Tea of the Day - Jing Tea Shop Rou Gui 'A'

I was reading an old post by another tea blogger, MarshalN which I agree with.  He was speaking about not being able to accurately give a sort of review of a tea without having sampled a reasonably large quantity of said tea.  While I have trouble deciding to purchase in increments of 100g of unknown teas, I decided I would sample today's tea several times before forming an opinion.

About a month ago, I ordered 4 different teas from JingTeaShop.  Among them are three examples of Wuyi yancha, and one dancong.  I have little experience with either of these particular types of oolongs, so I thought this would be an interesting sample.

First up is a Rou Gui, designated only by 'A', presumably some arbitrary ranking of quality.  The dry leaves smell of roast, a smell I associated with chocolate, simply for no real other frame of reference.  There is also something I can only sort of describe as "unknown" or "spice".  When they hit the warmed pot, the smell transforms into a very deep, sweet smell with fruity undertones.

The first infusions yield a sort of flavor which I can describe as 'prickly'.  It feels prickly on the tongue, sort of how mineral water can taste.  There is something in this taste which I can associate with the word 'spice', though I cannot place my finger on precisely which spice.

The roast reveals itself more heavily in the second and third infusions, especially in the aftertaste.  The prickly feeling stays with you to some degree as well.  I notice that as the tea cools down, the mouth feel thickens dramatically.  It feels much heavier, especially in aftertaste.

After the 3rd infusion, I feel like this tea falls off dramatically.  It develops a sort of sour/bitter edge which I can sort of relate to young pu erh.  In reading about brewing yancha, most people recommend using at least 3/4 of the volume of your pot with dried leaves.  I read this information after having already used only 1/2 of the volume of my pot.  At this point, I only have about 6 grams of this tea left, which is not sufficient to produce this ratio.  Many tea drinkers seem to believe that a smaller amount of leaf can generate a sort of 'insipid' brew, and perhaps that is what I am experiencing.  I will certainly be taking these pieces of wisdom when I move on to the two other yancha that I received.

Something interesting is - When I was cleaning my teacup that I had been using for the past couple of days, an aroma of cinnamon seemed to leap out of the residue that was being dissolved by the rinse water in the cup.  It was completely unexpected, something which I did not taste in the tea itself.  I can't decide whether my mind was playing tricks on me or whether the smell was actually coming from my cup.  I suppose stranger things have happened.