Dark Tea (Hei Cha), includes pu-erh & fu cha

What our customers say

Your tea is amazing because I feel that the old pu erh tea gives me energy every day in the morning. It keeps my body and my soul healthy and that's wonderful. As you can imagine I love the ceremony and the taste. I never had such a wonderful pu erh tea experience. Thank you for that! (S.H.)

Our featured dark teas

2005 Menghai Dayi Early Spring Tuocha (raw)
Compressed into a tuo cha ('Bird's nest'), this tea from the famous Dayi factory is composed entirely of leaves harvested in the early spring in the Menghai area. It has lost a bit of its initial bitterness through storage already and brews into a strong and smooth infusion. Hints of spice and sweetness become apparent after the initial infusions and keep you brewing.

2005 Changtai Yi Chang Hao Tuocha (ripe)
Changtai has a very good reputation as a private pu-erh manufacturer amongst pu-erh fans and the name yi chang hao marks the high end range of this producer. This shu (ripe) tuocha has mellowed considerably over the past few years and brews a dark, smooth, and complex tea soup. The texture is almost creamy. A perfect tea to drink now.

1992 Zao Xian Brick (ripe), 250g
At some stage along the aging process, the typical 'ripe' flavour of shu pu-erh mellows and the teas taste much more like an aged raw pu-erh. Over time, all undesirable flavours fade out and the essence of the tea is intensified. This tea has reached that stage after 20 years of dry storage in Taiwan. While it doesn't completely lose its ripe flavour, it is very much in the background and adds a beautiful dimensionality to this exceptional pu-erh.

2007 Licang Wild Arbor pu-erh, loose leaves (raw)
When I tried this tea on my last trip to China at a tea tasting, I was blown away by the intense cha qi that the infusion held. To me, this tea is extremely "physical" in its experience already and will improve along these lines with age quite nicely. The leaves are all large, young spring harvest leaves. The flavour is rather gentle and lacks almost all of the bitterness that many young sheng pu-erhs display.

2001 Bingdao Mengku Zhuan Cha, pu-erh brick (raw)
Tightly packed into a brick (zhuan cha), this sheng pu-erh doesn't age all too quickly. Since its production in 2001, it has mellowed a fair bit, but the leaves (and much of the flavour) are still relatively green and floral with distinctive notes of citrus fruit.

2009 Fu Cha brick
Fu Cha is produced by undergoing a double fermentation process, which - in the later stages - produces an abundance of a beneficial fungus called "Golden Flower" (or Eurotium Cristatum). Medical studies have found it to be very effective to help control diabetes since it lowers blood sugar and improves carbohydrate metabolism. It is drunk traditionally by nomadic people in Northwestern China, Mongolia and Tibet to help them with digesting and complementing their diet, which is high in oily food and meat. Read more about Fu Cha here

2006 Xiang Yi 'Refined' Fu Cha brick
This fu cha was produced by the famous Xiang Yi tea factory, also known as Yiyang Fucha Tea Development Company, in Hunan Province, China. The factory is famous for its dark teas and has earned a reputation in China for first class teas. This brick is a great introduction to fu cha and a perfect example of the tea used to make Tibetan Yak Butter Tea. It contains a large percentage of stems which help keeping the caffeine content low. As a matter of fact, the closest comparison that comes to my mind is a Japanese Houjicha, which is also a great tea to drink litres of. Like Houjicha, this brick produces a slightly roasted flavour with a medium body. Read more about Fu Cha here

2008 Ji Pin Xiang Yi Fu Cha brick (organic)
This brick was also produced by the famous Xiang Yi tea factory and is the factory's highest grade product, produced with organic tea leaves. The leaves are of much higher grade than the 2006 'Refined' brick and the brick boasts an abundance of "Golden Flowers" (see photos). This is a very high quality product and showcases the flavour profile of great fu cha beautifully. Read more about Fu Cha here

Here is the complete list of our dark teas

All prices in NZ$.
To order, please visit our order page.