7542 - A traditional recipe!

The beginning of the year for me is a time I like to get back to the basics in preparation for the new year. The world of tea is always a great source of daily inspiration. Here is the story of a tea that became an icon during the last decades and naturally presents itself on the path of any tea lover.

The aged tea family, despite its age-old origin, has only seen its influence spread internationally gradually over the last hundred years. The current cultural and economic context has made some of this family's teas more valuable than gold! Besides the knowledge and refinement of the collectors leading them to feverishly seek out the best vintages for their own consumption, speculative stock market games have also been part of this change.

Consequently, among the Pu Er productions of the second half of the twentieth century are found teas which have attained an unrivalled reputation. The great factories of the time innovated and created blends of various qualities from leaves of diverse grades and provenances  - to the delight of the consumers. From the beginning of the 1970s, recipes, generally coded with 4 digits, made it possible to standardize greater production, to keep the buyer's interest by proposing choices from year to year! So the "7542", a blend created in 1975 and produced since then by the Menghai Factory (2) from medium grade leaves (4), has seen its reputation become one of the references for quality in the industry and in the broader circle of enthusiasts.

So here we have the honour to present our Pu Er 1998 Menghai 7542, a recent arrival of this traditional recipe, a version harvested, prepared and produced in 1998, according to the 7542 standard. The ageing in Taiwan has given it almost twenty years of warmth and humidity in which to progressively refine while maintaining an astonishing vigor and powerful dynamism. Its liquor, full and charged, develops its aromas of damp burnt wood, camphor and ripe fruit on an utterly refreshing bed of mineral and menthol. The first infusion is resinous and slightly bitter, a guarantee of its vitality and promise of maturation, the following infusions are sweet and balanced. Generous, it requires patience or good company.