Gongfu – Perfect Leaves

Tasting Gaoshan Xiaozhong from Laoximen

While I was cleaning up my bookshelf, I found a notebook with a bunch of told tea notes. My goal is to post the notes so I can finally recycle the notebook and clear up some space. The notes are pretty bare compared to what I use now but I’d still like to share them. This is a great opportunity to reacquaint myself with my older teas by tasting them again, if possible. I haven’t done a re-tasting of this gaoshan xiaozhong yet, but I remember I didn’t like it very much. They came from my “tea lady” in Laoximen Tea City. I’ve since learned that her tea’s quality is questionable.

Tea: According to the seller, this tea is “gaoshan xiaozhong /高山小种.” Though her explanation was not very clear (or at least, I didn’t quite understand it), I believe she meant that this is a high mountain variety of lapsang souchong (“zhengshan xiaozhong/正山小种” in Mandarin). I couldn’t find anything called gaoshan xiaozhong online or in my Chinese tea books so I had to use powers of deduction to figure out exactly what I was drinking.

Typically, lapsang souchong comes from Wuyi Mountain in Fujian province. However, the alternative Chinese name for lapsang is “lishan xiaozhong/立山小种,” which leads me to believe the tea may also come from Li Mountain (not to be confused with Li Mountain in Taiwan). Li Mountain is still in the same neighborhood as Wuyi Mountain, so I believe both are very plausible origins. Since “gaoshan” simply means “high mountain,” it makes sense to me that this tea came from a higher altitude than ordinary lapsang, regardless of which mountain it came from. High mountain tea is usually low-yield and generally has a more bold aroma and flavor profile. People usually refer to certain Taiwanese oolong teas as “gaoshan;” I’ve never heard anyone describe black tea as “gaoshan” before.

Lapsang souchong is either smoked (yan/烟) or unsmoked (wu yan/无烟). Based on the flavor, I assume this lapsang is unsmoked. “Xiaozhong” means small leaf, which is a bit counterintuitive because xiaozhong teas actually come from larger leaves. The “small” must refer to the leaves’ position on the plant. Xiaozhong leaves are picked near the bottom of the branch, rather than the top. Leaves near the top of the plant are more valuable and flavorful. “Small leaf” is a pretty common descriptor for black tea. That said, “xiaozhong” rarely finds its way into a tea’s name, so teas called “xiaozhong” almost always belong to the lapsang family.

In short, I believe this tea is a high-altitude black tea from one of Fujian Province’s two major tea mountains.

Company: Because I bought this tea from Laoximen Tea City, it does not belong to any specific company.

Price per Gram: According to my February 2018 Tea Haul post, I bought Gaoshan Xiaozhong for roughly 1 RMB per gram (about $0.15 per gram at current market rate).

Brewing Method: I didn’t write brewing notes for this tea, but based on how I usually brew lapsang, I most likely used 95 – 100 degree water and brewed for 30 seconds. Then I probably added 10 – 15 seconds for each brew thereafter.

Appearance & Smell of the Leaf: Gaoshan Xiaozhong’s dry leaves were long, thin and twisted. They were dark brown with just a few highlights. The dry leaves had the aroma of a typical black tea. It smelled a bit like chocolate with some higher, sweeter notes on top. Whereas many black teas have a deep, hearty fragrance that really gets in your chest, I noticed that gaoshan’s aroma was very shallow. There were hints of dried apricot.

First Steep: My tasting notes simply say “underwhelming, flat.” I wrote that Gaoshan Xiaozhong did not have a strong aftertaste. It was rather sour and frankly, almost as bad as a teabag. The wet leaves were a lighter brown than the dry leaves. Brewing the tea also dampened the high notes, giving the tea a much darker aroma. I detected soapy flavors with a hint of sweet potato. The tea liquor was bright orange. On my second or third cup, the tea started to taste like pickle juice to I poured it out.

Though I didn’t like this tea very much, I enjoyed the journey of trying to figure out exactly what it was. How do you all usually figure out what your mystery teas are?

“TOT”: A Tasty Tiny Orange Tea (2007 Ripe Pu’er)

Tea: Tiny Orange Tea (TOT) 2007 Ripe Pu’er Stuffed Xinhui Mandarin Orange

Company: Bitter Leaf Teas

Price per Gram: $0.29 ($5 per piece, or $13 for 3-4 pieces)

There are no pix for this post, because apparently I didn’t take any good ones… Whoops~

Brewing Method: Bitter Leaf’s website has a video (linked above) showing an optional brewing method, but otherwise left no instructions. Because TOT is both a ripe pu’er and a dried orange, I decided to steep it with 100 degree (Celsius) water. The largest gaiwan I had at the time was around 120 ml. To expose more of the leaves, I took the top of the orange off and cut horizontal slits into the orange rind. The idea was to have the orange act like a filter. I added 10 -15 seconds to each brew after the first one.

