-smooth taste, than this should put your mind to rest.
I saved the best for last: the price is extremely reasonable, this is a tea that’s both miles better than the factory tea of the era (and even earlier ones, for instance the 88 qing bing can’t compete with this cake either) and rarer and more important in its role in puerh history. Price in Taiwan is about $2500 and that’s still a good deal compared to the inferior factory cakes I just mentioned. In a world where the rare aged “gushu” (without provenance) sells for multiples of this, and so do factory cakes (largely with plantation leaves), this is possibly the best finding we’ve seen so far.
This is a tea that’s often faked but because of our close relationship with Chen Yuan Hao (a key member of the original ShunShiXingHao / ZhenChunYaHao group) and other Taiwanese tea experts we’re able to fully guarantee its authenticity.
There really are many fakes of this tea, here are two notes to distinguish them:
- There is no Zhen Chun Ya Hao after 1997, so if you ever see a “98/99/2000/2001/etc ZhenChunYaHao”, you already know it’s likely a fake or, at best, misidentified
- The real ZCYH is always an old tree cake, the durability should be much longer than usual and aftertaste very strong with low to medium astringency. If in doubt you can use this tea to compare the taste to, they’re quite similar.
Strongly recommended for both excellent taste/Qi and collection/value appreciation. A full unopened tong may be available, please email info@puerh.uk for pricing. Strongly recommend to buy as much as you can of this to age into something that otherwise will be completely unaccessible (because of high pricing) in the future. This blog post has more details about why.
Approx ~357g cakes, some weight loss over the years. 1/4 slices approx. ~85-90g.
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