• handmade item

• materials: big-leaved arbor tea leaves from Bingdao Laozhai

• shape: brick

• dimension: 14 x 9 x 4 cm / 5.51 x 3.54 x 1.57 in

• weight: 500 g / 17.64 oz

This sheng pu-erh brews a bright golden liquor. It has notes of cut hay and earth in its aroma, complimented with a bold almond, buttery flavour.

We were lucky enough to obtain some of these huangpian which give insights into the highly sought after Bingdao Laozhai sheng pu-erh. Bingdao Laozhai is a place renowned in the Yunnan tea industry. Situated at 1400-2000 meters mountaintops, it is the one and only high altitude village occupied by Dai minority group in the Mengku town region. The price of pu-erh from this village would go into the thousands due to the extremely limited supply. Please visit our Bingdao Laozhai pu-erh blog post to learn more about it.

These huangpian are picked from the same trees as the Bingdao Laozhai, the only difference being that it is less aesthetically pleasing; the bigger leaves (huangpian) are filtered out so that the remaining leaves are neat and symmetrical when pressed into cakes. These bigger leaves are often kept by the tea farmers for personal consumption and are rarely found in the market. Even though the huangpian do not have the tidy appearance of its counterparts, it possesses similar taste characteristics and are sometimes considered more flavourful as the leaves spent longer period of time growing on the trees.