An Old Tin of Shui Hsien

I was gifted with a tin full of old shui hsien.  One of my tea friends had gone to Taiwan for holidays and had bought some tea there and this tin was given to me.

Looking at this 6 inches (15cm) high tin, I observed that this is a lao chong shui hsien tea produced in Fujian, China, namely Wuyishan General Tea Factory.  I have no idea on the age of this tea but it should be old - telephone number on the tin is 5 digits while its 7 digits in china now (less the area code).  I would put the tea to be at least 12-15 yrs old....minimum.  

Taking a whiff inside the tin, I could detect this tea was a high roasted....meaning it should have kept well.   I had opened a green TGY last month which I had kept for 2 years and the brewed tea tasted yucky. But I believe that high roasted oolongs are able to store well.  

This shui hsien aroma was slightly woody, nice shui hsien floral scent with a sweet finish.  It is a very nice tea.  My limited experience with Shui Hsien seems to indicate that older Shui Hsien tasted more mellow, in that the sharp finish is not present but instead a wood and herb aroma is more pronounced in the tea.   My opinion is reinforced with a sample of  an old shui hsien  given to me by Su, a famous tea collector in Malaysia.  This tea was even more aromatic.....strong intense woody aroma and sweet aftertaste.  The difference in taste was so great compared to a new tea that it was initially hard to tell that it was Shui Hsien.  

However, I would like to point out to my readers that buying old oolongs like this is very tricky.  Prices for such teas has no guide price.  It is best you get to sample the tea before a purchase.  Don't buy too much.....there is always another tea out there.  

2006 Xinghai Green Peacock Ripe Cake

I only bought one pu erh tea cake this year (no typo error).  A local purchase, this is the 2006 Xinghai Green Peacock ripe cake.  For my readers who had been following my blog, I would at this time of the year be overseas and would have returned with a luggage of tea.  The recent bird flu in China, had me 'chickened out' from traveling to China.  I am glad that my China friends are ok and are taking the necessary precautions to be safe.  I look forward to a tea trip this year, hopefully soon.

I am not being pompous by saying that I prefer to buy my tea overseas than in Singapore.  Let me explain -  Chinese tea drinking culture in Singapore is small.  A couple of Chinese tea shops do ply their trade locally but the selection of pu erh tea and higher end oolongs are extremely limited in choice, and the prices of tea are much higher (standard of living in Singapore is among the highest in the world).  Travelling overseas to Kuala Lumpur, Hong Kong, Taiwan and mainland China gives me a wider selection and lower prices due to competition.  I can also enjoy the passion of the Chinese tea drinkers and get to share their experiences and stories about Chinese tea.  

Xinghai tea factory's pu erh are regarded as 'traditionally' made as I was told...... the owners of Xinghai tea factory believed in the old school of producing pu erh tea.  I had consumed a Xinghai cake in 2011 (see blog) and had remembered good things about the tea.

This 2006 ripe cake brews a pretty strong tea.  I would suggest using 7-8g on a 180-200ml teapot.  The tea is aromatic and has a nice hint of a sweet finish.  I had a satisfying tea session as I realized I finished my tea session (about 6 infusions) quite quickly whenever I brew this tea.  If you are a ripe pu erh tea drinker, buying a cake from Xinghai tea factory may be a very good idea.  

Seasoning a Yixing teapot

New Yixing teapots must be cleaned and seasoned.  Why?  Can't you use the teapot immediately after you have brought it home from a teashop?

Here are the main reasons :

a)  teapot might be dirty -  obviously sediments, oil residues, or even insects might be found in your teapot.  It is possible that your teapot had been on display for a considerable long time before you had purchase it.  So a general cleaning or sterilization of the teapot might be in order.  Some of my teapot collector friends who purchased used teapots, will usually season the teapot again - like a recalibration.

b)  teapot has a smell -  I do not think your new teapot smell because of the clay.  You must remember that your teapot does absorbs smells easily and these scents may be difficult to remove.  It is common that your new teapot had 'caught' the scent of the firing kiln......it may smell horrid but should clear up with a proper seasoning session.  Your teapot may smell musty due to its storage conditions.  Shaking your head with disbelief?  Try putting a piece of garlic in your teapot for a week......No don't do that.....You will have a garlic scented teapot.

