How Do I Brew My Oolong ?

 

When I have an oolong session at home (usually alone), I will literally brew up 5 infusions; one brew a cup.  I might brew up a few more infusions when I had finished drinking the 1st 5 cups.

It is, to me, an easy way to enjoy my tea.  When I am reading or working on my laptop, having a few cups of tea beside me is a good  idea.....it keeps me seated than making one infusion at a time. I do drink the tea fast, about 15-20 minutes. An oolong, like the one in the pix is generally good for about 5-6 infusions before the tea weaken in a hurry.

It is quite similar for pu erh tea.  I brew 5-6 cups at a go, one infusion per cup and repeat this brew for the next 6-12 cups.  It is quite difficult to drink so much tea alone, so I do sometimes keep the later infusions in a vacuum flask where I can enjoy the tea later or when I am out for errands.  

When I am in Guangzhou buying tea, I do ask for a small sample (after I had tried the tea in the shop) on those tea I am interested in and I brew the tea back in the hotel room.  It is not easy to assess the tea in a room but it helps me a little before I make a buying decision.  I do bring along a flask during my travels and get the tea shop to pour a couple of infusions into the flask so I can continue to 'drink' the tea I had shortlisted to buy.  

Readers will know me that I do not describe a tea by each and every infusions but rather by initial and ending thoughts.  I enjoy the complications of a tea, the aging results of storage and the pleasant sensations after finishing a tea session. 

Time for tea.  

Some Thoughts On Oolong storage

Storing your oolong would primarily depend on the roast levels of your oolong.  

1.  Lightly roasted oolong.  Some examples are Taiwan high mountain oolongs like Ali Shan oolong. I had also tried a very high grade (aka expensive ) Tie Kuan Yin from China which is also lightly roasted.  I liked these teas.  It has a refreshing quality, a nice bouquet of fresh flower aroma with a light lingering sweetness in the aftertaste.  

These tea are not meant for aging and need special attention in storing these tea.  Refrigeration is a commonly used to keep these tea.  I suspect the tea leaves may be placed in the freezer.  I had seen, when I was in the Guangzhou tea wholesale centres where high grade Long Qing tea was also kept in deep freezers to maintain the freshness of the tea.  

2.  Medium to high roasted oolong.  I recommend you store them in tea caddies.  The popular tinned versions are, to me, very nice oolongs and I keep them in their factory packed tins. Most of these tins are double lidded.  It is reasonable air tight. Many of these teas do well with age. They do not ferment like pu erh tea, rather oolong oxidised with time. Old high roasted oolong are very highly sought and are very expensive. Even the older canned versions can cost more than $100 per tin.

3. Specialty oolongs.  One of my fav specialty oolongs comes from Hong Kong. Its their 40-hr high roast oolong. The tea taste and aroma is a surprising caramel like. A super tea in my opinion. However, this tea is meant to be drank within a year as the roasted aroma will diminish significantly after a year.  Its a drink now tea.  In spite of its shorter life span, this is a popular tea among many oolong tea drinkers worldwide. I look forward to going to Hong Kong again to purchase this tea. I may consider freezing some of this tea when I return. 

Chinese New Year

 

Tomorrow is Chinese New Year.  This will be the year of the ox (niu in Chinese).  

Good news.  If you are buying tea from my online store.  You can now pay in your home currency, whether in Canadian, yen, aussie, won, euro or any currency. Just drop me a mail and I will send the paypal invoice in your preferred currency payment. 

To all my readers, Happy Niu Year.  Live long and prosper.  

A New Xiaguan

 

I had received a new (pack of 5 tuo) Xiaguan  during last Christmas tea exchange with a tea friend.  This is a 2020 production and I had broken up a tuo and started brewing this tea.  

These are my findings and thought about this new Xiaguan

a) Compression - this was a shocker.  I had expected breaking up a tuo would be tough: especially for a newer one.  It was a surprise that the compression was low.......I used a pu erh knife and broke up the entire tuo under a minute, and with little effort.  So easy.  

b) Taste and aroma - a drink-now tea.  No astringency, nothing rough or unpleasant about the tea.  The tea tasted fresh, almost like a good quality green tea.  It even reminded me a little of long-ching tea; there was a iittle nutty sweet aftertaste.  A sweet bouquet of fresh floral aroma with slightly sweet mouthfeel. The tea brews well giving about 8 good infusions.  

Teashops should be happy. This very inexpensive tea is an easy sell.  New puerh in the past was considered 'difficult to drink' and the tea should be kept for a few years so the tea would be less astringent and mellow.  Now, this tea is ready to drink; fresh and pleasant and even tasted much better than the Chinese tea offered in many Chinese restaurants.  You can now see and taste this 'new' tea phenomena with the popular pu erh tea factories and even from boutique producers.  I would even recommend serious tea drinkers to buy this inexpensive Xiaguan tuo and have a brew of this tea.

But I have a few concerns.  

Pu erh processing is as follows

= tea leaves are harvested

- tea leaves are laid out to dry (oxidation does take place)

- tea leaves are stir-fried (called kill green, stopping oxidation)

- leaves are then rolled (by hand or machine) for shaping

- tea leaves are dried (sun or machine drying)

- leaves are sorted and may be compressed

My concerns are that, even though the entire process of pu erh tea processing remains unchanged, It is my thought that the timing or duration of certain steps are altered, whether lengthening or shortening the time of a process step, that made the pu erh tea today different from tea from 'yesterday'.  Will this new pu erh tea age well?  I do not know. We will find out in 8-10 years time, as many such tea would have aged by then.

