A Tea Addict's Journal

One of the most common things I’ve seen asked on forums is where to find small pots. By small, I mean pots that are under perhaps 60ml or so in volume. I think there’s certainly something to be said about using pots that are not overly large. For example, one person could hardly drink enough tea to justify using a pot that’s over 200ml. That’s huge, and will require lots of leaves and probably longer and fewer infusions. If you fill a 300ml pot with 1/3 full of dry leaves, that’s probably 20g or more, which might not kill you, but will certainly cause caffeine highs and other undesirable outcomes. So, there’s something to be said about small pots.

Small pots also have another benefit which older tea texts claim exist, which is that they retain the flavour of the tea better than large pots. Whereas large pots are seen to allow a tea’s qi to float out of the pot, smaller pots will retain it within its body and, presumably, deliver it to your cup. On a more practical note, small pots use less leaves, are relatively easier to control when brewing, and are easier to handle, so there’s something to be said about small pots.

I think, however, that below a certain size small pots become very difficult to use. Mind you, I have a lot of them – some as small as 30 or 40ml in volume, but I almost never use them, and have them around mostly as curiosity pieces. The reasons are really twofold. The first is that small pots, once they are below a certain size, actually start getting harder to use again. The amount of water you can pour in there is small, and therefore the room for error is also smaller. For leaves that expand a lot, you really can’t use very many leaves at all, and the pots often will have lids bulging out simply because the leaves have soaked up water. I also find them to be slightly unsatisfying – perhaps that’s the caffeine addict in me talking, but I find a pot between 80-120ml to deliver the right amount of tea for me, whereas pots that are smaller have trouble doing that.

Moreover, they are not very suitable for certain teas, unless you’re interested in crushing the leaves. Wuyi yancha, for example, or dancong, are likely to have leaves that are too large for a small pot to handle whole. Even some puerh will be too large, and require serious breakage for a small pot of, say, 50ml in capacity.

Also, and this is quite important, I think tea really isn’t meant to be a one-person consumption affair. It’s meant to be shared, probably in a few cups with different people. Drinking alone is common in the West, but less so in Asia. Which is why I think pots that are overly small are harder to find – they limit the number of people who can share in the cup. Some are only as big as one small cup of tea – such as my pot with stitched lid, but that means I can’t use that pot as soon as I have a guest, or even if I just want to share it with MadameN. That, I think, is deeply unsatisfying.

This is one of the most beautiful pots I own.

It is also one of the ugliest.

The reason I say that is quite simple – if you look at it from afar, the pot looks quite nice.  If you look closely, it has all kinds of flaws.  The shape is uneven, the body is slightly collapsed on one side, and the lid, oh the lid — you can see how it seems to be sinking on one side, and it’s not even round — in fact the pot is not round.  It is more like an oval.

As you can probably imagine, the lid doesn’t fit all that well.

Yet, there’s beauty in this.  All too often, I find newer pots to be entirely without character or personality.  A pot that is made exactly to shape and size is, in my opinion, very boring — I can find a million of those in any tea market, anywhere.  Give me a tea mall and I can find you a thousand perfectly made shuiping pots of all sizes.  I can assure you, however, that walking through a tea market for a whole day will not yield one that looks like this pot I have here.

All those supposed tests for trying out a new pot — whether or not the water will stop if you cover the air hole (this doesn’t), whether or not the lid will fall if you fill the pot with water and the flip the pot around (I haven’t tried, but I’m sure it will) and whether or not the pot has all its elements lined up perfectly in a straight line (no, once again) are, when you think about it, completely useless for tea brewing purposes.  There will never, ever be a situation where, mid-pour, you just need to stop the pour by covering the air hole.  Nor is there any real reason behind why a perfectly fitted lid will brew better tea (think the airhole that allows flow doesn’t leak air? think again).  So, these so called “well made” tests are, in effect, tests of whether or not a pot is made to perfection.  Why, yes, sure, they can be done by hand, but so can a machines.  Why do you need paintings when you have photographs, if perfection and precision is what you want?

I like this pot because it has personality, and because it’s full of contradictions.  Looking at the pictures, you may think it has very rough skin, but in fact, when you touch it, you’ll find that it’s silky smooth.  Its shaped with quirks that you only find in older pots – a slightly upward bending spout, a joint line that isn’t even remotely concealed, clay that still shows you what’s in it, and of course, the lack of any filters.  Pots like this one make me very happy – they tell a unique story that you can’t find anywhere else.  No wonder MadameN calls them my concubines.

Remember this little fellow?

He took a bath

My repair job really isn’t so good — I need to probably re-glue the handle somehow.  The pot now returned to its original state.  The clay is quite rough, with a lot of sand in it.  It even smells sandy.  I know some people wonder why I would clean a pot that is already seasoned so well, but I have to say I enjoy the process of giving each of the pots its patina myself — it’s part of the process of raising a pot and making it my own (and in a sick way, so is the process of damaging them).  So, all my pots, when they arrive, take baths, eventually before I start using them.

I also cleaned another fellow

This pot has a very fine clay — almost the direct opposite of the first one, and has a very nice shine already even after cleaning.  The only problem is it doesn’t pour so well, and is prone to slow pours.  Oh well, nobody is perfect.

This is a pair of teapots I bought more than a year ago, but because I was traveling for much of the summer, the box was never opened and remained in the attic until a few days ago, when I dug it out and opened it in anticipation of my move back to Hong Kong.  I must say that opening it is quite a thrill — not least because I feel like I bought something recently, but since I paid for it so long ago, it’s as if I bought something anew.  The pair of pots are obviously well loved, one a little more than the other.  They are small, and are of exactly the style that I prefer – rustic, simple, and functional.  A little cleaning and they will be good as new, and ready for use.  Until I finish moving though, back in the boxes they go.

The lens cap gives you a good idea how big (or, rather, small) they are.