The main reason is that the tea taste better when you brew tea in a Yixing teapot -  I cannot explain the scientific reasons.....or any non-scientific reasons.  The tea just taste better.  Perhaps that is why serious testing of tea in teashops or tea competitions use only white porcelain bowls and gaiwans to brew and sample the tea.

I season my teapot 1st by brushing the teapot with a used toothbrush under running water, then placing the teapot and its cover in a clean pot of water (a liter of water) and then boiling it under a small fire for an hour.  I repeat this boiling process but include tea leaves in the water (about 20-30g).  The tea leaves used will depend on the type of tea I want to use for the teapot.  If its ripe pu, then I add ripe puerh leaves in the pot.  Rinse, air dry the teapot and it is ready for use.  Why this method of teapot seasoning?  I vaguely recalled a teapot collector teaching me this seasoning method.  He emphasized that the 2nd time of boiling the teapot with tea leaves was very important as the interior of the teapot will be coated with tea for the 1st time......call it a base coat.  Finally, a good rub, with a dry cloth or just your thumb, on the exterior of the teapot (after every use or weekly) would help make your teapot develop a nice shiny sheen.

I also discovered an ingenious seasoning method during my travels in Guangzhou.  One of my popular teashops I visited in Guangzhou was letting me try a tea when I noticed they used a teapot as a tea jar (instead of a regular porcelain tea jar) to dispense the tea into teacups.  Normally, this teashop would brew their tea in a teapot, pour out the tea through a filter into a porcelain
 tea jar, then finally pouring the tea out into teacups.  I was told this was an easy method to season a teapot instead of the boiling method I mentioned above.  What this teashop did was - clean out the teapot with a brush under running water, then use the teapot as a serving jar.  When the customer had left or had enough of the tea, the final brew may be poured over the exterior of this teapot. This process was repeated for about 1-2 weeks before the teapot was considered 'seasoned'.  If it is for raw pu erh tea, this teapot was only used when raw pu erh is being sampled. 

There is no 'standard' technique of seasoning a Yixing teapot.  I have even seen a pure steaming method - teapot is steamed for a couple of hours.  I would advise against using detergents or any strong chemical agents that may cause your teapot to smell unpleasant.  Happy seasoning !!!

"Yi Tiao Long" - Dragon teapots

Produced in the 1980s, this is the 12 teapot dragon set known as 'Yi Tiao Long' - literally meaning one whole dragon.  These teapots were produced in China and came in either red or black clay.  I only have the 'black clay' version ones.

This 12 teapot set is interesting in that this 12 teapot set came in sizes from small to large.  Smallest size is about 20-25ml while the largest teapot can hold about 200ml of tea.  No.....the set is not made of of 12 different size teapots but I could detect (by just looking) about 8-9 different sized teapots in a each set - meaning there are a few duplicate sized teapots in each set.  (hehe....I have a few sets).

And.....the teapots only came in one design.  Traditionally called 'shui ping hu', which literally means water container or pot, this design was popular back then and even today.  This design is very visually appealing but I would like to warn my readers that such teapot design can be quite delicate to maintain as a tiny knock on the spout of a 'shui ping hu' teapot can  easily caused a chip to the mouth of the spout.    Last 2 pix shows the chop marks 'Zhong Guo Yi Xing' - translated as China Yixing.  All the pix shown above are the dragon teapots which are unused and 'new' in box.

I had also observed that the quality of the teapot in general was good.  Let me explain.  For Chinese tea drinkers who use teapots for their brewing, buying and using a teapot is very important.  Chinese teapot collectors are even more particular, paying attention to things like straight line alignment of the teapot from handle to spout (if you look at the teapot from a top view), the fitting of the teapot cover and the overall finish.  This 'Yi Tiao Long' teapot set is generally acceptable but I did observed that this teapot set does not have that 'collectible' finish of new teapots today.  It is slightly more rough in the finish, a less refined feel.  My guess is that these dragon teapot sets were manufactured and sold to the tea drinker for tea brewing in the 1980s, where teapot collection as a hobby was not the rage then.