Pu erh tea, to me should be drunk when it is old .  Pu erh tea must have some age and with good storage, the tea will have delightful complications in both taste and aroma.  There is an added dimension to the tea once you drink an aged tea.  When you buy an older tea, you are buying the tea and you are buying the storage.  How much weightage do you give to storage when you assess a 10 year old tea.  How about a 20 year old tea?  Generally, well stored old pu erh are highly sought after and you can see the higher prices of these tea as well.  Storing a pu erh tea for more than 10 years or more is very challenging as it takes up real estate space and you have to monitor the storage with  higher vigilance especially if you are residing in a temperate country.  

When I am on a pu erh buying trip (I have too much already though), I will continue buying the older production ones for the reasons above.  

Your thoughts please.

Art of the Xin Cha - awaking the tea

 

I had blogged about 'xin cha' a few times in my blog and my readers would now know that breaking up a compressed pu erh tea (cake, too or brick) into smaller pieces, placing these pieces in a tea caddy for a week or two..........and you will discover that your tea is much better in both taste and aroma after this short time in storage.

Many tea drinker buddies from Europe and North America, upon receiving an overseas tea order,  have held back their enthusiasm over their purchase.  They do not peel off a piece of their pu erh purchase to make a brew, upon receiving their box of tea.  They felt the tea tasted 'flat' if they brewed the tea immediately upon getting the tea.  Now, they leave the tea alone for 1-2 weeks before they start a brew.  My tea buddies will happily testify the tea tasted much better after the tea had rested for a couple of weeks,

Why? I don't know.  Maybe the tea went to sleep while In transit in the cold temperature of the cargo hold of the airplane and now needed a bit of time to come out of its hibernation 

I had also proposed that for highly compressed pu erh tea, breaking them and storing the tea in tea caddies for 1-2 weeks will also help improve the aroma and taste of the tea.  Many tea drinkers I know, do not break up their pu erh cake, tuo or brick. Instead, when they want to drink a particular tea, they will pry off a small chunk to brew.  

This 'peeling off a small chunk to brew' is also practised by many tea shops when sampling a tea.  It is good optics to have this practice.  Buyers can still see the pu erh cake or brick and the entire wrapper.  It is also practical for a tea shop if it has more than 30-50 varieties of pu erh for sale. Putting the sample tea in tea caddies may not be practical and helpful in this aspect.  

If you have a collection of 20 of more pu erh tea, having 20 plus tea caddies is not a practical idea when there is 'no space' in the house for so many tea caddies.  

I may have a solution. Use 4-5 small tea caddies.  Small means capacity size for 50-100g of pu erh tea.  Choose your 4-5 pu erh tea you want to drink and break up 50-100g into the tea caddies and keep the unopened part of your tea back to your collection. You would have 4 -5 awakened teas that would last you 1-2 months before you can choose to refill them with either the same or another pu erh selection. 

One more thing.  A Korean tea buddy emailed me last month.  He breaks his tea into tea caddies  He however argues that for highly compressed tea. the tea would take a longer time to awaken.  He felt the tea tasted better after 3-4 weeks after storing in a tea caddy,  I share similar findings and I suggest you do likewise. 

Time for tea.  

Goodbye 2020 And Hello 2021

 

2020 in one word - Tumultuous.  

This pandemic had taken a physical and economic toil on all of us.  As we welcome 2021 tomorrow, I am sure 2021 would be a much better year for all of us.  

I was not able to travel much this year and I should think I can only fly overseas only late next year.  For many tea drinkers around the world, I had noticed from my email correspondence, many of us are had bought less tea this tea and are instead drinking from our stash of tea.  I am sure we had bought some nice tea in the past and we are now brewing them during these 'rainy days'.  

Pix shows a 2010 Lao Man E's ban zhang 500g tea brick.  This tea is strong from the 1st sip.  There is now some mellowness and a slight hint of sweetness In the tea.  Very strong chi in the tea and I felt a sweaty sensation (for a couple of minutes) from the 2nd infusion. 

I am thankful that all my readers and tea buddies around the world were doing not too badly this year.  To all my readers and tea buddies, Happy New Year 2021.  

Tea for the special occasion

 

I would normally open an older tea to drink and share with my family and friends, This is usually done on special occasions like Christmas or Chinese New Year.

I was most probably showing off when I would take out the cake with its wrapper on, opening or breaking up the cake when we are brew the tea.

I realised now it was a mistake.

The tea is not at its best when you open the cake and prying off some tea to brew on the same day. The tea would be much better if I had broke the cake up and stored the contents in a tea caddy for a few weeks before that special occasion. The taste and a aroma of the tea would be better. Yes call it xin cha or awaken the tea.... it really works. This is especially so for highly compressed cakes from Xiaguan and even Taetea (Dayi) cakes. Both raw and ripe cakes would do very well if they are broken up and kept in a tea caddy for a couple of weeks.

I am opening a 2005 Xiaguan cake. This is not an iron cake but the compression, in my opinion is just as hard as an iron cake. This cake should be nice as I could detect the old Xiaguan signature faint perfume aroma from the cake, I cannot wait for Christmas.  Counting down the days.