Qilinhao Naka 2012 (sample)

0/ rince: the wet leaves smell cat urine, red fruits and smoke 1/ the texture is extremely silky/milky… dominant cat urine flavour and some good distant smoke, the whole gives a herbal & slightly fruity aftertaste… dry tea. 2/ wet leaves: cat piss all the way… taste: hints of milk, then herbal, then cat piss. Very astringent. The texture is not so silky anymore (because of the astringency). When the soup is cold it’s totally herbal with some minty notes. Slow & distant sort of huigan that transfroms the herbal notes into a slightly sour and fruity cat piss flavour… aftertaste is like before. Truely performant aroma persistency. oddly the gaiwan lid smells vanilla… very dry… there is some energy and at least some clear mind energy, but for some reason it can’t focus on that today. heaviness in the stomach… 3/ it’s thick and very much herbal with a hint of milk and some quiet mint, then comes the cat piss along with some sour tobacco (i think) that gives depth. There’s still a touch of noble smoke too. some cooling effects that last. no much change in the herbal & fruity aftertaste and still lots of aroma persistency 4/ Very thick and i’m clearly feeling drunkness. there’s a more defined fast huigan now that gives some herbal brown sugar. top taste is herbal, some leather… Length has mint, some good sourness… super astringent…  long lasting aftertaste I’ll go back to that later, i’m feeling tea drunk, i can’t tell if it’s only because of the tea though. So far i’m enjoying the tea a lot, and i started this session with zero hope given the lack of interest i had yesterday for their bing dao, which is clearly a blend. 5/ It’s the astringency that was hiding the texture of the soup: it is indeed super silky… still herbal and now with some more obvious brown sugar right after, the taste is savory too, i’m really enjoying the character of that tea, and i can understand why it’s sold out, unlike their supposed-to-be lbz & bingdao…  6/ becoming wetter, good shengjin… some reminiscences of “that” taste in the aftertaste… the durability seems more than honorable..  … i wanted to compare this naka with a leftover of douji naka ‘09 brick, but it’s pointless.. the douji is everything but delicate and pure, everthing but subtil and smooth… It also has some herbal and minty notes (and a bit of everything actually) and gives a good slow huigan but… no… not today ^^ i’m going to grind some super fresh castillo & caturra beans instead…