The highlight of this "Yi Tiao Long' teapot set is the clay.  As I only own the black clay versions, I found that this black clay was very pretty, in that the teapot develops a beautiful sheen after a few sessions of brewing.  I had also noticed that the teapot literally sparkle, like there were bits of diamonds in the clay (yes...I wish), but I was told these were minerals that were found in the black clay.  Holding this teapot under a light..... the 'diamonds' on the teapot.....a happy sparkling exercise .  

Time to season a teapot.

2006 CNNP Yiwu Raw Pu erh

This is a 2006 Yiwu raw pu erh cake.  The wrapper on the cake stated that this tea cake was made from wild old  Yiwu tea tree leaves.  Stone pressed and manufactured by Tutsu Export Co (aka CNNP).  

Stone pressed cakes refers to the compression of tea leaves, in that, the tea leaves are placed in a stone pot and a worker would stand over the stone cover, using his weight to press down on the stone cover, thus compressing the tea leaves into a cake.  Machine pressed cakes simply uses hydraulic press systems that compresed the tea, that are usually placed in a metal pot.  The compression levels of machines are higher than stone pressed techniques.  I find stone pressed tea cakes more appealing, as the looser compression allows me to pry open the cake by hand and reduce breaking the tea leaves.  

This cake has that 'mild' aged tea taste.  It is still a little astringent as it is a 6 year old tea.  I had purchased it in 2009.  I suspected that these few years of storage in Singapore had reduced the traditional sharp bitter taste of a new pu erh raw and this cake has shown some characteristics of aging.  I was initially worried over the darker looking color of the tea cake (refer to pix).  I had stored my tea cakes individually in plain brown envelopes and placed on my book shelves.  It was a relief the tea tasted 'ok' and did not have any wet stored taste.  This particular tea cake felt much 'drier' and the cake seem very crispy when I was breaking up this cake into my tea caddy.

In my opinion, this Yiwu tea cake has a mix of old gushu inside.    It is a pleasant tea, very easy to drink, nice aroma........ slighty fruity and herbal.   No, I did not sweat profusely or feel any major high ( a tiny bit of both though).  Very enjoyable....finished almost half the cake within a month.  

I had recently broke my teapot which I had used for ripe pu erh......*$%k)!@n&*n!!!!!..... I feel better now.  Not an expensive teapot but I had brewed more than 1000 times of ripe pu with it (3 years of brewing).  Guess it will be a blog on teapots next.  Stay tuned.  

2007 Fu Hai Yiwu Ripe - A Revisit

It was about 3 years ago that I opened a cake of this 2007 Fu Hai ripe pu erh cake (see 2010 blog).  Re-reading my post, I found that I had very good impressions of this cake.  Well, I have opened another of this 2007 cake to see whether my current impressions are similar.

This 2007 Fu Hai ripe puerh cake, according to the wrapper, was made with Yiwu pu erh leaves.  Yiwu is a traditional, and remains one of the pu erh producing area in Yunnan.  You will noticed that the surface of this cakes are made from relatively large tea leaves.  A reader in my 2010 entry of this tea, noticed that the centre of the cake were made with broken and tiny tea bits of tea.  I had explained that every production will have complete as well as broken tea leaves and the 'tea packer' will usually pack the broken tea leaves inside the cake while packing the whole tea leaves on the outside of a tea cake.  Isn't this cheating? Are tea drinkers shortchanged?  My opinion is that in every tea harvest and processing, its inevitable that some leaves will be broken during processing. most of it unintentionally of course.  I would guess up to 20% of the leaves may be broken or crushed during processing.  And packing the tea leaves in such a way to 'conceal' the broken tea leaves does require some skill.  I would like to think, at this point, that the quality of the tea is more important than broken tea leaves.......meaning if you like the tea, then it is a good tea.

I do find that this Fu Hai cake to be a good tea.  The aroma is complex, in that it has a broader range in the aroma - its like pleasant chinese herbs that are used for boiling traditional soups. This tea exudes a comforting and warming scent and sensation when I sip this tea, accompanied with a subtly sweet finish.

