Before I get to today’s delicious tea I want to share a little bit of what I’ve been learning about the Feng Qing Tea Factory…

Feng Qing is a county in Northern Lincang Prefecture, placing it West of the center of Yunnan Province. This region was known as Shunning Prefecture during the Ming Dynasty.

The Shunning Experimental Tea Factory was formed in 1939 and produced extraordinary amounts of Black Tea. The name was changed in 1954 to the Feng Qing Tea Factory, by no coincidence the same year of the adoption of the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China. The relatively newly communist China sought to reorganize the political geography of the country and in doing so renamed the loosely defined region of Shunning to Feng Qing.

There are few tea factories which have withstood the test of time in the face of political turmoil in China so it is no small feat that today I’m drinking Feng Qing tea from 2003.

Today the company is known as the Dian Hong Group, which is fitting because it is the first factory to have produced Dianhong, a now famous Yunnan Black Tea.

Now let’s drink some tea…

Today’s tea is the 2003 Feng Qing Jia Ji Er Deng, a sheng puerh acquired from Yunnan Sourcing. From the Yunnan Sourcing site,

“Jia Ji Er Deng” means Special Grade #2 and was developed by the Feng Qing tea factory in the 90’s. It’s a grade similar to Xiaguan’s Jia Ji grade, or Menghai’s 7542 recipe with an average of grade leaves.”

I threw 7 grams in a 100ml gaiwan and dove in!

The first thing I want to say about this tea is that it does. not. quit. I had 12 steeps of full bodied tea and probably could have gone further than that. Maybe next time a smaller gaiwan…

The tea started a little slowly, being tightly compressed, but immediately gave an unmistakable vanilla sweetness. The first two steeps were incredibly smooth and creamy, and then gave way to increasing bitterness.

As the tea grew stronger, and the liquor darker, I found a distinctly fruity aftertaste, one of my favorite sensations in a raw puerh. Notes peach or nectarine were a welcome substitute for the soft vanilla that had faded after 3 or 4 steeps.

This tea could have been flash steeped at least 7 or 8 times. I got a little eager and over steeped a few times but luckily this tea had more to offer than I could even drink. I would absolutely consider buying a full cake of this tea, truly an easy drinker.