Mengding Huangya
蒙顶黄芽 · Mengding Yellow Bud
Yellow
This tea spends days wrapped in paper.
After each pass through the wok the warm buds are bundled up and left to smother in their own heat. Three fryings, three rests, sometimes a week or more of it, while the trapped warmth slowly turns them from green to yellow. Nothing is added and nothing is taken away. The leaf simply changes colour under the paper.
The buds come from old heirloom bushes halfway up the same Sichuan mountain where cultivated tea began. Patience is the only ingredient. It pours pale gold and tastes of apricot, sweet, and you will not find a sharp edge anywhere in it.
- apricot
- honey
- velvet
- Origin
- Mengding Mountain, Ya'an, Sichuan
- Water
- 80°C / 176°F
- Ratio
- 4 g / 100 ml
- Caffeine
- Medium
- Rinse
- Not needed
One of the oldest surviving yellow tea styles; Meng Shan tribute lineage
How much leaf
Gong fu brewing is leaf-heavy and short. Set your gaiwan or pot size and this is what to weigh out.
Vessel volume
100 ml
Recommended dose
Use ~4.0g of tea
The session
4 infusions, about 3m 5s of total contact time.
- Steep 130sPale gold, still holding its breath.
- Steep 240sApricot and warm milk emerge.
- Steep 350sHoneyed nut deepens the middle.
- Steep 41m 5sA long cool sweetness stays behind.
Also sold as
Meng Ding Huang Ya, Meng-ting Huang-ya, Yellow Buds, Huang Ya
Steaper times this session for you
A countdown per infusion, a gong when each one is up, and the whole library in your pocket. Coming to iPhone.
Get notified at launchThese numbers are a median of independent gong fu sources, not a law. Leaf age, vessel and water all move them. Spotted something wrong? Tell us.