Yiwu Smuggler 2022

Laos Ban Sinan Qiao Mu Sheng Puer 2022

Calm, honeyed sheng puerh with a soft, dense buttery taste and aroma reminiscent of ripe fruit and a long sweet aftertaste.

The village of Ban Sinan, where it comes from, lies a tea cake's throw away from the border with China, behind which we can find one of the most famous Puerh villages, Guafengzhai, in the famous Yiwu mountains. As both locations share the same terroir, the character of the local teas is almost indistinguishable. Tea leaves from neighbouring Laos are usually brought to Guafengzhai and mixed into expensive tea cakes labelled Yiwu Guafengzhai. We named our genuinely fake Yiwu cake accordingly. So "Yiwu Smuggler" is a reference to its taste, smell and story.

It was collected in the spring of 2022 from younger tea trees (so-called Qiaomu - approx. 50-70 years old), then matured in loose form in Kunimng and this fall it was manually pressed into 200g cakes with a stone.

Origin: Ban Sinan, Phôngsali, Laos
Cultivar: Daye – big leaf tea trees
Harvest: Spring 2022
Type: Raw (Sheng) Puerh