But I digress - I have recently read in the tea forums, that some pu erh tea drinkers are contemplating sealing their pu erh in plastic bags as a way of storing the tea and had suggested that the tea will turned out, with time, into a very nice aged pu erh.  I would advise against this form of storage.   Let me share my thoughts on this :
- In Feb 2010, I recorded a blog entry about a 2004 Dayi 7542, that I had purchased locally.  This tea cake was interesting in that this cake was wrapped with very thick cellophane plastic.  I suspected that this wrapping was to preserve the integrity of the cake and prevent shoppers from opening the cake as the wrapper or even the tea may be damaged before the cake was sold.  The problem was that I found that this tea cake did not age well at all.  It tasted like a new cake.  My guess is that the tight cellophane wrapping prevented the tea from 'aging'.
- You would have read from my blog that I have travelled quite a number of times to Yunnan, Guangzhou, Hong Kong and Malaysia in the past few years.  I had the privilege to make friends with many tea shop owners, tea drinkers and serious tea collectors.  I had the opportunity to taste some of their tea collection as well.  Some of these teas are very old and kept by these collectors for many years.  I can say that the teas kept by them are not stored in any special or secret way.  The tea are just stored in rooms or in shelves in their house.  Most the the tea cakes, I observed, were stored in their original tong wrappers, and are only taken down to drink (or very rarely, to be sold).
What I am saying is this.....you have one chance of aging pu erh tea.  Do it right.  I shudder to think of the disappointment with the results of the tea you have stored in your plastic bags after 10-15 years.

Back to this Fu Hai tea cake.  If you are a ripe pu erh tea drinker, do consider a purchase when you come across it.  Should not be expensive.  Recommended.

Expired Tea

Oh dear, I realized I have few oolong tins  that are past their expiry dates stated on the tins. The use of expiry dates on food is important in that it protects the customer from eating food or drink that may not in an optimal state of consumption on due date.  It may be less serious if you opened a can of fruits that is a month overdue, but consuming a cup of yogurt that is 2 weeks overdue may not be altogether a pleasant experience.

The date on this 'Sea Dyke' Ti Kuan Yin (see pix above) stated the expiry date as 13 Oct 2011.  This meant that the production date of this tea was 3 years before due date, i.e. Oct 2008.  There is now a trend for some tea collectors to go to tea and grocery shops looking to buy such expired tinned teas, as these tea drinkers believe these teas are more mellow than the new tins.  I myself came across a Guangzhou tea shop that sells such expired tinned teas for a premium and yes, these teas sells well.

Now the main issue is - Does tea have an expiry date?  Answer : It depends ( I often use this phrase when I answer my Economics questions and it is more often correct). But seriously -  It depends, because of the type of tea you have purchased and how you have stored your tea. Green teas like Long Jing,  and Japanese powered green tea (matcha) are usually consumed within a year.  Greener oolongs (meaning light roast) like Taiwan high mountain tea also fall in this category.    Green teas are generally appreciated and consumed for their fresh and invigorating taste.  Serious green tea drinkers are particularly concerned in preserving the freshness, taking extra steps in storing their green teas in vacuum sealed packs and containers, and even resorting to refrigerating their green teas.  If these teas are not store properly, the taste and aroma would somewhat be diminished.  The tea leaves may also turn brownish and would be quite unpleasant to drink.  

Some teas can keep for a long time.  Pu erh tea which I enjoy drinking is a tea that will age to wonderful tea with a pleasing aroma and taste.  Other teas that will age well include  Liu Bao and Liu Ann tea.  Highly roasted oolongs like the above Ti Kuan Yin will keep well, with some tea lovers attesting that these tea will taste  mellow with age.  

Be mindful that there are also oolongs; that are lightly roasted and the tea leaves appear greenish especially when observed after a brewing session. Such tea would not keep well over time.  Some teashops may 'reroast' such green oolongs when they notice the tea has lost its aroma.  It is a practice that is not condone by me.

So, is there an expiry date to teas like pu erh and liu bao?  Chan Kam Pong in his book "First Step to Chinese Puerh Tea" answered "Every tea has a climax - a peak time when it is best appreciated.  Generally speaking, Puerh tea aged for 30 years is already very good."  My Guangzhou tea master friend thinks that puerh tea will reach an optimal level after 25-30 years and may even taper off after further storage.  

For me, drink your green teas fast, preferably within a year and refrigerate your tea  if possible.  For teas like pu erh and liu bao - yes, these tea will keep and age well, but with an important caveat - proper storage.