Appearance & Smell of the Leaf: It’s….so… small! Bitter Leaf isn’t joking when they say the orange is tiny. A small package doesn’t mean a small aroma though. The fragrance hit my nose as soon as I opened the packed. It smelled like a sweet tart. TOT didn’t smell particularly like dried orange or ripe pu’er. It was oddly sour, but in a good way. I could tell right away it was a mandarin orange by the smell (mandarin oranges are superior oranges, don’t @ me). TOT also smelled similar to “ugly oranges” (丑八怪橘子). The leaves themselves looked like Bitter Leaf’s Black Beauty. They were pressed into the orange, so of course it was difficult to get a good look at them.

First Steep: I rinsed like one would normally rinse a pu’er then steeped for 45 seconds. The aroma of the liquor was sweet yet strangely earthy. It smelled like what I imagine cooking red meat in a roasted oolong would smell like. The liquor was a cloudy, coppery orange. I was super nervous about tasting the tea. Perhaps not surprisingly, the first steep tasted overwhelmingly of orange, with only a hint of pu’er. The flavor was medicinal in character but it wasn’t unpleasant.

Second Steep: This steep was about a minute long and I was in love with the color of the resulting tea liquor. The orange gave way to a red, and the coppery tone intensified. The brew was also much more clear than the previous one. As expected, I could taste more of the ripe pu’er in this steep. For some reason, though, this steep came out bitter. I still detected more orange than pu’er, but the pu’er was definitely there (I think that’s where the bitter note was coming from). I was not in love with this brew, but I didn’t hate it either.

Third Steep: I brought out another fairness pitcher so I could have one for fresh steeps (the ones I’m writing about in each section) and one for cumulative steeps. I collect the cumulative steeps by pouring the leftover liquid from each brew into a separate vessel, then after a few brews I try the tea from the secondary vessel. When brewing gongfu style, certain characteristics will come and go depending on the temperature of the water and how long you’ve steeped the tea. Tasting the cumulative brew gives you an “average” of the tea, and is similar to what you would taste when brewing western style.

The third steep was incredibly red. When I tasted the third brew, I audibly gasped in surprise. The flavor was so balanced. The orange was no longer dominating, the pu’er was coming into its own and the medicinal note also calmed down quite a bit. There was no more bitterness in the tea. I still detected something I didn’t quite like, but it wasn’t a bad flavor per se.

Fourth Steep: The orange got fat. The leaves were really trying to break free but the orange was not letting it happen. By the fourth steep, the orange color had left the liquor; it was becoming more brown. The tea was swelling to fill the gaiwan. This is the steep that marked the transition from orange to pu’er. The tartness was gone and the soil flavor increased, but the brew was still relatively balanced.

Fifth Steep: More surprise: the orange flavor made a strong comeback. It may have been because I was playing with the orange after the previous steep. TOT didn’t blow my mind but I liked it. It’s a nice, casual drinker. I hadn’t brewed a tea for so many steeps in a long time.

Sixth – Twelfth Steeps: There was a battle over which flavor would come out on top: ripe pu’er or orange? At times the bitterness was overwhelming, and I noticed that the hotter the water (I had to boil more partway through my tasting) the more bitter the tea. Normally I can’t drink this much tea at once, but because I was only drinking one three-sip cup per steep then pouring the rest into the other pitcher, I could handle it. The orange got so big it was difficult to cover it with water.

Around steep nine, I randomly started to think TOT would be great for cold brews and for cooking. It would go great with chicken, fish or tea eggs. I imagine it would also be awesome to stew pork (I cannot verify this) or lamb. Basically, it would be awesome with everything, lol. I imagine it would go well with lemon grass and black pepper, with a bit of garlic.

Please don’t take my cooking advice. My food is terrible.

For steeps ten – twelve, I took the leaves out of the orange. They were tightly rolled still, and they filled the gaiwan almost completely. There were easily 5 – 7 grams of tea in the orange. TOT’s leaves were the first ripe pu’er I’d had in a year that I actually liked. After brewing the leaves by themselves, I brewed the orange by itself. It tasted like weak candy, but it didn’t have a lot of flavor but itself. Tasting the orange alone, I finally figured out that one of the flavor notes I caught was prickly ash, minus the spice. Prickly ash is technically in the citrus family and I love prickly ash so this is a win.

