I’ve been told by my doctor that I have to lay off the caffeine (which is my case means tea) as much as possible, so you’ll probably be seeing a lot more tisane and book reviews here for the next few weeks or so, until I give in to my tea addiction. In the meantime, I’ve found one tea that seems pretty gentle on the stomach: Infusion-de-vie’s 5 Year’s Aged Premium Chenpi Puer (that’s a pretty big mouthful).
The description of the tea:
Sun-baked Raw Green Tangerine peel from Xinhui, an area of Jiangmen famous for producing the most fragrant peel due to its unique oils in a special breed of trees only found in this district since the early Song dynasty, is aged together with premium palace-grade AAA puer from Yunnan, creating a natural marriage of flavours and fragrance which no artificial teas can match. Infusion-de-vie searched for farmers using only natural sunlight to ensure the best of the ageing journey to produce a tea suited only for the royalty.
Since each serving comes inside the chenpi (or tangarine peel), it’s pretty large. I definitely can’t finish one fruit in one go, especially as you can brew this tea multiple times, so what I do is that I break off bits of the puer and chenpi and brew the tea using that. I keep the remainder in a ziploc bag inside a box and so far, it’s holding up well (better than my French Muscat tea did, at any rate).
Taste-wise, this pu-er is very fragrant and balanced with the citrus flavour from the chenpi. There’s no artificial citrus taste, just the fruit adding a bit more complexity to puer. I actually brought this to my dad’s office and they all enjoyed it because of how fragrant it was. It’s got a sweet, earthy flavour (the way pu-er tends to have) to me and is very smooth, with very little astringency and no bitterness.
Plus, it doesn’t seem to aggravate my stomach so that’s a plus!
If you’re looking for some puer to go with meals or just to to drink by itself, I would definitely recommend this.
More information
5 Year’s Aged Premium Chenpi Puer’s web page (there’s free shipping within Singapore if you buy online).
About Infusion-de-vie:
Infusion-de-vie, translating to “Tea of Life”, is a Singapore registered Organic Tea Company specialising in blending organic tea leaves and traditional Chinese herbs.
[…]
Infusion-de-vie values premium quality and believes in inspiring a healthy and well-balanced lifestyle. Its teas are a balanced infusion of organic premium tea leaves and traditional Chinese herbs, which invoke vigour and vitality in the bodies.
To ensure we get Teas and traditional Chinese herbs of the highest standards, our tea masters take reference from the Ming dynasty herbal compendium, Bencao Gangmu (本草纲目) and work only with suppliers who conform to its principles. With palates borne from years of experience, these experts then carefully concoct the exact ratio of ingredients needed to bring out the flavor and fragrance so distinct of each blend of Infusion-de-vie.
(Information taken from their about page)