Back after 3 long years, we present to you, one of the most exciting teas from India, the 2023 Spring Wild Gushu Sheng Maocha from Manipur wild tea forest.
 
After years of tweaking and learning, we have finally arrived at a version which is going to be our standard offering. The maocha is processed right like it should be with no extra oxidation & no long wither like we used to love doing. With the kill-green done just right, it preserves the springtime vigour very well. One of the challenges with making this tea early on was getting the kill-green temperature right, which we now realise was kind of impossible to get so early on. People who toss the tea on the wok, need to have the muscle memory to do so, no amount of geekery would add the touch of "chef's kiss" here, intuition is the key.
 
The dry leaf has aroma of sweet red berries and honey. After the rinse when brewing gong fu style, the leaf opens up and you can anticipate your ride ahead. There are notes of sweet mango leather, raisins and apricots. On the first infusion, the first thing noticeable is the thick liquor coating your mouth. There are notes of honey, mangoes and something green but not grassy, closest note which comes to our mind is guava leaf. On the second infusion, the tea is ready to give more of itself and you can taste the kill green toasty taste along with sweet and fruity finish having notes of honey and apricots. On the third infusion, you can taste a little of golden raisins and honey. The finish is fruity and sweet on every steep. The fourth infusion opens up the fruit basket with notes of mangoes, guava, apricots and jujube. There notes dance around till unnumerable infusions. This tea could last you the whole day, there's absolutely no limits to the number of steeps, at least for practical purposes.
 
Appearance : Light orange
Taste : Honey, mango fruit leather, golden raisin, apricot, mango, guava leaf, apricot
Steeping Time : 3 minutes western style, 20 seconds gongfu style adding 10 seconds every subsequent steep
Leaf to water ratio :  0.9 gram per 100ml for western style, 6 grams per 100ml for gongfu style
Recommended Steeping Temperature : 90°C
Harvest Season : Spring 2023
Recommended Steeping Method : Works best gongfu style