The conclusion: All in all, TOT was pretty awesome. It’s not on my favorites list, but I enjoyed the experience. I’ll most likely buy it again someday. Bitter Leaf’s tea’s international shipping is pretty gui (expensive), though, so I’ll have to wait a while. Besides, I’m craving some Teasenz products right now.

Wudong Tea: Yulan Xiang（玉兰香）

Tea: Yulan Xiang / Magnolia Fragrance is a type of fenghuang dancong (single tree phoenix oolong).

Company: Wudong Tea/ Chaozhou Tea Growers

Price per Gram: 30 to 34 cents ($15 – $17 per 50 gram packet).

Brewing Method: After my last brewing disaster, I decided to find new brewing instructions for the tea. I found something that said to use 2 – 5 grams of tea for 225 ml gaiwans. My gaiwans are typically about 100 ml, so I did some quick math and decided on 3 grams of tea and 95 degree water. I later found the brewing instructions on the seller’s website. They’re similar to the method I used, but they call for a slightly higher leaf-to-water ratio (5 – 8 grams for 120 – 150 ml, depending on preferred strength) and shorter brewing times.

yulan xiang dry leavesa

Appearance & Smell of the Leaf: The dry leaves were long and twisted, but not super thin. There were browns, dark moss-green leaves and spring greens. They were relatively unbroken when I received them.

I learned that Yulan Xian translates to “magnolia fragrance.” I have no idea what magnolias smell like (to be honest, my repertoire of flowers is super limited). The leaves smelled like artificial grape flavoring and dried apricot. I liked it a lot, and could definitely smell that it was a phoenix oolong.

First Steep: I started with a quick rinse. The liquor was light and left me skeptical. I tasted the rinse, just because I wanted to, and I was struck by how thin it was. After the rinse, I brewed the tea for about 1 minute. The wet leaf smelled like cranberry wensleydale cheese and was a lot brighter than the dry leaf. It smelled like my hair product (Kinky Curly Knot Today, which contains things like marshmallow root, slippery elm, mango fruit extract and some fragrance). The tea liquor was a super pale yellow.

When I tasted the tea, I was unimpressed. I didn’t find the tea pleasant at all. It tasted like what I imagine furniture polish must taste like, with a strong baking soda after taste. I could taste notes similar to what I detect in certain tieguanyin (iron goddess) teas. It was very “green” in flavor, but not green enough to be classified a green tea.

Second Steep: I meant to add just 15 seconds to the brew, but I wound up adding 30 seconds. This time, the tea liquor was a little furry and was more the color of pale urine. It had more yellow in it than the previous brew. The flavor had not changed all that much. It was very light and I actually started to suspect my water. The flavor of the water came through more than the flavor of the tea.

yulan xiang tea liquor

I felt bad because I received these samples for free and I really wanted to like them but they weren’t doing anything for me. I figure that perhaps I just don’t like dancong’s that much. Maybe I can’t enjoy the complex flavors. Later brews were more pleasant than the first two brews, and stronger brews were definitely better.

Yulan Xiang was so thin it felt like water, despite the fuzziness. There was also a bit of astringency but not so much that the tea wasn’t refreshing. I guess you could compare the feeling of drinking Yulan Xiang to drinking fresh spring water. I’m drawn to oolongs because of their variety, and I’d love to be able to enjoy something more delicate than my typical cliff tea. One of these day’s I’ll get it, I’m sure. 🙂

Actually, I still had about 3.5 grams of Yulan Xiang left, so I brewed it just before writing this post. The larger amount of leaf definitely solved the thinness problem, and the liquor was darker, but my other observations remained pretty much the same. The second time around, however, I found myself better able to enjoy the tea. Perhaps it really is just a matter of getting your taste buds accustomed to the flavor.

Despite feeling tepid towards the tea itself, I loved the look of the wet leaves. They totally transformed and were unrecognizable from the shriveled dark leaves I started with. The wet leaves are bright green with some orange-red and brown-red leaves mixed in. They glisten in the relatively clear tea liquor. If anything, this tea is fun to take photos of.

