2008 Xiaguan - FT "Baoyan Jincha"

I often write that one of the reasons I drink shengpu because I can't smoke a pipe. I get my vicarious appreciation of tobacco leaves from chunky, bombastic pu'er. I must look entirely deranged, sniffing the aroma of leaves from my chahe [tea-lotus, shown below]. I love nothing more than to find an excuse to stand in the tobacconist and soak up some delicious, dark scents from the rows of leaf-urns lining the walls.

Every time we go back to my family home, I enjoy some private conversation with my father. This Christmas, he was standing out in the frozen morning air, wandering the outer reaches of the back garden. Like a Dakota scout roaming the North American plains, he was visible only by the thick plume of pipe-smoke working its way up to the chilly blue sky. I grabbed an old coat, slipped into a handy pair of wellies, and ran out in the direction of the base of the plume of smoke. Like chasing rainbows.

Standing under the leafless trees, that pipe took me back to days past. Aroma is so closely linked to memory. Even though it burns away in a matter of minutes, there is something eternal about burning tobacco and its lingering scent.

I don't remember the words we spoke, but I remember the feeling: ease, humour, peace.

Which brings me to this Baoyan tea. The experience of this tight little mushroom is similar to that of pipe tobacco, in flavour, aroma, and comfort. (I distinguish pipe tobacco, and it's big, sumptuous leaves, from cigarette tobacco. One seems a complex delight, the other a cheap and convenient substitute lacking the depth of its cousin - but I'm not a smoker.)

Baoyan means "precious flame". Readers who happen to be Buddhist monks (hi, chaps) will know that this refers to the Buddha's Dharma. Despite the stance of the CCP towards Buddhism, it is encouraging to see that exports to Tibet still take place. Xiaguan seems conscious of this culture, and unafraid to promote it in marketing literature and tea-wrappers. Sometimes, it plays safe and celebrates ancient Yunnan kingdoms no longer in existence, but I am impressed that someone in the company has the backbone to make references to Buddhism.

Shown above, the imprint into the mushroom reads "FT", denoting that this tea is destined for the Feitai Company of Taiwan, and consequently constructed to a higher degree of quality than the usual rough charms of Baoyan.

Unwrapping the tea is like popping open a tin of my father's tobacco leaf: thick, black scents of superdense, rich leaf jump into the air and rapidly fill the room.

That beautiful, dusky orange brew! Long scents of burned brown muscavado sugar persist in the wenxiangbei [aroma cup]. As ever, these dwell in the back of the nose once I sip the tea, combining so well with the hoary tobacco flavour. The FT quality is obvious from the clarity of the soup (compared with the standard Baoyan production), and its sharp, well-defined flavours.

The tiniest hint of smooth smoke in the nose completes the illusion, and I am back in my wellies, talking with my father.

It's probably redundant to conclude that I like this tea. The complexity introduces something of raisins in later infusions, and I am always drawn back to it, never bored. Stare longer at the shifting patterns of flavour and detect hints of preserved fruits, whole-grains, wild herbs. The more you look, the more you find.

I've bought quite a bit of this inexpensive tea, and look forward to enjoying more sessions while the cold winter continues. I'm a sentimental fool, but it comes to us all in the end.