Very smooth, but not aromatic enough for me when brewed.

As usual with TeaVivre, the dry leaf is intensely aromatic, suggesting sweet and umami flavors. The leaf looks to consist exclusively of tips, with two very tiny leaves attached to a bud, the leaves hardly bigger than than the bud itself. Upon brewing though, this tea disappointed me.

Character is typical for Huangshan Mao Feng and recognizable as this type of tea. I think the flavor is sweeter and smoother than typical, but the aroma is milder. There's also less astringency.

The brewed cup is interesting, but the aroma, while extremely pleasing, is too weak to impress me...not as strong as the dry leaf suggests. I'd describe it as lemony, and slightly grassy and toasty, but faint overall. Flavor is smooth and subtle: there's not much bitterness, a very slight sweetness and a slight umami flavor. If brewed in a mug, I find the flavor sinks to the bottom of the cup. Pleasantly dusty finish, just a touch of astringency.

I found the best results when using more leaf, a single, very long steeping time (5-8 minutes), and boiling water. When I tried making multiple infusions, each was too weak.

I have a very cheap, low-grade Huangshan Mao Feng in my cupboard and, while it is somewhat more astringent, and the dry leaf doesn't smell quite as fresh, upon brewing it has a stronger aroma, and I prefer it for that reason, especially given the very high price of this tea. I also prefer TeaVivre's standard Huang Shan Mao Feng to either of these teas. The only advantage to this tea that I found is that it's less picky about brewing temperature--TeaVivre's other tea has a very narrow range of temperatures in which it tastes good to me and is thus a bit tricky to brew. I find that for this tea, temperature makes little difference and boiling water works just fine. It's just hard for me to get this tea tasting strong enough, which bothers me for a tea in this price range.

My favorite huangshan mao feng is still the one from Teaspring. It costs about the same as this one, but I found it much bolder tasting.

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