A Tea Addict's Journal

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Home sweet home

August 5, 2008 · 1 Comment

It’s nice to be home again, drinking some tea that I like, in this case, a wet stored loose puerh.

Aside from the obvious, such as having a whole tea set to brew tea properly, drinking tea at home is invariably calmer and less stressful than, say, trying to drink tea the proper way away from home. It’s not the same to brew tea in a hotel room, or a tea room somewhere, as it is to do it in the comforts of one’s own home. Mind you, my room right now is still a mess, still suffering from the ill effects of moving a few hundred miles, but slowly, I can see it take shape and become something of a sanctuary.

One of the elements missing from my current tea room is some proper decorations. Right now, it is full of boxes and other junk from moving, and unfortunately, it will probably take a while to clear all that out. Just as a Japanese chashitsu has a toko, or alcove, where the host displays a work of art or flowers to set the mood, I think all of us can probably spend a little time to make it more comfortable. Whether it is a conscious display of teaware, or a little painting or even poster, having some objects to admire while drinking tea does, I think, enhance the experience a little.

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Subsistence

August 4, 2008 · 1 Comment

The past two weeks were mostly spent drinking bad tea. Aside from one or two chances to drink decent tea, the rest of it was consumed by travel, last minute planning, etc, and had no time to drink much that’s good. Much black was consumed, and in between, some aged oolongs and some other random teas I had with me. Drinking my way across little teashops was an interesting experience, because talking to some of the owners or shopkeepers, you really get a sense of what people actually order. For example, talking to a person who works at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, I found out that aside from a few people, the vast majority simply order what’s on the “simple” tea menu, which is not surprising, but the end result is that the “better” teas are often not very fresh, and in the case of the Assam which I wanted, was adulterated with the smell of some other herbal stuff and thus brewed a cup that had a strong hint of peach or some other fruit. The people who work there have no clue what an Assam is supposed to taste like (ditto Darjeeling), so they really have no way of telling if anything’s wrong with the tea.

I think it is safe to say that despite the hulabaloo about tea becoming more popular, etc, the “tea” that is really becoming popular is the “RICH IN ANTIOXIDANTS! SLIMMING TEA!!” variety. People drink tea for the perceived health benefits, and unfortunately are probably drinking low grade, pesticide soaked leaves, instead of what might actually be good for them. The few stores I went to that sells decent teas also show the other kind of tea that is popular with your average tea crowd — the “Vanilla butterscotch mint cinnamon rooibus” kind. One store, called Lupicia, has a wonderful looking store with very nice packaging, and basically every flavour you can find under the sun. I think one out of every twenty of their teas was actually unflavoured, and if you are willing to shell out $1 for two grams of tea, you can buy some ok looking Taiwanese oolong, overpriced, to say the least.

What I feel is very much lacking in all this is any sort of real education going on. You can’t fault somebody for selling tea — they have to make a living, after all. It doesn’t mean that we should just leave it at that. I feel that there is often no effort being made to try to show the average consumer what a wonderful drink tea is. It’s not a spiritual thing, it’s not Eastern mysticism, it’s not some hollowed age old tradition — on the most fundamental level, tea is simply a beverage to be consumed and appreciated. Nothing is wrong with flavoured teas, mind you (I drink my occasional Earl Grey), but so much more is out there. Unfortunately, they are either not available, or marketed as some rare, exotic, Oriental, mysterious, or even sacred, with the attendant price tag that goes along with such labels. I am continually amazed at the kind of markup some people get away with simply with a nice back story and pretty salesgirls (or boys, or website). The “Monkey Picked” stuff comes to mind…

Anyway, I’m rambling, so I’m obviously too sleepy to write anything more that’s coherent. Maybe to be continued.

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Tourists

August 2, 2008 · 2 Comments

There was this wonderful looking kama in my room at the hotel we were staying (no, we were not in Japan)

But some people decided to use it as a candle holder

Which is really quite unfortunate, because the kama itself is rather nice. I, for one, won’t mind having one, although the ones shaped like these are almost impossible to use for my kind of tea making. Subsitute it for a tetsubin though….. oh, the endless possibilities.

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The last tea…

July 26, 2008 · 14 Comments

Before I get married…. shared with some friends and family.

See you all on the other side 🙂

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Independent teashops

July 23, 2008 · 2 Comments

I find it amazing that independent teashops survive in this country. This is not a friendly place for tea, and for the most part people drink crappy bagged tea. I’ve always wanted to take some pictures of the tea section in a lovely place like a bad supermarket in the midwest…. it really gives you a good idea of what people are imbibing.

That makes it all the more pleasant when you go to a place that at least tries to provide a nice experience drinking tea in a shop, despite all the extra hurdles that they have to go through to get off the ground running. There’s something philosophically attrative about an independent store that survives despite the onslaught of the Starbucks of the world. I guess they’re the modern equivilent of homestead farmers who make it despite the tough conditions of the frontier and establish a foothold in a hostile land (occupied by its rightful owners, at least on this continent).

I went to a place called Tea Chai Te yesterday while having to do some waiting around, and spent a good hour there just sitting and sipping tea while reading a not very good book about green tea. I wonder how independent shops gather the 100 or so teas they offer — I suppose it’s from wholesalers of various ilk, and sometimes directly sourced from whoever it is that sells such things. I ordered the Wuyi Oolong, usually one of the safer choices out there (no varietal specified). The tea was brewed for me and came as liquid only in a Chinese made small tetsubin, enameled lined and all. I suspect it was made in an infuser basket. I got a drinking cup too — some fairly large red glazed thing, which was fairly pretty, although the tetsubin and the cup’s colour meant that I couldn’t judge the tea. The tea was all right — I think the water makes it better here, and there was some throatiness to it. They also served other more esoteric things, including a few puerh, although most of those are mini-tuos that I wouldn’t dare try.