Here’s the first tea I tried from Wudong Teas. My impression was not as positive as this one. Would I recommend Yulan Xiang? If you like dancong then yes, this is probably really good. If you’re on the fence about it, perhaps you should stick to more popular and readily available varietals. While some teas can be over hyped, there’s usually a reason one or two teas become more popular than the rest.

yulan xiang in filled gaiwan

Bitter Leaf Teas: Black Beauty (2009 Menghai Ripe Puer)

Tea: The company lists Black Beauty as a Gong Ting (imperial) ripe puer (宫廷熟普洱). There is no information as to whether the trees are young or old, but given the price, I suspect the trees are fairly young. The tea had been aged about 10 years by the time I tasted it. There is no other information about the tea on the website.

Company: Bitter Leaf Teas

Price per gram: 18 cents per gram ($4.50 for a 25g sample).

Brewing Method: I followed the brewing instructions on the package. I used 3.3 grams in a 100 milliliter gaiwan and brewed the tea at about 95 degrees Celsius for 3 seconds. I added 3 – 5 seconds for each infusion after that. The flash brewing got a bit tedious, but Bitter Leaf must have had a reason for including those instructions, so I intended to humor them. A small leaf brews faster than a long leaf, and it tends to get bitter. Bitter Leaf tried to save me.

bitter leaf black beauty leaves

Appearance of the Leaf: The leaf was surprisingly small. I’m used to very long, elegant leaves so seeing the small pieces was a little off putting. Black Beauty appeared to be made from leaf pieces rather than full leaves. Seeing as I know next to nothing about ripe puer (but I’m learning!) I figured the small leaves are probably okay.

Despite the size of the leaf, the colors were quite promising. Black Beauty’s leaves were about the color of milk chocolate, with some light caramel notes mixed in. I didn’t see any black leaves mixed in, rather, the leaves were all varying shades of brown. They looked like piles of various forest twigs.

The leaves smelled like dirt to me, if I’m being perfectly honest. I know that ripe puer is supposed to smell and taste like dried fruit and baked goods and even pudding depending on the type, but for some reason I just can’t smell or taste it. I’ve had only one good ripe puer before, and it was a random hole-in-the-wall shop product. I’ll never find it again. (T_T) I smelled a little bit of fudge on the leaves, but the dry leaves smelled like wet soil. After a quick rinse, the chocolaty notes got stronger, but so did the “soil” smell. The wet leaf smelled more palatable.

First Steep

Black Beauty’s liquor was gorgeous. It was a deep brown-red color, something like mahogany. I’ve had red teas (also called black teas) that were a similar color. The liquor simply smelled humid. The flavor was not nearly as bad as the smell. I still tasted the dirt notes, but Black Beauty was incredibly smooth. Still, I don’t think I could call it tasty. It tasted like wood and dirt and furniture polish. I emptied the tea into my tray.

Second Steep

The second steep was less abrasive. It was shocking. I like the smoothness of the tea, if not the flavor. The smoothness might get me into ripe puer, but ripe puer still feels like a grandpa tea to me. The session ended quickly.

bitter leaf black beauty liquor

I really want to understand why people like ripe puer. Of course, I know that not everyone will like everything, but I feel there must be something I’m missing. I won’t give up on it until I’ve thoroughly explored it, but for now I’m going to keep saying that I don’t really like ripe puer.

Here’s an older installment of my ripe puer adventures. I loved the company but not the tea: Teasenz Chocobar Puer

Wudong Tea: “Dawuye” （大乌叶）

Tea: Dawuye is a a type of fenghuang dancong. In other words, it is a single tree phoenix oolong.

Company: Wudong Tea

Brewing Method: I debated whether to brew the tea Dawuye in Guangdong style (lots of leaf, with a long steep time) or Wuyi Style (lots of leaf, with unusually short brewing times). I ultimately decided to go with Guangdong style because I wanted to push this tea to the edge.

Dawuye’s leaves were beautiful. They were long, dark and twisted. They were mostly dark green with a few flecks of grass and hay-yellow leaves mixed in. The leaves reminded me of a higher grade Shou Mei (white tea). Before I heated the gaiwan, the leaves smelled like smoked dried plums or waxberry or similar dried fruit. After I heated the gaiwan, the leaves smelled green. I’d compare it to Fukamushi tea of Biluochun. Overall, the leaves smelled grassy and vegetal, a little like asparagus, but not overwhelmingly so. You could also compare the smell to cooked cabbage.

