Monday Night in the Brooklyn Zoo

Last Monday was our first tea session. We sat around a living room coffee table, half of which was taken up by the tea table and the other half was taken up miscellaneous teas. Everything from Shi Feng Long Jing fresh from the 2016 harvest, to a giant tuo pu er with from an unknown location and year was present on that table.

At 6 pm the party kicked off with a White Honeycomb Yan Cha from West China Tea Company. This was a nice one to start with because the flavors in this tea are confident with out being overpowering. The waxy honeycomb flavors are balanced nicely by the roast. This is it was an easy drinker and was met with positive responses by people who are not easy to please.

The group was a nice mix of geeky tea drinkers with people who know nothing about tea and just like to hang out. As the night went on the five of us sat around the table and talking about everything from geeky tea facts to Korean bodybuilders. We broken only to run and get towels when the tea table, which is not made from the right wood, started to leak out of a small crack in the bottom. 

I lost track of all the teas drank that night but the West China Tea Company's Yan Cha and Tea Drunk's Long Jing 2016 were defiantly the stars of the night. The mystery pu er was brewed and then quickly discarded with suspicions of mold.

Probably the most interesting part of the night for me was when we brewed a pu er cake I got two years ago. This pu er cake will be a post of its own in the future, but when it was steamed into its cake shape not all of the moisture left the leaf. This obviously put the cake at risk. In the first brew we could taste the moisture. I describe the taste as my grandfather's garage/workshop. This is a taste I often find in bad pu ers, but was surprised to find someone who actually liked it. This taste was present in the first brews, but faded in the following steeps leaving the figs, branchy, nut flavors often found in pu ers. The tea will never be too great, but I think more of the flaws will fade as it ages.

The night went on until midnight. By the end most were proficiently tea drunk and talks began of next week's tea session. We decided that small finger foods would be allowed and if possible we would move it to the communal backyard. These tea sessions tend to start around 6:00 pm but people come and go as they please.

If you are interested please leave a comment or email me at conroy.dylan@outlook.com
All are welcome.