Still, if only they have such stores everywhere I go — unfortunately, that’s not the case here, and in most cities you’d be hard pressed to find even one or two such things. Oh well, at least, I think, things are starting to change.

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Aging cakes

July 21, 2008 · 2 Comments

I’m in Portland now, getting ready for the upcoming festivities… so don’t expect much update in the next week or so 🙂

However, there are always observations to be made.  As Walt just pointed out in his comment to my last entry, cakes change — and they are always changing.  I bought a cake of the 2002 Mengku for my cousin a while ago when I was still in Beijing, and now it’s been here for…. 2 years or so.  What I’ve noticed, when I tried it yesterday, it’s much sweeter and mellower than when I got it — less bitter, and more fragrant.  I think the climate here works fairly well for aging puerh — a dry season in the summer, and a wet season during winter.  The wet season here is wet enough so that the cakes are sufficiently moist, and then dries out a bit during the hotter months.  In fact, I suspect the whole Pacific Northwest works fairly well, probably.

I wonder how my cakes in Hong Kong are doing.

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Haiwan Meng Pasha

July 19, 2008 · 3 Comments

Haven’t done this for a while

This came through the mail from a friend. It’s still on sale, apparently, but quite a bit higher than I remember it used to cost.

The cake got a little beat up on the way here in the mail — some parts of the cake was pulverized.

The tea…. is a fairly standard one. There’s quite literally nothing too remarkable about it, but nothing bad about it either. It’s one of those reliable, clean tasting cakes. It did go for quite a while and hasn’t weakened too much after many infusions.

There was an initial floral note early on — in the first few cups it was quite obvious. I think I would’ve liked to see a little more punch to the tea, but it was relatively speaking a little subdued. Then again, nothing’s wrong with that.

Obviously I haven’t done this for a while.

Now I suppose this, too, will go into the “wait” pile and see what happens to it five, ten, or twenty years from now. Maybe leaving it out in the crazy thunderstorm outside will help speed up the aging.

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Collective wisdom

July 17, 2008 · 15 Comments

As we all know, many brains is better than one when it comes to solving problems…. so I need your help 🙂

Along with the broken pot, I bought another one that turned out has a bit of a crack on the outside (didn’t see it because, well, it was covered in dirt). That’s not the real issue though.

Looks nice enough

Until you see the inside

And this is AFTER cleaning it with BLEACH. You don’t want to know what it looked like before — imagine a white covered interior that feels like it is caked on for ages. I have no idea what it is, or how it is so stubborn. I’ve already removed most of it, although you can see how it still has that brown base that makes the whole bottom sort of spotty looking.

How do I clean this thing?

I’ve heard you can use citric acid to melt things away like this, but I’ve never tried it. Aside from that…. what else can I do? I mean, I’m not sure if this pot is really that usable, since it is cracked (although it does not leak — cracking is only on the outside, strangely enough). Either way though, I’d like to at least have it be clean….

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All look same

July 16, 2008 · 3 Comments

Mr. Lochan sent me quite a few samples. I only went through two. Today I thought I’d pick up the third one.

One thing about Darjeelings, at least first flush, high grade darjeelings, is that they all look sort of the same

Which really makes me think… can the average buyer of darjeeling tell them apart, if tasted blind — especially with English brewing methods? This is a good tea, with all the right notes for a darjeeling. However, I can’t quite remember how this might or might not be different from the other ones I’ve had so far. Perhaps they’re from the same estate, so the taste is only minimally different — since there are no names, I can’t tell for sure. Or, maybe because I’m brewing it in an approximation of English style…. the differences aren’t as obvious. I wonder if I should switch to a small pot to make these things.

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Border tea

July 15, 2008 · 5 Comments

Lew of the ever expanding Babelcarp kindly gave me this sample when I was in New York

The tea is from Taipei — a store that I actually visited once or twice, and then through a friend of his came into his possession. When I first saw it and smelled and looked, I told Lew that I think it’s a “border tea”, which generally means non-Yunnan tea made into some sort of puerh. On the back of the bag it says Yiwu Maocha, but every maocha out there is Yiwu….

The reason I said it’s border tea is because it smelled like it, and it also looked like it — long, wiry, thin stems with that twisted look. Yunnan tea generally looks a little fatter and shorter. I have a cake of this stuff, and also some various assortment of loose tea that are almost certainly border tea — most likely of Vietnamese origin. They also have this distinctive smell — it’s best described as somewhat spicy, and after trying a number of these things, quite common.

They also tend to brew dark

And they look dark when wet

The taste is usually of the same spicy note you’ll smell, and tend to be a little thin in terms of body. Mind you, they’re hardly bad — I’d drink this anytime. They’re just not Yunnan in origin, and is often passed off as higher grade stuff, which it decidedly isn’t. The most famous border tea that is easily obtainable is probably the 1980s or 1990s Hongtaichang, which you might see quite often. They have a squarish neifei with about four columns of words and usually no wrapper. I’ve seen them sold at various places, including M3T in Paris and shops in Taiwan, as genuine Yunnan puerh with the price to boot. If you find them in places that sell them for what they are, they are fairly cheap (under $50 a cake). For a 1980s or 1990s tea, it’s not bad…

Thank you, Lew, for the nice sample. I tend to like these mellow, easy to drink things. It’s less stressful to make than younger or harsher teas.

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