First Steep

For the first brew I steeped the tea for a full minute. Interestingly, the wet leaves smelled like macaroni and cheese and the leaves were even more gorgeous than before. The greens were glistening; they really popped. Dawuye’s tea liquor was very, very golden. Once again, it reminded me of the vibrancy of Japanese green tea. You could also compare the color to certain sheng (raw) puers. The liquor was surprisingly cloudy. There were a lot of particles and dust, even though I used a filter. I’m not sure whether the dust came from the shipping or whether it’s a feature of the tea, but if it’s a flaw I doubt it was the farmer’s fault.The leaves I received were, for the most part, quite long and unbroken.

Despite the beautiful leaves, the vibrant liquor and decent aroma, my first sip of the tea was unpleasant. It tasted like a bad Tieguanyin (Iron Goddess). The tea was extremely bitter with an after taste of baking soda. Though I like the flavor of baking soda, this particular tasting note offended me. I was unhappy drinking the tea, but I decided to take another sip. When I aerated the Dawuye liquor (by slurping it) and breathing out of my nose, I could sense a hint of a floral note, but it was unclear what that flower was. I eventually just poured the tea out. The empty fairness pitcher smelled exactly like the floral note I detected while drinking the tea. It faintly reminded me of Milan Xiang (Honey Orchid).

Second Steep

For the second brew, I decided to steep for 30 seconds. The liquor remained cloudy. I read somewhere on the internet that you can’t really start to fully appreciate phoenix oolong teas until the third steep, so I wasn’t about to give up so soon. I hoped the second steep would be better than the first.

With the second brew, the initial bitterness had gone away. Because I changed the steeping parameters (I shortened the time, and the water had cooled down a bit), I’m guessing the milder flavor was a result of the combination of changes, rather than a result of a single change. After this experience, I would not recommend brewing tea Guangdong style. I’d suggest reducing the amount of tea or increasing the amount of water. I have gaiwans that are around 120 or 150 milliliters, which would be better for 8 grams of dancong. The brew had a medium mouthfeel. It wasn’t thin like water, but it wasn’t something you could chew on; Dawuye’s liquor was slightly viscous. I also detected a dry finishing note, which I enjoyed.

The baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) flavor was still present. I guess that particular tasting note might have to do with the minerality of the tea and my water. For health reasons, I must use bottled water when in China, but I try to use water that still has some of the naturally occurring minerals in it. I use the same water for all of my tea.

The huigan (aftertaste) was highly floral. The vegetal notes were still present, but the floral aroma was the most prominent feature of this brew. Wudong Tea’s Dawuye was not bad; I just don’t think it was my style.

Third Steep

I added ten seconds to this and subsequent brews, which means the third steep was about 40 seconds long. The showed no signs of letting up; it was certainly a tea that I could brew for a long time if I chose to. It was stubbornly dark. On the third brew the bitterness calmed down even more while the dryness ticked up. The floral-ness became more apparent in the initial taste, but it still mostly lived in the aftertaste. Aerating the tea did almost nothing for the flavor, which is strange for a phoenix oolong. While I was slurping, I actually tasted more astringency in the back of my mouth.The tea tasted like bitter medicinal herbs. I could only describe the tea as ku (bitter).

Subsequent Steeps

The fourth and fifth brews of the tea were better than the first three, but I stopped drinking because I wasn’t enjoying it. I’m grateful for the samples Wudong Tea (Chaozhou Tea Grower) sent me but I had to give up on it. I’m excited to try the other samples they sent. Perhaps I’ll find something I like.

Raw Pu’er Tasting: Tobacco-Smoked Sausage

You may have noticed that I’ve been posting every day this week. To those of you who receive each new post notification as an email, I apologize for the spam. I don’t plan on becoming a daily blog. Rather, I’m just catching up and proving to the world that I am, in fact, alive. I disappeared for health reasons, but *hopefully* I’m all better now.

Let me preface this tea tasting post by saying that Taobao (a Chinese shopping website) is extremely dangerous, especially on 11/11. Single’s Day (11/11) is more or less equivalent to the US’s Black Friday. Online sellers will dramatically reduce the price of their products and offer massive discounts for bulk orders. I was raised by an extremely frugal mother so I don’t fall prey to sales, however, there were things I was planning to buy anyway, so I waited until Single’s Day to purchase them.

As you know from my Chocolate Bar Pu’er post, I’m searching for a ripe pu’er that pleases my pallet. In the meantime, I like to bathe my tongue in cliff tea and raw pu’er. I typically drink young raw pu’er because it’s sweet and gentle yet complex, but if I see an aged raw pu’er I usually give it a try (if you’re confused about this whole ripe vs. raw vs. aged thing, don’t worry, a pu’er tea guide is on it’s way).

