A mountain brick from Damaidi, carried along old trade roads
In early spring 2024, Amgalan Chin made his way to Damaidi village in Mengsong, walking the same paths that once formed part of the Tea Horse Road. He had worked with a family there for several years, exchanging knowledge about aging and cellar conditions between Yunnan and the Russian steppe. This batch came from a small garden at mid-mountain elevation, where the morning fog lingers long enough to slow leaf development and concentrate the sweetness. The pluckers took one bud and two leaves from 30-year-old bushes, and the leaves were processed the same day — wok-fired by hand, rolled gently, and left to dry under the April sun. Amgalan chose a 200-gram brick compression to slow the aging, hoping to preserve the delicate floral notes while building depth. He describes the tea as ‘quiet’ — a slow, deliberate sheng that rewards patience. In his cellar in Ulaanbaatar, a few of these bricks will rest alongside older Mengsong pressings, part of a long study in how the same mountain evolves across vintages.