Pre-Booking of 8 Years Vintage Black Tea from Yunnan

This year in spring I spent some time in Zhenkang county, Lincang, Yunnan, China for sourcing tea. We found a very rare vintage black tea from one of our manufacturers. This vintage black tea is now opened for pre-booking.

At first this tea was introduced as a gift

In 2015 spring, we have visited a tea manufacturer who is located near Ma An Shan area. On the last day we received a vintage black tea as a gift. I brought it back and tasted the tea. I felt it was very unique. Its flavor is reminiscent of both black tea and vintage oolong tea. Eventually, it became one of my favorite teas in last winter. Since I enjoyed it very much, I had been wishing to purchase this tea when I went back there again this year. Fortunately, my tea manufacturer was still holding some teas. Though it was only about 40kg, I have bought all. As we are sharing between Malaysia and Japan, we could only allocate about 20kg for each market.

A natural farming tea harvested near Ma An Shan

This tea was harvested from the mountain called Huo Cao Shan 火草山. It is located next to Ma An shan. Due to its remote location and less popular, tea was grown in complete natural farming method, using no pesticide and no fertilizer. Tea trees were left in the surrounding ecology. It was growing just like a wild tree. Tea trees were relatively old, generally more than 100 years old. Because of the old age, no fertilizer and any agricultural effort are given, tea tree grows very slowly. The quantity of leaves on these tea trees were less than 1/4 compared to the ordinary tea tree from common tea garden. As it grew slowly, the poly phenols and minerals content are very rich. It gives an extremely long lasting aftertaste and flavor lingers down the throat for a long time. It gives an intermediate body, which is different from the tea from Ma An Shan that usually gives full body.

 

Baking every year in order to enhance its flavor

In the past 8 years, this black tea has not been just kept quietly. The tea manufacturer has moderately baked this tea every year so as to maintain the freshness and low moisture. This is exactly the same technique as how Phoenix tea, Wuyi or Taiwanese vintage oolong is stored. Thank to the refined firing skills of the tea master, this tea is giving a distinctive flavor, that are like fragrant wood, dried persimmon, dried date and brown sugar. Thanks to its sweetish flavor, it could be a great accompany in winter. In addition, this tea gives very mellow and silky mouth-feel thanks to the long aging period. It is reminiscent of vintage Shui Xian oolong.

Vintage Yunnan Black Tea

Right now we are keeping this tea at our warehouse in China. Once we confirm the booking quantity, we will ship it out. We are anticipating that tea will be ready to ship in the middle of September. Please let us know by e-mail if you are interested in this tea. 100g JPY4,300 200g (100g x 2) JPY8,300 600g (100g x 6) JPY24,500 1000g (100g x 10) JPY34,400