2012 Miles' Birthday by TeaUrchin

I believe that for most people, having a child is good. And when something is good, why not to commemorate it with a puerh cake? I believe it is a lot better idea than commemorating a birth by getting drunk as two hells. Furthermore, when one commemorates a child's birth with a cake, why not to base it on Guafengzhai? Why not indeed... well, Tea Urchin picked the right moment to have a child with his bella Belle. If I wanted to have children this year, with 6500 RMB per kg of GFZ leaves, I'd have to make only a couple of cakes. Furthermore, as far as I know, no children are planned this year, so the nearest year would be the next one. It is likely that GFZ material prices will be even crazier. I must not delay having children for much longer or I'll have to resort to Wuliang, Mangfei or some no-name Mengku.

The scent of dry leaves was certainly promising and stronger than you meet in many other Yiwu teas. I like Guafengzhai for its "in-your-face" power and directness.

The leaves are quite long, not always whole, but definitely in large pieces. And there is a lot of whole leaves too. 

Upon rinsing, ample amount of makes-me-happy aroma is emitted by the leaves. There is a lot of sweetness and while I'd describe the main aroma as "wet hay", but it could be viewed as floralness too. And there's a lovely aroma of blackberries too. I like that component in Yiwu teas; when it is manifested in the taste as much as in aroma, I tend to quickly fall in love with it. 

Listening to Kind of Blue, I poured myself a cup.

The liquor actually started a lot lighter, yellower, but gradually changed into this sort of orange. It is pleasing to look at, I think. 

The performance in mouth is very good, I'd say. Unlike a lot of Yiwu teas, this cake has easy-to-grasp taste, it's not just "sweet thick nothing". Guafengzhai is indeed a tasty place. I'd say the liquor is very thick, very sweet and smooth in a most pleasing way. It starts with higher tones of dark forest fruit and then, over further steepings, acquires more clearly defined heavy floral undertones (like lilies, I believe). Overall, the taste is quite satisfying, rich and fulfilling. I had no problem aiming all my concentration at drinking it.

After the main body of the taste goes away, a rather smooth bitterness comes up, followed by a medium deal of astringency - which is also quite smooth. No problem there. I did not pick up as much cooling and vibrations as I have in some other Yiwu teas.

Where the tea shone the most for me was its qi or whatever you call it. It was an intense experience to drink this. Right after swallowing the first couple of cups, I felt that my perception of the world around changes to that pleasantly "stoned" point of view and I had stronger  and different perception of processes inside my body. Not many teas affected me this strongly from the start (and all were from Yiwu, interesting...).

I think that Miles may be very happy with this cake. It is a very well done piece and if you are, like me, a fan of Guafengzhai area, it's probably noticeably cheaper than this year's (or, even worse, of the years to come) material. Still not an exactly cheap tea (and I'd still prefer to buy something older), but in the realm of young teas, this cake seems to offer a rather good value for the money.

And two shots of mighty, muscular leaves: