For myself, the appeal of Taobao is the massive amount of tea that is otherwise unavailable or difficult to access outside of east Asia. I’ve held off on specific Taobao recommendations because the landscape can change quickly and I tend to create content with a longer release cycle. This post is an exception. I’m writing and releasing this post quickly so they are all currently available at this specific moment of time in February 2026. Some may still be there in a year, others may not.
How To Buy
1. The Direct Method
For those comfortable with the Taobao app, you can buy directly and ship to a shipping agent (like ShipForwarder).
The Process: You buy the tea → ship it to the agent’s warehouse → they consolidate multiple orders → you pay for one international package.
Shipping Lines: * Guangzhou ePacket: Best for small hauls (under 2kg).
EMS: Faster, but expensive.
Sea Freight: The “slow boat,” but significantly cheaper for heavy hauls. Oftentimes unavailable.
Estimated Cost: Expect to pay roughly $0.03–$0.05/g in shipping fees.
2. The Beginner-Friendly Method (Super Buy)
If you don’t want to navigate the Chinese UI, use an intermediary like Super Buy.
Browsing: Use a standard Taobao account to find what you want. Alternatively if you don’t have a Taobao account you can use the Super Buy Browsing function but it is reportedly a bit finicky.
Fund: Send money to your agent (Super Buy) and have them buy it for you. Most will accept paypal or other methods.
Purchasing: Paste that URL into Super Buy. They buy the item for you, receive it, and take QC (Quality Control) photos.
Consolidation: Once all your cakes arrive at their warehouse, you trigger the final international shipment.
Join the The Tea Table Discord. The Taobao channel is a valuable resource for real-time help with account lockouts or finding specific “hidden” storefronts.
Price Range
Taobao has all the price ranges, but western Taobaoers typically shop at what would be considered more of the budget price range in the western scene. I think more people should check out more expensive tea, but I also understand why people opt for inexpensive options when there are a lot of barriers towards pricier gambles. Regardless, I have not tried enough higher-end options to wholeheartedly recommend them so these picks are centered in the $0.05-$0.30/g range.
This is a fancy ripe. Credits to shah for turning me onto this years ago. It used to be pricier but Dayi prices have gone down quite a bit. Very refined and a nice aged profile.
One major risk in Taobao is the storage factor. There’s always some unknown aspect to it. Different vendors have different storage and there’s often a decent degree of variability in the storage offered. For Dayi raw in this age range, much of the storage is a bit drier than my preference. It’s not unforgivable but the storage is an important factor towards how the tea presents. For ripe it’s not nearly as important making it a higher batting average category than raw.
A cheap brick? Really? Credits to Phobos for turning me onto this one and Chen Tang. It’s simply a very good daily drink, antique wood profile. Less tippy and high-end than the Anxiang but just as delicious in most of the ways that count.
If you are a ripe enjoyer, Chen Tang is a good place to pick up a variety of ripes. Fan of 7572? They have a dozen options, almost all inexpensive. Same with much of the other popular Dayi recipes including raw like v93, 7542, 8582, Golden Needle White Lotus, etc.
Dayi to Age: 2015 Dayi Purple via Chen Tang (link) $67/357g ($0.19/g)
In an infamous Hong Kong Category III film, Red to Kill, an evil social worker goes from a seemingly well adjusted empathetic man to an absolute maniac when he gets triggered by the color red. This is how I feel about the western tea scene with the color purple. Purple wrappers seems to drive them into a mania to buy buy buy.
This cake has been peddled around the west for various prices. Like many Dayi teas it was quite a bit higher about 5 years ago, but has fallen to a pretty reasonable price range. If you want to hear our thoughts on this tea search our video archives.
Unlike the Purple, I highly unrecommend Red to Kill unless you derive as much enjoyment from absolute depravity as me.
Mid-Range to Drink/Age: 2008 Liming Yayun via Pu’er Youxuantang(link) $98/357g ($0.27/g)
In Taobao some of the shops sound like consignment or even old school pawn shops. One such store was selling this (not the one mentioned here).
This tea is available from a variety of vendors for around $100-125. It isn’t super budget but it punches a bit above its weight. The Yayun has a pleasing old school, smoky, honey profile. I infamously mixed this up with the pricier 502 Double Lion in a blind tasting. Enjoyable to drink now but should improve. Denny and I split a tong.
Mid-Range to Age: 2005 Nanqiao Blue Peacock via Pu’er Youxuantang(link) $107/357g ($0.30/g)
Old school Bulang profile, a bit smoky and probably needs more time. I think this one needs longer than the Yayun but if you want some sturdy Nanqiao Bulang for a cheaper price (stares Double Lion down) this is your cake. It’s not quite the same tea as Double Lion but it has a strong, resinous, smoky profile.
From good ol classic, Xiaguan specialist MX Tea, a classic tea. The burly, sturdy Jiaji is a workhorse tea that is worth seeking out and referencing. You can get these 22 and 23 year old tuos for an exceedingly reasonable price. 2004 is the better value, the 2003 is a bit better and still not very expensive. The value of MX over other Xiaguan dealers is they are more consistent selecting for decent storage whereas other vendors can be hit or miss.
MX is a good place to find other inexpensive tuos, like the Teji.
Mid-Range to Drink: 2004 Xiaguan Gold Ribbon Red Eye (link) $32/100g ($0.32/g)
Like a true Taobao degenerate I check MX’s new listings regularly. They sometimes release one-offs or teas that are in limited quantities and sell out quickly. One such tea was the aforementioned Yayun, which was sold out by the time I received my sample cake (Denny and I bought the rest from other vendors). The Gold Ribbon Red Eye is one where I’m not sure how long it will be around. It’s a special production made by XY that is smoother than your standard Jiaji but retains a bit of that crane taste (moreso than the Nanzhao). The later years are better value (2006/2007) but I find the price difference worth it for something a bit older with better material. This is smoother and more easy to drink than the Jiaji right now.
Come, open your wallet and join the Taobao Degen club.
It is fun and exciting as a novice to dive into the world of tea drinking and appreciation. In the beginner phase after you’ve had an introduction to tea, it can feel like the possibilities of different tea types and vendors is limitless. Drinking comes easy with a strong sense of purpose in tea drinking and exploration. (spoilers) This feeling does not last. You are only a new tea drinker once and while the tea world is vast there is a limit to the high of exploration. Only so many teas to explore that truly bring a higher or new experience and at a certain point you may start to feel burnt out. With the exception of tea drinkers that completely peter out, most tea drinkers settle into some sort of rhythm of tea drinking devoid of that initial sense of purpose.
Drinking With a Purpose
The understanding that the initial exploration high is transient can be a bit depressing. Drinking with intent and a purpose feels good. But… it does not necessarily permanently have to end. Now settling into a regular rotation of teas you enjoy that pass the speed test isn’t a bad thing and is enjoyable in its own right. The trick is finding the right context or angles to explore to keep things interesting.
I’m about 15 years into more serious tea drinking and still find plenty of interesting new teas to try and discover. Part of this is due to the depth of tea to explore. But a lot of it is being creative, purposeful and varied in the context of drinking the same teas. I drink more or less the same types of teas I drank a decade ago, but I can still find different angles for exploration.
Finding the Angles That Interest You
One type of episode I’ve done quite a bit in the past year is a side by side comparison with another tea. The SbS (side by side) comparison helps distinguish more up front notes like flavor, texture, body, etc. When I drink tea with others we rarely drink this way, instead drinking a tea for several infusions and then moving on to another. This is a bit better for determining differences in aftertaste and seeing how a tea develops because teas are not put into such a direct contrast. I see all these methods as approaching the same tea from a different angle that can help in more fully understanding teas. Mixing up the way you are trying the tea can help you focus and concentrate on different aspects while keeping tea drinking fresh.
It can sometimes be helpful for me to dictate the purpose of a session, whether it is to evaluate a certain tea, learn more about how its storage presents, or even if I outright say that a session is sheerly for enjoyment. This focuses my attention better and helps to dictate my angle. I also find this statement of purpose can be clarifying and let’s me just end a session rather than trying to extract 100% of it.
Themes
Another angle is a themed tasting. A great way to learn about tea in both an enjoyable and deeper way is to undergo a themed sampling. It is far easier to learn drinking similar teas in close proximity than it is to drink them over the course of a lifetime. Perhaps it is a specific brand within a certain age range, Xiaguan 2005-2008 or a small-leaf varietal (Yibang/Xikong) or a specific Heicha. As followers of the blog would know, I love this approach. Tastings in 2025 featuring Xiaguan masochism and the massive Yiwu-ish report along with a few smaller ones. Drinking themed sessions allows me to really appreciate the teas that stand out amongst their peers in a way that I might not if I had them solely on their own. I feel it also helps encourage a more profound, deeper understanding of a specific tea type.
Drinking Tea With Others
Another great way to drink tea with a purpose is to have it with others. Drinking tea in the west is often a solo experience. Having people to talk about teas with is both enjoyable and a great learning opportunity. This can come in many forms.. If possible, sitting down for tea is always fun. I’ve had great sessions with people who are newer as well as old tea veterans. I’ve also had many fruitful conversations comparing notes on certain teas in online spaces, such as Discord.
Drinking with a purpose almost always beats drinking haphazardly. Think about what would make tea drinking interesting to you. Not everyone’s answer will be the same, but hopefully this post gives people some ideas on how to keep the flame burning.
I think if you surveyed tea heads about the most important pu’erh operation over the course of the past century, you’d end up with one answer, Menghai Tea Factory. Not only was Dayi prominently involved in the invention of shu pu’erh cha (ripe tea) but they remain the industry standard for ripe pu’erh production and the primary pu’erh investment commodity for speculators. With falling prices and increasing accessibility, for actual tea drinkers Dayi remains a strong option for both newcomers and veteran drinkers. As I’ve gotten more than a decade into pu’erh drinking, I’ve become more and more convinced that people should start with and get their feet under them with Dayi pu’erh before moving onto other avenues.
Where is Menghai Tea Factory Material From?
Menghai tea factory is based in Menghai county. Like eastern Xishuangbanna (6FM/greater Yiwu) it has a long history of pu’erh production. Unlike that area, Menghai county is generally more associated with larger factories and blending. Menghai Tea Factory has large gardens in varying places around Menghai county and draws primarily from them to make their blends. Mountains like Bada, Bulang, Nannuo, Mengsong, etc. Occasionally you will see teas being marketed from a single mountain like Bulang, but the vast majority of Dayi products are multi-mountain blends.
Why Buy Dayi Teas?
Semi-aged and aged raw Dayi give a solid baseline for pu’erh. It won’t end up as everyone’s ideal but it is definitely one to benchmark. Dayi of a certain age is on average is better than competing factories, Xiaguan, Haiwan, etc. And frankly speaking, boutique teas are weird, variable and much more difficult to benchmark. They offer a huge variety but bring forth many challenging, beginner unfriendly topics. Better to get your feet under you with proper decent factory pu’erh.
Dayi is also now easy to find semi-aged from the late 2000s (2006-2009) and the prices tend towards the reasonable (2008 8582 can be found for $50ish). When I started drinking pu’erh teas in this age range these same teas were not even 10 years old. Now they are nearly 20! I wish I focused more on Dayi and less on boutique, especially when I started. Don’t invest completely into boutique marketing, whether it is a western vendor or a Taiwanese boutique. At least give semi-aged Dayi a proper shot.
For ripe teas this is a no brainer. Dayi has long been considered the standard bearer. While I do like boutique ripes, I’d recommend people try out Dayi first to get their bearings. These are also not expensive. You can easily find under $20-30 357 gram cakes of ripe with a few years. Even their fancy products are usually just a bit more.
Common Mistakes
Menghai Tea Factory vs. Menghai County. I have consistently seen this mistake for over a decade. Menghai County is a very large geographical location where pu’erh is grown. Menghai tea factory / Dayi is a tea factory. Do not assume because something is labeled Menghai it is a Menghai Tea Factory production. Pay attention if it is explicitly Menghai Tea Factory or Dayi.
7542 & 8582. Commission vs. actual production.Oooh I’ve tried a 7542 before, a 2003 7542 before. 7542 and 8582 are Dayi recipes so surely anything under those recipe numbers must be made by Menghai Tea Factory. Wrong. The terms 7542 and 8582 were poorly regulated before 2005, which meant random custom productions not even made by Menghai Tea Factory were circulated as these classic recipes. Beware products that are just generically labeled 7542 and 8582, especially if it does not specify it was made by Menghai Tea Factory. If you want to taste what Menghai Tea Factory tastes like, these are not good reference points and will only lead to even more confusion. Pay attention to whether the recipe is explicitly an official Dayi production. One such example is the 2003 Hong Kong Henry Serious Formula 7542. This is not a Dayi product and does not taste like a Dayi 7542 despite being sold for years as 7542.
Fakes. Dayi is a commonly faked brand and I’ve heard a few reliable people say there’s way more fake Dayi than actual Dayi. Something I have not verified but seems completely plausible. What’s the best way to avoid this? Especially as a beginner it’s simply to follow the path others have traveled. Do not buy the cheapest thing you see on Taobao, use others recommendations to buy from generally reliable sources.
Modern Eras of Menghai Tea Factory
1940-1995 – While Menghai Tea Factory was created in 1940, and there is plenty of interesting history for pre-1996 Menghai Tea Factory, these teas are frankly very hard to find so this information is mostly not too useful. Generally speaking, most of these were pressed under recipe numbers 7542, 7532, 8582, and before that in the 1950s/1960s as Hongyin (Red Mark) and Lanyin (Blue Mark). Teas from this era were almost all traditionally stored (the norm for decades).
1996-2004– Pu’erh production was privatized and you start to see teas being openly labeled coming from a specific tea factory, i.e. Menghai Tea Factory, Yichanghao, Xiaguan, Haiwan, etc. There’s quite a few products during this time. Various 7542s (1997 Blue Water Mark, 2001 Simplified Yun), the Bok Choy series (Banzhang), Big Green Tree Series, Gold/Silver Dayi, etc. Teas in this period are quite pricy compared to newer eras mainly because production quantity was still not too high yet. The default storage starts to change towards the drier, but a large amount of tea from this period was still traditionally stored, particularly from the 1990s.
2005-2013 – Big organizational change for Menghai Tea Factory. 2005 is an interesting and unique year because it was the first year after the organizational shift. The prices are a fair bit higher than later years but not as high as pre-reform years. One reason occasionally given is that farmers wanted to show support for Menghai TF and provided quality material as a result. I’ve also heard that they still had maocha from pre-reform that had yet to be pressed. During this period a good deal of Menghai TF alumni would go off and start or work at newer companies. This time period was a huge period of growth for the pu’erh industry with increasingly more pu’erh being produced both in general but also by Dayi.
2014-onwards – Not as hard of a cutoff as 2004 was, but this era of Dayi has been marked with a lot of questions regarding their quality, specifically processing changes done to make the tea more palatable quicker, specifically more oxidation and less rolling.
What Teas Should I Try?
As a beginner the sweet spot is the 2005-2013 range. The prices aren’t as crazy as pre-2004 teas and are much easier to find. As you move deeper into the 2010s, there are increasing questions regarding quality and processing. The more age the better in most cases. Although you can certainly try younger Dayi curious, I would try to make earlier teas your goal.
If you have the experience and budget, the earlier era pre 2004 is well worth checking out, just be aware that storage can be highly variable and they will be much pricier than teas post 2004 and harder to find. Also please do remember that just because something carries a Dayi factory recipe label (7542, 8582) it doesn’t mean it’s a Dayi tea. There are a ton of sketchy non Dayi tea floating around with those labels. Try them if you like but do not treat them like a genuine reference of that recipe.
Unlike Xiaguan or most other factories, most baseline Dayi teas from 2005-2010 are typically serviceable. You could pick semi-randomly if you buy in the right range and probably do generally OK. Still, it is always a good idea to get a baseline with their most famous recipes. Try 7542, 8582, and if you feel like it 7532 and Spring of Menghai. For ripe, try 7572, 8592, 7262, and a tip heavy blend like Golden Needle White Lotus. These are not the premium products (those tend to be special productions) but their classic recipes they press frequently.
Where Can I Buy Them?
Taobao remains an underrated source for getting Dayi. Buy from an authorized dealer in the correct age range and you should do alright. One problem I’ve ran into, is the storage often runs a bit drier than my own preference even from the Guangdong sources (climate controlled or shipped from elsewhere). King Tea Mall or Yunnan Sourcing are also around, just expect to pay a bit more with less selection.
With the current trade situation, Taiwan may or may not be an option. Teas We Like and Quiche (TSH) are decent options. Like mainland sources, there’s no guarantee how long they’ve had the tea. Even with all these question marks I think pursuing and trying to develop some understanding of Dayi is something every aspiring pu-head should do.
Along with ~50 other people I participated in an aged oolong tasting curated by Marshaln. Marshaln has a fantastic blog, which is easily best English language source on aged oolongs. I highly recommend reading through everything with the aged oolong tag on his site. For the blind tasting I did the full gauntlet twice. Once with Hanji when he passed through Seattle, and a second time with Denny and John on a Dennysode.
Aged Oolongs in the West
Aged oolongs is amongst the least discussed teas types in the online discourse. The best ones Denny and I have come across in the last 10 years from a western vendor are the aged Baozhongs from Everlasting Teas but most of what I drink comes from my travels. The state of the scene has not changed much from its sorry state since I did The Box report about a decade ago.
While I own my fair share of aged oolongs, I don’t talk about them hardly at all. Mostly because I have noone to talk about them with. A tasting like this gives people a chance to drink tea and importantly discuss it and learn together.
The Tasting Design & Distinctiveness
These were labeled A-G and consumed blind.
Even though I have some experience, the tasting was still pretty edifying. Marshaln clearly selected the teas by their distinctive characteristics you’d run into searching for aged oolongs in Taiwan. There’s some overlap between a couple teas but not a lot. The tasting is also instructive because now a set of drinkers have the shared experience of tasting the same set of teas that we can use as references. For instance I can tell Denny it reminds me of tea B in Marshaln’s set and he will know what I mean.
I am writing this up because I am hoping that it can help mentally categorize different sorts of aged oolongs even if you can’t try the teas.
What Were The Teas?
We were instructed to drink A and B first to calibrate our tastes before moving onto C-G. It was also suggested that we drink them all gongfu and grandpa at least once.
A – Presents pretty young and does not have a ton of aged notes. The important thing with A is the semi-aged profile that will develop eventually towards plum. Unlike pu’erh where we can try teas semi-aged or in progress, most of my oolong experience is unaged or aged (25+), which creates a gap in my knowledge of what an oolong in the process of aging should taste like.
Marshaln described this as a 10-15 year old high mountain oolong. Also mentioned that this was recently re-roasted, which was done subtly enough that I did not pick up on. To me this felt closer to young tea than the aged oolongs I’m familiar with.
B- Very roasty and carbonized. B is hard to identify any actual age because it lacks much aged taste. It also represents a type that littered the western scene when I started drinking tea. Very important to be able to identify if you are interested in aged oolongs. The good thing is most are pretty easy to place because the roast is so prominent. Tea that undergoes this sort of heavy re-roasting has its aged notes significantly reduced.
Marshaln described the roast as doing the heavy lifting. He also noted that it brews more brown than red, something that can signify a more roast heavy aged oolong.
C – The first one that really presents a significant amount of aged taste. Has a nice brightness. Wood, leather, some light earth. This is the sort of tea that would easily pass the speed test for me. It is smooth, sweet and easy going down and brews flexibly.
Marshaln described this as a Baozhong with 20+ years of aging. The most interesting part of this is the hint at what it was like when young. Here it is described as having relatively minimal roasting.
D – When Hanji and I originally had this we pegged it as similar to B. This turned out to not line up with later sessions with it. Maybe we were going too fast or the contrast with C was too extreme. It does present very differently than something like C and F. It is earthy, mineraly, the roast is fairly far in background and in the later steeps I could barely taste it. Denny described this as brandy-like. Some nice mouth coating sweetness. Can get a little sour when pushed but nothing too bad. This one seemed to vary quite a bit depending on water and how it was brewed.
According to Marshaln this has unknown provenance and speculated that it might be a heavily roasted export grade tea. The heavy roast and different starting point might explain why D differs from something like C or F which have more minimal roasting.
E – Very musty. A clear through-line to Liubao or ripe pu’erh. Along with B, this would be my least favorite of the set. I’ve ran into a few like this and it’s a type I’d probably avoid. Their smooth and easy going down but I’d rather just drink heicha or ripe over something like this.
The interesting part is how something ends up like this rather than properly aged or even sour (the typical result of getting too much humidity). Marshaln offers some hints saying that the owner discovered that this had turned moldy and ended up storing it with some ripe. He also noted the dullness of the leaves.
F – An immediately appealing tea. Lots of sweetness. Honey, plum, a light tartness when pushed. Decent body. On average I probably had the best time with this tea. Hanji and I guessed this was an old Dongding.
This turned out to be an aged Baozhong. It is older and has developed deeper aged notes than C. I am curious if C would develop more of a similar profile given enough time. Similar to C it is described as having a relatively light roast.
G – Very ground up material. A lot of people have this marked as their favorite. While I agree this has the best material, I had mixed results especially in a mug where I am admittedly a novice. When I got it right, it was very smooth, aged taste, earthy, mineraly. It actually reminded me the most of D, although the material here is better but more ground up.
Marshaln said this is from fannings of old Dongdings from the 1980s, noting the material is the best of the tasting.
Things I Learned
Minimal roasting even early on is fine. One preconception I had was that only mid-fired or darker teas could be aged. Marshaln speculated that C and F were both light roasted, and those turn out to be two of my favorite profiles. A also had a lighter roasted profile and seemed to be moving in an agreeable and possibly similar direction.
Learning about aged profiles.. Distinguishing between the aged profile of C and F versus D and G is interesting because it might determine what profile a tea will age into. It’s also interesting to hear how something like A may move into a C or F profile as it gets another couple decades.
Water matters a lot. This is obvious but there were interesting tasting variations by some of the participants, many of which might be chalked up to the water. In Seattle and the Pacific Northwest people always say we have good water. This might be true, but we more specifically have soft, low TDS water. When I’ve measured the TDS of our tap it is around 30-40TDS, quite different from the majority of other people’s taps.
Mugging covering up flaws was stressed throughout the tasting. As someone who doesn’t mug tea, it was good to get a bit more experience.
Open Questions: The Importance of Temperature!?
The largest open question I have is on the importance of temperature to the aging. In theory the enemy of aging oolongs is the humidity, making the west a theoretically reasonable place to store them. How important is it to be hot? For pu’erh we know that temperature has a massive impact on the end product and a place that is cold but humid isn’t really very good for transforming pu’erh. For oolongs we simply don’t know.
Thanks to Marshaln for putting this on. I enjoyed drinking and discussing the teas with others!
Since diving back into tea at the end of 2024, I’ve done a lot of thinking on how the tea scene has changed and what the ideal intro to different tea types are. In many ways the ideal way to approach Taiwanese oolongs or Yancha is the same as it was in 2012. Identify specialized vendors in that tea type and sample a bunch. You’ll pay more and have less choices than someone based in east Asia but that is the reality of being based in a different continent. As is often the case, pu’erh tends to complicate things more, due to the variety and diversity of approaches. The easiest way to make sense of this is to break down pu’erh into simpler components and categories, like Five Types of Raw Pu’erh You Should Try. A decade ago the conversations mostly centered around young boutique and larger regions, like Yiwu. In reading about specific teas I was highly influenced by bloggers like Half Dipper and Jakub (Marshaln didn’t focus on reviews). Scroll back to what they were drinking in 2013, and you’ll see a wide array of young recently produced pu’erh many under western vendor’s labels. Factory pu’erh seemed to be an afterthought. Not to say it wasn’t around, Yunnan Sourcing sold some stuff or you could go to various ebay vendors who hopefully would sell the real deal. But factory teas simply weren’t a huge focus of conversation in the pu’erh community a 10-12 years ago. No doubt TeaDB was a part of this same movement pushing things in the young boutique. Looking back, I think this was suboptimal and perhaps even a bit strange. If someone came to me and wanted to get into pu’erh, besides directing them towards the different types I’d encourage them to get their baseline from factory pu’erh made between 2005-2008. Here’s why.
1. They Are Old Enough Now & Have Aged Good Enough to Give a Good Baseline
This is a math problem. Factory teas are mostly made to be stored and not consumed young. Back in 2014, teas between 2005-2008 were not even 10 years old. Now they are 17-20 years old, firmly semi-aged. The time allows these teas to darken, mellow and get to a more drinkable place. I’d still generally recommend people try them from places besides Kunming where they’ve seen real heat and humidity (Taiwan, Guangdong, Malaysia, etc.).
As production expanded throughout the 1990s and 2000s, there was speculation as to how the tea would age. Generally speaking it seems like factory teas has aged fine. While the 2005-2008 are not nearly as strong as their predecessors (say 1980s/1990s Dayi), they do exist along a similarish aging trajectory, unlike many boutique teas.
2. It is Easy to Find
Yunnan factories crank out a ton of tea every year. These are not boutique single tree runs and even the limited special products operate at a certain scale. But besides the handful of Dayi and Xiaguan that Yunnan Sourcing or other western vendors sold these products were largely unavailable from the western market. Sure you could risk Taobao, but that is a lot of hoops to jump through.
Now it is much easier. You have all of the original channels, the generally reliable King Tea Mall, Teaswelike, Quiche Teas, etc. Taobao is considerably easier to navigate than it used to be. There are multiple established Dayi flagship sources and there are a lot more people with taobao experience that can help you (join a Discord!).
3. Reasonable Prices
You’d think with another decade of storage these would now be extremely expensive. Teas that were 17-20 years old were not cheap in 2012. I’m happy to report that is not the case . A huge part of this is simply the quantity of pu’erh made. The last few years have not been kind to Dayi stocks and their prices remains at a bit of a low point, where you can snag cakes through reputable channels for under $100 cake easily. Xiaguan and other factories are generally priced even less than Dayi teas.
You may ask, why not go a bit older if prices are so cheap? Unfortunately it remains difficult to find reliable pre-reform (earlier than 2005) tea. These teas are generally considered stronger and better, an assessment I agree with, but because of the more limited quantity they are much more expensive than an average factory production from 2008.
4. Boutique Pu’erh is Complicated and Weird (Not Just Western Boutiques)
Boutique pu’erh is weird. It is easy to be allured by the promise of fantastic tea leaves from old grove trees. Seems like a simple enough idea. Unfortunately it has ended up being anything but.. Boutique products being smaller runs allow more variability in how the leaves are processed. In trying to create a product that can taste better young, the tea can be processed in ways that make it taste good but age poorly (underrolled, green tea pu’erh, honged). This is fine if you want to consume the tea young, but not great for those that prefer aged pu’erh. Conversations prop up regularly about certain products not aging well or being processed in a way that makes the tea taste good young but age poorly (see Green Tea Pu’erh). It has both complicated and expanded the variety of pu’erh by a wide margin. Now you have to learn about proper processing and be able to taste if there are processing flaws if you want the tea to continue being decent. It can be quite difficult and frankly tedious.
Being a pu-head in the 1980s/1990s would’ve been comparatively quite dull, choosing between a handful of traditionally stored productions. In 2025, the amount of productions, boutique and factory is quite overwhelming.. It is part of the rabbithole, but it is easy to get confused.. Factory tea from the mid 2000s (minus the wrapperology) is back to basics.
A veteran drinker complained about how drinking Taiwanese boutique pu’erh is generally not worth it because you have to drink through all their strangely, processed perfumed house note to even get to their base taste. Now that I’m semi-experienced with pu’erh I immediately understood what they were talking about. If I were to do over my tea hobby, I would not have focused nearly as much on boutique pu’erh from the get go and instead shifted it towards factory tea. In this alternate universe, I think I probably would’ve bought some boutique pu’erh at some point but I think I focused far too heavily on it for my first 5 or 6 years of tea drinking. Imagine getting recommended Xizi Hao from the start as some sort of endgame of tea and getting your baseline set with these teas. Many boutiques will give you experience in a very specific little niche of the pu’erh game.
Many of my favorite pu’erh teas I own are boutique productions. These do have real upside if done properly. I tend to think of boutiques as a high potential ceiling, but also a low floor that comes with an expensive price tag compared with factory tea. There are good boutique teas, but it can be a morass getting to them.
Which Teas?
So the list is still subject to change over time, but these are the recommendations as of Summer 2025. I think this list would be similar to one from 5-6 years ago or so as these teas are large scale productions and don’t skate in and out of availability as much as boutique pu’erh.
My advice is to focus on Dayi and then Xiaguan, with potential add ons from places like Mengku or whatever.
2006/2008 Dayi 8582
2006/2007/2008/2010 Dayi 7542
2005 Xiaguan T8653 Thick Paper (Early in the Year Batch)
There are a ton of factory productions but I think these three will give a steady foundation for pu’erh that you can use as a springboard to dive deeper into factory tea or branch out into the wild world of boutiques.
Where Should I Buy These?
It is easiest to purchase these from TeasWeLike or Quiche (dropships Taishunhe). For those brave enough, the lowest prices are probably on Taobao (you need you to use an agent like SuperBuy or ShipForwarder).
You can try some of the Dayi Flagships or Chentang for Menghai Tea Factory. For Xiaguan, MX is the most reliable and decent option.
The 1995/96/97 Zhenchunya Hao are a series of famous cakes made by Lv Lizhen (from Taiwan) in collaboration with former Yiwu village head Zhang Yi. They were made in the midst of a several decade run of pu’erh factory dominance and were created as a callback to the Haoji era predating WWII, where brands (SPH, TQH, FYC) based in the six famous mountains/Yiwu area made pu’erh. The ZCYH also signifies the beginning of a new era of pu’erh where smaller, boutique operations started to operate eventually growing into what the pu’erh industry is today.
Supposedly some of the earlier batches of 1995 were trial runs. There is also supposed to be considerable batch variation. This batch was made in 1996 and pressed in 1997 with materials from Manxiu, Luoshuidong, excluding Mahei.
Lv Lizhen continued to press pu’erh later under his own label. As did Zhang Yi (Shunshixing).
Major thank you to Linda Louie of Bana Tea for selling me a sample of this to drink with Denny and to write this up.
Age & Storage
One reason I sought out the Zhenchunya Hao was to get an idea of how boutiques are aging. It is now possible to find Taiwanese boutiques (CYH, YQH, XZH, BYH) with tea around 20 years old. But it is very rare to find 25+ year old boutique tea. The ZCYH is very close to 30 years. It’s also a tea with a mixed reputation and not necessarily unanimous praise.
For anything significantly aged, storage plays a key component in how the tea presents. In the episode recorded, Denny and I were not familiar with how the tea was stored although it was clear it was kept dry. After we recorded the episode I asked Linda and received the following information:
1997-Early 2000s – Hong Kong w/Vesper Chan.
Early 2000s-2017 – Kunming.
2017-2025 – Los Angeles
Preparation
I kept the sample in my pumidor open for several months before our episode.
I tried to calibrate my tastes and had some of my favored early 2000s Yiwu boutiques before the session, teas like the 2003 Wistaria Zipin, 2003 Chenyuan Hao Tongqing Hao, and 2004 Biyun Hao Manzhuan.
A couple things I was looking out for:
Sleepy or dying. While I don’t have prior experience with this to compare with boutique teas there’s an air of uncertainty about their aging trajectory.
Aged oolong-notes. I’d heard murmurs that this may have some aged oolong notes.
I brewed in a gaiwan, about 5g:75ml. Why a gaiwan for such an old tea? I have been using a gaiwan very consistently and I think there’s something to be said for brewing in your comfort zone. Oftentimes the best brewing device is the one you are currently using the most. I kept the steeps short and slowly pushed them out as I saw necessary, boiling before every steep. The leaves were already looseish. I don’t have a great feel for the compression of the cake but I’d guess it is looser than factory tea (stone pressed).
The Session
Steeps 1-2.
Starts out very concentrated and dense. This tea is very much alive from the get-go! Thick but not oily. The taste is heavy wood with a nice sweetness that really lingers. Resin, tree sap, very impressive aftertaste. The aftertaste I feel tips its hand at being an Yiwu tea. Rewatching our video, I think my solo session is starting out even stronger.
Steeps 3-4.
Loses a touch of density but more brightness comes out. A bit of cherry combined with the wood. These steeps are the most reminiscent of aged oolongs. A very pungent and intense aged oolong. The aftertaste is very nice and coats the back of the mouth and throat, very deep. Denny and I noted some slight tanginess in our session, which do not show up here.
Steeps 5-7.
As I add time it picks up back some density. Note-wise it moves away from the brighter notes into pine and resin, and refined, antique woody notes. There are hints of brightness but the brightness albeit less so than our prior session. Having the full dose on my own I am struck by the strength of the tea.
Steeps 8-10.
Done a bit later in the day. Variation on what has happened earlier. These are very pleasant steeps that are very woody and reasonably active and felt deeply.
Steeps 11+.
Done over the course of a couple days. Similar to what has come earlier.
Processing
I do not detect much evidence of oxidation. The leaves are thick and plump, not brittle. The wet leaves indicate that these were significantly rolled, especially compared with what is often sold by boutique operations these days. The rolling is something that Linda had also mentioned to me. This tea hints at a couple aged oolong vibes in its brightness if you look closely, but mostly feels like a 20 year old boutique pu’erh with solid strength.
Most Similar Teas & The Next Chapter
Of the teas I had ahead of time, it’s really not too similar to any of them. Due to the drier storage, it is actually a bit less matured than most of those 20-25 year old boutiques that have been aged predominantly in Taiwan. I think the biggest hints I have are a previous session I had with the unofficial 2000 Zhenchunya Hao made by Chen Huaiyuan (CYH boss, who was mentored by Lv Lizhen) and perhaps the 2003 Chenyuan Hao TQH Reproduction. The 2000 tea was much less bright and more mellow than the 1996 and had moved into very woody territory without the brighter notes that the 1996 ZCYH sometimes had. I think it is plausible that this tea moves in that direction. The depth and lasting sweetness remind me a bit of Zipin but that’s not an uncommon Yiwu characteristic either.
One note that is not present here is zhangxiang, something that is missing from quite a few Taiwanese boutique productions. I don’t know if that necessarily signifies a negative, but it is a difference between many of the standout factory productions I’ve had.
Final Thoughts
This tea easily exceeds my expectations. Perhaps I have been too trained on the softer boutique teas that came later, but the strength and density of the tea should not be underrated. While it isn’t the 1988 Qingbing in strength this isn’t just a delicate boutique and has a strong backbone behind it with high quality aftertaste and depth. I would not be comfortable saying this is way better than the highest rated teas I had in my Yiwu Mega-Report but it is definitely amongst the best teas featured there. The tea is also very lively and I think could certainly be aged more. Big thank you to Linda for your generosity!
Like the Yiwu Megareport this is a return to a couple reports I did in the 2010s. The first focused on Bulang and the second on Menghai County tea. The initial Bulang report had teas ranging from fresh to 12 years old with an average age of maybe 3-5 years. Coming back to the Bulang theme a decade later there’s a large chunk of teas at the 15-20 year mark, with just two teas being produced since 2020. The maturation of these teas has tamed the famed Bulang bitterness and made for a much more enjoyable drink through.
Banzhang is in Bulang so it is shoehorned in as are some teas that are Bulang adjacent.
Bitter to Sweet Conversion
Classic Bulang and Banzhang tea are famous for a punchy and potent profile with a quick conversion of bitterness into sweetness. A characteristic that is also oft cited for classic 7542. It’s a classical pu’erh note and not hard to spot in both factory and boutique versions of these teas. The speed of the conversion is another trait to note. Something like the 2002 Menghai TF Bok Choy had a very quick returning sweetness. There are also other teas that are much slower to convert or don’t convert at all which results in a pervasive lingering bitterness, something I’m not really a fan of. In ripes I’ve come to appreciate it on occasion or when it is well integrated into the tea.
Bulang Structure & The Value of Blending
There’s a fair deal of repetition in the profiles dealt with. I did enjoy most of the teas, but Bulang has a more narrow profile compared with the 6fm on a whole, which is why expanding it to Menghai County and Menghai area blends makes sense. After all these areas have a history of being blended together. When a factory or producer moved outside of Bulang for more of a blend, like many of the Dayi teas which don’t specify geographical provenance it can fix this problem by creating more dynamism.
Slower Storage Hasn’t Been Awful
In past reports I’ve talked about the importance of storage. For factory teas this absolutely matters. In particular something like Xiaguan really needs good storage to smooth it out. For Bulang teas while I would definitely prefer storage in Taiwan, southern China or the tropics over the US the slower storage hasn’t been nearly as awful as I anticipated. Something like the 2010 Gumingxiang Banpen has clearly mellowed especially when I look back at my notes from a decade ago.
Boutique vs. Factory
Western Xishuangbanna doesn’t have the same boutique prominence that Yiwu and eastern Xishuangbanna does. My Yiwu report was dominated by mostly boutique teas, with very occasional factory toss ins from the turn of the century. In Menghai County it is a different story. You have the factory (Dayi) based in Menghai County, cranking out different blends many of which could be roughly grouped with teas here. While I almost included a bunch of Dayi teas, most are not explicitly Bulang, and I decided to save some ammunition for 2026 where I’ll be doing my best to cover more of Menghai TF teas.
In my TeaDB 2.0 phase I’ve leaned a more towards factory than boutique, having done the vast majority of boutique buying 7-10 years ago. I think this preference holds true for most of the teas here. Another advantage to the teas I sampled a decade ago is that there is simply way more 15-20 year old tea available. The teas from 2005-2010 were about 5-10 years old when I tried them back then and now have reaped the benefits of time.
Goals:
Stash check.
What should the average (VOATO) and benchmark teas be? The Malaysian stored 502 Double Lions probably has the biggest reputation of any overtly Bulang tea. Is this deserved?
Ratings
As has been the case for previous reports I am rating purely on my own appreciation of the tea at the moment I drank it and the ratings are not a reflection on the potential of the tea.
Nanqiao/Liming
Nanqiao ended up being the benchmark for this.. Famously in the western scene they have the Double Lion whose Malaysian stored version remains a very solid benchmark and one of the better teas of the report. It seems like the one remaining state-run factory Liming (which I’ve always thought of as B-tier Dayi) made quite a bit of tea from this area.
Amazingly Liming has never been featured on a TeaDB video. It’s not really a factory I hold in high regard (B/C level Dayi) but some of their teas in this era are decent.
2008 Liming Yayun (A/B)
Sold by Quiche but also available on Taobao from a number of vendors for much less. Solid tea. The bitterness is mild, but the bones are strong. Thick, oily resinous. Retired smoke. Leaves a nice aftertaste on the back of the mouth. Very classical and I think this is entering a state of being drinkable. Perhaps reminiscent of the 7742 except more ready.
2007 Nanqiao Early Spring Tribute (C)
Decent overall. It isn’t as potent as most of the other teas here and instead leans more heavily into flora, sugarcane, and grassy notes. Still it is thick and hints at some past smoke. I’d say that this needs more time, heat and humidity, but for the price it’s a reasonable value.
2006 Nanqiao Double Lions (A/B)
I don’t know exactly what version this was, it might be the smaller 250g cake. Regardless it is a solid, often overlooked tea. Wood, oily. Takes a bit of time to open up. Definitely not as punchy and only lightly bitter. It has good aftertaste and coats the mouth nicely. The sessions on it are a bit varied with some being a little less satisfying and others feeling like the real successor to DL.
I also was able to session a CN stored one, which was also pretty good. Retired smoke, wood, incense, oily. Almost as good as the MY version. The 2006 is well worth pursuing if you want a great PQ ratio.
2006 Liming Arbor Wild Arbor King (B)
Pretty good tea, with a very classical Bulang/Menghai profile. Smoky, heavy BBQ, needs a lot more time but it has good bones. Decently oily with a good aftertaste. Wood, pine, resin. Needs heat/humidity but Kunming has chipped away at it.
2005 Nanqiao Double Lion 502 (A)
A very good standard. Woody, incense. The bitterness isn’t as strong as you’d think. Maybe for boutique bros. But it is very intense and concentrated. Good, booming aftertaste. I’ve struggled with how to rate teas like this in the past but the Malaysian stored in particular holds strong in a lot of aspects and I’ve risen in my own enjoyment of the tea over the past 7 or 8 years.
2005 Nanqiao Double Lion 501 (A/B)
For a tea I almost never heard about this was shockingly good. It does a very good impersonation of the 502 with just a bit less strength. Wood, incense, protracted mouthfeel, strong immediate aftertaste. Need to SbS with 502 to more fully parse out differences.
2005 Nanqiao Banzhang Tuo (C)
Unfortunately not everything Nanqiao made in 2005 was great. This one isn’t awful but doesn’t really impress either. In contrast with something like DL it is thinner and more narrow. Some light fruit and the aftertaste does resolve well but it’s not that pleasant to drink. It needs quite a bit more time and even then I don’t think this will get close to the NQ DL.
2005 Nanqiao Purple Peacock (A/B)
Southern Chinese stored. This tea is in a nice place to be consumed. I don’t think it is quite as Bulang heavy as other teas in the report or perhaps it is just more tamed. Thick, wood, leather. Mouthcooling early. Not too bitter but can get astringent. Goes down easier than Double Lions but with a little less potency.
2005 Nanqiao Liming Impression (B)
This one isn’t as good as the 2006 Liming Arbor but is a little more aged. Oily, woody, has a bit more depth but a little less oomph than the Arbor. Good thickness overall.
2005 Nanqiao Blue Peacock (A/B)
This is a good tea and undercovered compared to other Nanqiaos from this era. Very concentrated and oily. Still has some BBQ-like smoke. Good throat coat. Still pretty drying and not quite ready but this has good expansiveness and is aging well. I don’t quite agree that this is better than the best of DL, but it is operating on the same playing field.
2004 Nanqiao Double Lions (A)
I suspect most would put this above the 2005. I’m a bit more split and to me this feels like it is in a smoother state but also lacks the intense concentration and pungency that makes the 502 so memorable. It still has very similar notes, oily, woody, some incense. In particular those who prefer boutique over factory will go for this as it has certain refined characteristics the 2005 502 lacks.
2004/98 Nanqiao SEA (B)
A weird one. In some ways this looks like an extremely stellar tea. It is very oily, with heavy retired smoke, incense, and camphor notes. I don’t love the aftertaste as much as other Nanqiaos from the era. It is also less dense and just a touch hollow compared with things like the 502 Double Lions or even the Blue Peacock. There’s also some curious black tea type notes to it, although it mostly can be ignored. A decent enough brew but I don’t like it as much as some of the other Nanqiaos.
Dayi/Xiaguan
I probably could’ve included a lot more Dayi and it probably made sense as the primary benchmark here. But I wanted to avoid having this get way too big so as a result so I included those that are overtly labeled Bulang (7742, Bok Choy) and a couple versions of the famed 7542 recipe.
2011 Xiaguan Laobanzhang (C)
From Puerh NW. The tea is reasonably strong but I’m otherwise unconvinced about it. It has some thickness and oiliness early, but is eventually overcome with a lot of drying and bitterness that doesn’t convert very quickly. I think this tea probably would’ve done better with more heat/humidity but it’s not very close to being ready as of now.
2010 Dayi 7542 (C)
Not terribly impressed. It is somewhat oily and thick. It is not particularly punchy/bitter, although it does get astringent. Perhaps it is my expectations but I find this lacking. Due for deeper exploration next year.
2009 Xiaguan DX 7223 (C)
Commissioned by Dehexin who was partly responsible for the Double Lions and drew my interest. It is just OK. It is sweeter and more narrow than the other teas here. Way too little of a punch to really grip me. Tastewise woody, a bit of fruit.
2006 Dayi 7742 (A/B)
Supposedly aged Bulang material. This is good but needs more time. Actively smoky, BBQ, woody, oily, and pungent. This is a straightforward tea with a classical profile. Quite different from the 7542. Not going to be for everyone (I suspect I wouldn’t have liked this 10 years ago) but it is solid tea.
2006 Dayi Bulang Peacock (B)
Shockingly mediocre considering the price. Body is medium. Taste is wood, apple, a bit creamy. Doesn’t really have the big expansiveness of the better teas here. Does get a bit sour and somewhat astringent but the aftertaste is much worse than the 7742. Probably more of a collector’s item than a drinker’s drink.
2005 Dayi 7742 (A)
Really good and a bit different than the 2006, probably on account of storage. Much less smoky it does have a bit of a recently retired tobacco taste. Very refined wood, antique furniture like. Aftertaste is very quick and coating.
2005 Dayi 7542 502 (A/B)
Mine compared with Dennys is a bit further along. Smooth, not a ton of bitterness but still a fair bit of astringency. Wood sweetness, creamy, resin, leathery.
2002 Menghai TF Xiao Bok Choy (A)
From Houde. Good tea. Needs more time. Still pretty sharp but the aftertaste converts very quickly. Depth is pretty good without being great. Some resin. Longevity is OK. There’s some factory tea I like more than this, but I think some of that is the drier storage that this has gotten. I think if western storage may eventually be able to get some of these teas to a drinkable state but it takes a while.
Chensheng Hao
A Banzhang focused producer. They occupy an interesting space where they market themselves as a premium, luxury brand but are clearly operating at a fairly large scale. They are also a producer who really started to hit their stride in the 2010s rather than earlier like Nanqiao and Liming and their teas feel relatively less traditional than the aforementioned teas.
2022 Chensheng Hao Lao Banzhang (B)
I suspect this is getting into a bit of a more muted awkward stage as it is not as rich as it was a year or two ago. It is young, but I appreciate its clean, clear profile. It is relatively thick, has a moderate bitterness, and comes through with a nice but not super intense sweetness. Good longevity as well.
2017 Chensheng Hao Yi Hao (C)
Pretty good tea, but is still quite green in a way I don’t love. Oily, floral, nutty. Good intensity of aftertaste. There is some bitterness although not as much as the Bawang when pushed. Unfortunately this needs some pretty significant age, but I think this could be pretty decent.
2013/2016 Chensheng Hao Bawang (C)
Lumping in 2013 and 2016 since I feel the same about both. Very bitter tea with thick oiliness. The bitterness is slower to convert. I do have three of the 2019 aging away, but I see it as an extremely long term aging experiment.
2013 Chensheng Hao Jin Yin (Gold Mark) Banzhang (B)
This also needs time but it is closer. I’ve had this tea three or four times and my opinion has slowly risen. I think a good chunk of the enjoyment is it because it has been stored less dry than the other semi-aged CSH I’ve had. Like those it is very oily and has some strong bitterness. However, it’s considerably less green and starting to lose that sharper edge. It has a decent concentration of flavor. Tastewise brown sugar, wood.
2013 Chensheng Hao Organic Banzhang Arbor (B)
More standard and in my opinion likable than the CSH Jin Yin. Good body. The aftertaste resolves quickly it has a nice deep slightly heavy feeling to it. Good aftertaste. Tastewise it is around what you’d expect, florals becoming woodier.
2012 Chensheng Hao Yin Banzhang (B/C)
Measures up a bit worst compared to the Yee BZ. Partly because its been stuck in Seattle for longer. Still maintains green, floral notes. Has nice thickness. A bit bittersweet as a lot of younger CSH is. Similar to the Yee BZ the bitterness is a little slower to convert.
Western Boutiques
These are interesting to visit and revisit and predictably ended up being a bit of a mixed bag.
2024 White2Tea Astro Kittens (D)
Smells nice. Floral, nutty, sugar. The most bitter tea of these, pill like at times. Very protracted mouthfeel. The bitterness was quite slow to convert. I’m curious what this will be like later, but it is not something I would enjoy drinking anytime in the next 20 years.
2018 White2Tea Lucky Puppy (A/B)
My favorite of the boutique products. Has aged pretty well and is now simpler but pretty tasty. Wood, light fruit.. Very thick, moderate bitterness, sugarcane. Some mouthcool early. Very quick and good aftertaste that coats the mouth. Very sweet after that. Despite being young this is enjoyable.
On potential negatives, as one would expect from a modern production the rolling is on the lighter side of things. Perhaps this is why the tea is entering into such a nice phase so quickly.
2016 White2Tea Untitled 02 (B)
Thick, a bit oily. Moderate body, herbal, moderate bitterness. Lightly sweet and decent depth. Some resolution on the bitterness but it also has a lot that lingers more than preferred. This has fared OK enough and I like it, but I think it needs more time and I am ambivalent about the nature of its bitterness.
2012 Essence of Tea Bulang (C)
Malaysia stored and preferred over the 2010. It has a moderate body, is a bit herbal and gets quite bitter. Like the 2010 it doesn’t convert to sweetness much, which is more striking because this tea is much further along than the 2010.
2010 Yunnan Sourcing Jieliang (B/C)
Still pretty green, nutty. Thick, but not as much as the best teas in this report. Resin, strong mouthfeel. The conversion isn’t super fast, but it is there. This is getting there but still needs longer. Not bad.
2010 Essence of Tea Bulang (D)
Pretty dry stored. Antique wood. Fairly bitter, not a ton of conversion into sweet. Still quite burly, tart. Not a big fan of where this is right now.
Other
2013 Yee On Banzhang TFC (B)
Very thick, oily. Some mouthcooling. A touch of citrus. It is more bitter than most here. I think this will be quite a good tea at some point but still needs quite a bit of time. Has a strong protracted mouthfeel. The one hesitation is the nature of the bitterness which is a bit slow to convert although not overwhelming. Nevertheless I generally trust operations like Yee On to know what will age. Some solid potential.
2012 Hailang Hao 16th Anniversary (D)
The leaves here are clearly good, but I’m just not a fan beyond the first two steeps. Starts out nice, oily, syrupy texture. Still quite green, grassy. After that the session goes downhill fast. It gets somewhat bitter, but it also doesn’t resolve and the greener aspects really linger.
2010 Gumingxiang Banpen (B)
I have a much better handle on this tea than 2014 or 2015 where I gave it negative and mediocre reviews. On the negative it does feel relatively less blended and a bit more single faceted, which is what I think confused me when I’d had this tea before. The tea has a big body, it’s oily, and at this point only mild to moderate bitterness that converts. The conversion is a bit slower, but the tea is substantive enough that I feel decent about its future.
2008 Haiwan Lao Banzhang (A/B)
My only Haiwan. Picked up from Wilson at Adventure in Every Cup back in 2016. It isn’t quite as bitter as you’d expect and has more of a subtle power to it. Softer and a bit less resinous than other teas in this report. Less pine and more of a dark oak/cedar. Nice coating of the mouth. Soft, oily, good depth.
2006 Banzhang Laoshu Green Peacock (C)
Same cake as sold by TWL but a different storage, probably drier. This is stronger, has a big mouthfeel and more penetratingly bitter than the majority of other teas. The aftertaste is slower to convert. It is also not as oily and has a thinner focus. I am not a big fan of it.
2006 Zhongcha Six Side 8081 (B)
An overall decent tea that just lacks the intensity and expansiveness to be truly great. Nevertheless it has good structure/balance, oiliness, above average bitterness that builds, and some retired smoke. There are some light camphor notes and the aftertaste all resolves in a pleasing way. Just not quite as big as I want my Bulang tea to feel.
2005 Yunhai Banzhang (B)
This was sent by HappyGuy over on Discord. Thank you!
This is still a bit green and could use time but tastes proper to me. Dry wood, slightly oily. Pushed gets a bit sour. Has a decent enough aftertaste. Leans a bit towards the fruit/sweet direction but has strong enough bones.
2005 CNNP Big Yellow Mark (C)
I reviewed this almost a decade ago and it hasn’t really changed too much. The smoke is mostly in the past now. Has a bit of a softer perfume, pinewood, resin. Oily.. I’m a bit cooler on this than I was back then, partly because the aftertaste isn’t as good as some other teas and I’m not a huge fan of the softer perfumey (Nannuo?) aspects of this tea.
2005 Farmer Banzhang (B/C)
An interesting tea. Has a good amount of sweetness and is far more fruit forward than a lot of other teas here. It is also pretty astringent and drying, but it mostly all resolves. Despite being pretty oily and thick it also has a softer side to it. I’d take the 2002 Bulang brick that YS sells over this but it is respectable.
2005 Yuanyuan Tang Laobanzhang (A/B)
Taiwanese boutique ringer alert!! Thanks to Peter for sending this in. Apparently there’s some sort of relationship between CYH and YYT LBZs, although the details are hazy to me. Either way this is one of the better YYT I’ve had. The taste is mildly bitter and sour. A little oily but not as much as the NQs. The aftertaste is quite sweet and has a decent amount of depth. I’d originally put this at B tier but ended up upgrading it as it has significant appeal now. As you might expect from a TW boutique version it is a bit sweeter and a little softer than the other Bulang teas being made at the time. Still it retains a decent amount of thickness. Solid tea.
2005 Chenguanghetang Menghai Yesheng (A)
The Malaysian stored version. Amongst the most enjoyable teas in this report. Herbal, incense. Some mouthcooling. Very sturdy and thick. Strong mouthfeel. It is mildly sweet and if I had this after an Yiwu it might be a bit too strong. Good depth. Despite its strength I am pretty OK drinking the MY stored version semi-regularly now.
2004 Hualian Laobanzhang (B)
Decent enough tea. Still a little green and has some sourness. It has the proper Bulang structure (bitter then sweet, oily) and is a somewhat enjoyable tea. The downside is it’ lacks the potency and expansiveness to be more than decent.
2004 Mengyang Guoyan (C)
A bit dank. This feels closer to traditionally stored. Very mellow, creamy, woody. It’s an alright enough brew, but does not provide the Bulang thrills I seek.
2002 Bulang Brick (B)
This is solid old tea. Burly wood. Smells of smoke early but it quickly dissipates. Really not too bitter. Oily, rustic, quite sweet, very old school pu’erh. Has a good body throughout.
2000 Hailang Hao Bulang Mushroom Tuo (C)
This has good structure to it but its Kunming storage hasn’t done it any favors. Oily, hay. It’s aging fine but too slow.
VOATO & Benchmarks
Not sure I own enough tea to make the VOATO (Value Over Average Tea Owned) a decent metric here. The cakes I do own are the CGHT Menghai Yesheng, the 502 Nanqiao Double Lions, the Nanqiao Purple Peacock, and the Chensheng Hao Bawang. Those are amongst the best teas of the month and I think the average tea would be the Purple Peacock, IMO a solidly reliable tea. A reminder to keep standards high for future pickups. The teas here are also in pretty direct competition with good old Dayi teas, especially from the mid 2000s.
Thanks to Pedro and TeasWeLike, the 2005 Malaysian Stored Double Lions 502 has probably the largest reputation in the niche pu’erh scene, a reputation that seems well deserved. Like most teas that get some hype, it’s not a value budget banger but it is a very appropriately potent Bulang that I think deserves its place and should be experienced.
Final Thoughts & Why No S Tier?
I prefer the top end teas in my Yiwu report more than the top end teas here. I think there is the potential for some teas, like the 2002 Menghai TF Bok Choy to rise but it’s not there for me at least not yet. If you think the top should always be S, just add a grade scale up to every tea, making the 2005 NQ DL 502, 2004 NQ DL, and the 2005 CGHT Menghai Yesheng the top teas.
Although the brasher Bulang style often takes a bit of a backseat to my Yiwus I do enjoy drinking most of the teas in this report. Many of them are also decent enough value. The sweet spot falls in that mid 2000s range where many of these productions are still relatively attainable and smoothing out. I did not include many Dayi products here which would probably be in direct competition with these teas like the standout Nanqiao and Liming products.
I frequently get asked about entry points into pu’erh. Usually I’ll refer them to things I’ve written in the past like the different types of pu’erh to try out. Pu’erh is big enough that you don’t have to go too deep to find it (search for it on Amazon), but most generalists teashops/options that sell it in the west carry very mediocre examples. Starting out at the right point helps to make your journey more efficient and minimize tea tuition. This post is about how to stretch your resources to maximize experience and learning, under the constraints of the almighty dollar.
Getting Connected: Join A Discord
Since getting plugged back into the tea scene in 2024 I’ve started to see how the scene has evolved. The dynamics are definitely not like they were in 2012/2013 when I spent countless hours reading Marshaln and Half Dipper while hunting through old TeaChat threads. At that time this is where the majority of tea-related dialogue was. In 2025, TeaChat is a shadow of its former self and the chatter has moved elsewhere, Facebook, Reddit, Instagram, but most notably Discord. There are two major English speaking Discords Communitea and The Tea Table, both of which see a decent amount of activity. Even moreso than something like Reddit, the nature of Discord chat allows you to quickly find vendors of the moment and get recommendations on specific teas. I met with a newish tea drinker recently and was surprised at the breadth of tea and vendors he had tried despite starting serious gong fu drinking fairly recently. He’d sampled serious vendors across most of the tea types and had heard of just about everyone. Obviously he was not an expert in every single category but it seemed like he’d gotten a reasonable introduction and dipped his toes in remarkably quickly.
A downside to Discord is most of the information is more hidden than it was in the TeaChat glory years. Old forums have the benefit of being searchable and more easily scrollable. There were often pinned posts where you could see what people were drinking on the regular and get their impressions. This sort of thing is not really present in the same way on Discord. In theory you can get that information, but it’s a lot messier and more difficult to access.
My advice? Join one or both of the Discords. The two servers have different participants and vibes. You don’t need to check often or everyday, but both are receptive to newcomers and there’s a lot of information that gets exchanged. This isn’t to say its a perfectly ideal environment that replaces having tea in person. But in my opinion for people out west this is better than the alternative, learning solo and reading something like Reddit. There’s also the major benefit of being able to trade and access the secondary market…
Trend: Sorry, No Samples
Another change in the vendor landscape is the lower amount of samples being offered. In 2013, most vendors offered a smaller 10-25gram size even for cheaper cakes. This is no longer the case in 2025. I would not have predicted this trend, but it makes a lot of sense for hobbyist organizations like TeasWeLike or Quiche to reduce the overall burden and time commitment. Anyone that has sent out a tea package knows that breaking up cakes is a pain. It takes time and often a fair bit of cleanup afterwards.
Advice: Pay the sample tax. If samples or smaller quantities are offered for a tea you are interested in, even if there is a higher $/g charge. You do not need to maximize value everywhere. Don’t hesitate and buy.
Get Tea Currency & Utilize the Secondary Market By Swapping and Selling
If you were stuck on an island and could only interact with the tea world by ordering tea online, it’d be easy to end up with a random assortment of pu’erh. You’d be limited by your budget. And you’d also be limited by what you can or cannot sample. You may decide to buy one $400 cake, since its not as easy or possible to sample 8 or 9 different $400 cakes that interest you. It’s good to get reps but a cake is big and I’d prefer to get experience from a wider amount of sources.
The good news is that connecting with people over Discord can help here as well. Discord does not have to be buying temptation after buying temptation. It can also limit the financial burden, so you don’t need to buy 10 whole $400 cakes to try them all. The two major Discords both have marketplace channels, places you can buy, sell or exchange teas with other users. It’s a nice place to get good value since you are often buying cakes that have been broken into already. It can also be a good place to sell unwanted tea and help to trim down your stash.
Discord is also great for finding fellow members to swap with. One Discord user (shoutout KnockFan) has shared his experience getting started with tea, where he bought one well-liked but pricy cake, the 2003 Wistaria Qingteng. He then used that as currency to exchange to trade for a variety of other teas he was interested in.
This might seem like a pain since it involves coordination and going to the post office.. But if you are operating under some financial constraints and have a tea that people like and can’t sample easily, this can be a worthwhile tradeoff. It’s a particularly great way to cash in some chips to get experience with other teas of interest without over accumulating too much or spending more.
Kunming storage has never been my preferred storage. In the scheme of pu’erh drinkers I’ve always been friendlier towards the danker side of storage.. As a result there are very few teas I own that have actually undergone a significant amount of Kunming storage. I wanted to revisit my long standing bias so I emailed the west’s most well known purveyor of Kunming stored teas, Scott (Yunnan Sourcing) for his recommendations.
Goals
Determine my current opinions of Kunming storage and if I need to revise my previous storage preference. While I don’t own cakes of any of these teas I have tried five of the seven before.
See how it compares with western storage, specifically my own. One reason I own so little Kunming is that I suspect my storage operates similarly and given my storage preferences it would take a very long time for a Kunming + Seattle combination to age.
Tied with 2. But in the XG Masochist report I used a multiplier to determine relative biological age based off of where it was stored. Seattle was valued as half of Taiwan/Guangdong. The third goal is to evaluate and revise this.
Scott’s recommendations leaned northern. A secondary goal is to see if my opinions on northern tea, which I tend to avoid, have changed now that they’ve gotten older.
Notes
2012 YS Nanpozhai
This starts out quite tasty, but very green tasting. Honey, acorn, nuts. It is also sturdy and oily. The bitterness does build and starts to take over the session. Some of it resolves nicely into a sweet aftertaste, while other parts linger. It is all still quite young tasting. I have had the 2013 before, and comparatively this is less floral but the notes line up generally, with just the very top notes being chopped off. There’s clearly good material here but the slower storage prevents makes it harder to tell what semi-aged profile it will eventually have.
2012 YS Xin Banzhang
Doesn’t start out too punchy, but steadily builds up steam. Acorn nuts, sugarcane. Nice strength and protracted mouthfeel. Bitterness crescendos in the middle steeps but does properly fade. It is thick, oily. Not changed or mellowed enough for my tastes but seems intact, without bitterness taking over. The notes sort of line up with those from 11 years back. It does not have a fruity sort of sweetness so I think it has aged a little.
2012 HLH 16th Anniversary
Seems less aged than even the YS Xin Banzhang. It starts out with quite a bit of activity before getting fairly bitter. The bitterness is rewarded with a protracted mouthfeel and some returning sweetness. It does have a nice oiliness to it and some mouthcooling that indicates quality material. The bitterness only partly resolves in this case, and it does tend to linger and builds up a bit as the session goes on in a way I don’t really enjoy. A subsequent session makes this pretty obvious.
2011 YS Mushu
This has more aged notes than the Nanpo and seems to have moved along further and better, mostly in the sense that it has darkened and deepened. Leather, darker, fruits, more of a wood base. Good oiliness, mouthcool. Some honey, while also having a sturdy bitterness. Here I can see the semi-aged profile developing. Not bad.
2005 HLH Lincang Impression
This is very green for something that is 20 years old. BBQ smoke, burly, honey, woody. Also oily, still quite green. Taste old school in a nice way. Tastes younger than alternate storage, but decent density and strength. The bitterness is there but not overwhelming and it resolves mostly.
2002 Tailian International
Oily, smoky, some density but also narrow. Don’t love the bitterness that doesn’t really resolve very quickly. Does have good strength and some density, but it is thinner than I tend to prefer and while there’s some mouthcoating it’s kind of moderate. I had a more positive impression of this tea previously, perhaps because I’d had shah’s back in 2018 (his southern US storage had aged the tea a bit). The storage here is slower and to me results in a less pleasing tea.
2000 Bulang Mushroom
Nice old school pu’erh. Reminds me of some of the mid 2000s Nanqiao Bulang-centric products. This is aging properly and perhaps would be around the 8-10 year mark of some moderate Taiwan or southern Chinese storage. Dense, oily, less sweetness. Old school pu’erh in a good way. Still too green for me to really love, but it is heading in a decent direction. Just slowly.
Do I Enjoy These Teas?
A few of them, but they’re also kind of tiring and not something I’d reach for. I think this sort of storage may actually be decent for some of the more delicate Taiwan boutiques or Yiwus, teas I did not try in this report. I think about teas like the 2010 Xiangming TF Manzhuan which are similarly dry stored and are aged enough to at least somewhat enjoy.
Kunming Storage
This drink-through has not really changed my prior opinions. I still do not love Kunming storage and do not think I will be seeking it out. It has however been interesting to drink them with more experience and through a slightly different lens. The teas I’d tried before definitely resemble what they were about a decade ago. None have really thinned out, and many are still impressively oily and thick. I also suspect my storage may be advancing the tea a little faster than some of the teas in this report. Furthermore, I also think the multiplier I applied in the Xiaguan report of 2 (my storage ages teas at approximately half the rate of GD/TW/MY) was set too low. Now I’d estimate it around perhaps a third of the speed of those hotter locations. So a 21 year old tea stored in Seattle, is the very rough equivalent to 7 years in Guangdong. This is obviously a simplified way of looking at it, as the actual result is not the same but I find it a useful rubric to look at smoothness and drinkability. I would probably set the multiplier similar for Kunming storage.
Perhaps my palate has been shaped too much by the tea I drink, but think I will stick to my Xishuangbanna heavy diet of pu’erh.
A good tea friend who has gotten a lot of reps in with boutique pu’erh brands recently discovered a tea brand he really enjoyed called… Xiaguan. While he had of course drank a handful of crane teas, he hadn’t dove in enough to realize there were some teas that really hit the spot. This all despite Xiaguan being perfectly accessible, well known and much cheaper than the teas he’d been buying… He had somehow missed his natural affinity to one of the largest brands around..
We are All Shaped by Circumstance
Every drinker is molded by which teas/vendors we stumble upon initially. Someone who hears about pu’erh on TikTok from Jesse’s Teahouse will have a different trajectory than someone who discovered tea on reddit and buys from White2Tea or Yunnan Sourcing. People also tend to follow trends according to what teas they observe other people are buying and discussing. When I started drinking pu’erh, young pu’erh from labels such as YS, W2T, EoT, and TU were getting the bulk of bandwidth and conversation. Places like teachat, steepster, and instagram were buzzing with the new releases of the year. It was not uncommon to run into drinkers who bought a single cake of each their favorite western pu’erh vendor’s lines. Pu’erh with any significant degree of aging was the distinct minority of teas being offered by the handful of vendors that actually sold it. The Taiwanese boutiques that had been sold 5+ years before through Houde and Origin Tea, were mostly unavailable.
When YQH started being offered by Emmett in 2015, the western pu’erh audience (myself included) was starved for semi-aged boutique pu’erh. With virtually no competition, it is easy to see why it was so popular. Things would’ve been different depending on the year.. If I had gotten into tea in 2006, I would’ve likely been amongst the generation of drinkers eagerly awaiting Houde drops of factory and Taiwan boutiques. Or in 2025, perhaps I would be mining the discord and buying from places like TWL or LP. But in 2015 other than Houde scraps, YQH was by far the easiest to access Taiwanese boutique with teas of age.
One problem with having limited points of exposure with just one vendor or producers is they tend to have house characteristics and you are subject to their preferences. In 2015, during the western mini-YQH boom your alternates were mostly not that similar (factory, young western boutiques) or difficult to access (travel to Taipei and buy Wistaria). Probably due to a lack of comparison points, I anchored my own preferences towards the smooth YQH style of tea, and discounted other brands with stronger taste and perhaps more traditional processing. While I still enjoy YQH pu’erhs regularly, the ones I’ve bought are mostly good price performers rather than my absolute favorite boutique brand. I don’t regard YQH and myself as a total mismatch, but the amount I bought does not match up with my own appreciation of the tea.
Match Quality: The Importance of Trying Lots & Matching With The Right Pu’erh
David Epstein uses the term match quality to describe the fit between the work someone does and their abilities. I think this can apply to tea as well in terms of one’s own preferences. One piece of advice I give to new drinkers is to get reps in with the major categories of pu’erh. I’ve divided this into five categories that are quite different from one another.
It is important to dive in with good intentions and purpose. Choosing good examples is important. You shouldn’t judge HK traditionally stored tea from sketchy amazon pu’erh and you also shouldn’t judge boutique pu’erh off of the cheapest northern noutique cake available either. Do some basic reading on good examples. Try to like the tea! If you approach a tea in bad faith, you are not giving the tea a fair shake. If someone has in the back of their mind that traditionally stored tea is going to give them cancer that will impact the actual sensorial experience of the tea. Each of these five categories isn’t equally easy to find either. Good examples of traditionally stored tea were very difficult to find online until Yee On started selling and even now we have to contend with tariffs.
There is a very wide variety of pu’erh and it is important to match with the types you will enjoy the most. Your tastes will change and you’re not married to that same tea type forever but it can help to give you a strong foundation to start from. That foundation is intended as an entrypoint and springboard to start and explore more. One logical second step is to subdivide the categories you like even further. As my friend and Xiaguan shows, there’s a huge variety of pu’erh even within those categories. Those would technically fall into the semi-aged factory hot + humid category, and within this very massive group, you have prolific factories like Dayi, Xiaguan, Mengku and a variety of accompanying storages. It is an understatement to say there is a ton of variations within each group.
If you asked me to project my drinking % in 2012, I would’ve been wildly off, likely estimating a high amount of oolong. If you had asked me in 2015, I probably would’ve still overestimated oolong but I probably would’ve also overestimated my young raw consumption. Only by 2017 would I have a reasonable estimate of drinking habits now in 2025. Until your tastes are settled it’s hard to answer, but you should not overbuy too early assuming how your tastes will end up.
Questions you’ll want to answer:
Of the major categories of pu’erh what do you like? Does it pass the speed test? Subcategorize the categories you like and ask these questions again. How much do you want to drink factory pu’erh? Boutique? Which brands?
My Own Tea Diet
At one point I think my pu’erh stash was close to 80% boutique pu’erh and my drinking followed accordingly. Fast forward to the present, I’d say at least half of the pu’erh I drink is factory pu’erh. So what happened? I think I’ve slowly moved towards what I’d say is my ideal match in terms of type of pu’erh.
I’m amongst the most exposed western drinkers to what is available and have always sampled widely. Still other distractions and a lack of availability prevented me from fully exploring factory teas to the extent that I actually enjoy them. The boutique craze (both young and older) of the mid 2010s also messed with me enough that I overvalued a soft, smooth profile to a fault. The factory teas were rougher and it was frankly hard to find satisfying examples.
With Xiaguan, there is quite a lot of workmanlike tea that isn’t going to appeal to everyone so picking the right examples is important. Only after sorting through a ton with some help from people like Toby, do I have a few Xiaguan teas that I’d actually drink regularly. There’s also an advantage towards being a late comer, as you can take advantage of the knowledge and channels opened up by those who came before you. Similar to Xiaguan, Dayi has become increasingly easy to buy. At one point, they had non authorized taobao retailers like MX take down all their listings, making finding well stored, sufficiently Dayi difficult to find. The higher production years in the mid 2000s have also gotten older and have become more and more drinkable.. Contrary to the belief that pu’erh will always go up, Dayi prices have also gone down quite a bit in the last few years so it’s a great time to buy Menghai Tea Factory, tariffs be damned.
Try lots of tea and don’t assume you know exactly where your tastes are going to end up. Boutiques are often the most expensive teas in certain years but they’re not necessarily going to be everyone’s ultimate endgame.. Some people are naturally more inclined towards factory teas just as some people like HK Trad and others like Kunming storage. I thought I’d be a nearly exclusive boutique drinker at one point, but I’m a lot closer to 50/50 these days. Keep an open mind and don’t get tunnel vision.