While I was scrolling through tea sellers on Taobao, I happened to notice a pu’er on sale for 34 RMB (the original price was 50 RMB). That’s roughly 5 US Dollars. Every instinct in my body told me not to buy it, but curiosity got the best of me. I added it to my cart, ordered my stuff and waited.

When the tea arrived, I was surprised and dismayed by how small the cake was. The cake was thin and weighed about 100 grams. Pu’er cakes usually don’t come in sizes smaller than 250 grams. At only $5 it wasn’t a bad deal, I just expected more. The seller did give me a sample of another tea though.

Since the sample and the cake were from presumably the same tea plantation, I decided to try them side-by-side. There was virtually no identifying information on the sample (sketchy, I know). It simply said “2013 ancient tree.” The pu’er cake, however, was a 2015 ancient tree raw pu’er from Bingdao. The cake is still aged tea, but it’s much younger than the sample.

I used my newly-acquired tea table as my setup. I don’t have two gaiwans that are the same size in my current appartment, so I used roughly the same amount of tea and water in each one. The blue and white gaiwan is larger so it wasn’t completely full, but that doesn’t really affect the tea. The first thing I noticed about the dry leaves of the pu’er cake was how beautiful they were. There were light green, dark green, and white furry leaves. I thought that was a good sign but I couldn’t tell much because the cake was so tightly compressed I had a heard time getting leaves without shattering them. The 2013 pu’er leaves were similarly colored, but they were long and unbroken.

2013, 2015 raw pu'er dry leaves — I’m wearing gloves to spare you from looking at my ugly fingernails.

As per usual, I warmed the gaiwans using 90 degree water, then placed the leaves inside. Both sets of dry leaves smelled of tobacco and mysterious wood with hints of jasmine. The pale yellow-brown tea liquor also smelled strongly of tobacco, and had a small amount of hair in it. I live for tea fur; it thickens the overall mouth feel of the tea and adds another dimension to the experience.

The color of the wet leaves was unsurprising. They looked like cooked collard greens. Though I expected the change, the color was absolutely beautiful. If I could find paint pigment in that color, it’s probably one of the only colors I’d use.

The similarities between the two ceased when I finally tasted the tea. The 2013 tea had a comfortable medium mouth feel, but it tasted like fresh tobacco (I’m imagining that’s what tobacco tastes like, anyway). I gagged as soon as I took a sip. The 2015 tea, by contrast, was much more mellow. There was no bitter aftertaste, but the mouth feel was also much thinner.

On the second brew, the 2013 tea liquor was much darker. It seemed that the exposed surface area of the 2013 leaves led to a stronger brew. The second brew is when I decided the 2013 tea tasted like cooked sausages. I was confused. The tea felt so good in my mouth that I wanted to keep it there for ever, but it tasted so bad I wanted to spit it out. I eventually stopped brewing the 2013 tea after three rounds, and I emptied the fairness pitcher so I wouldn’t have to smell it.

2013 raw pu'er leaves in water — The 2013 tea leaves may have tasted awful, but they look so good.

I focused my attention on the 2015 tea, which danced new choreography on my tongue with each subsequent brew, yet it remained somewhat shy. The flavor was mild, but I slowly began to taste other things. I couldn’t quite parse out what those flavors were though. When I sniffed the 2015 leaves after I was done tasting them, they smelled like orchids, which I found fitting because this was the first time I was using my orchid tea table. Life is funny that way, I guess.

This tea tasting reminded me of what I already knew: be very wary of Taobao seller samples.

A friend of mine also ordered tea online, and when we tasted the sample we both immediately spit the tea out and stopped drinking it. In my experience, Taobao samples are either terrible (so they can’t get rid of it unless they give it away) or expensive (they want to get you hooked on the tea so you buy the more expensive leaves). I guess you could consider the better, more expensive tea a win, but that’s not usually what I’m looking for when I get something on Taobao. I want something passable, something I can use as a daily tea so I can save my nice tea for guests and special treats. Even though I know tasting samples usually turns out terrible, I also know that I’ll still try the next sample that comes my way. After all, what’s life without a little danger?

Gongfu Brewing, Explained

I’ve been talking about using the gongfu brewing method for the past couple of weeks, but it occurred to me that I haven’t really gone into the details yet. I tried to give some necessary information in the first post, but I decided it would be better to simply give my gongfu explanation to its own post.

I personally believe that gongfu brewing is the ultimate mindfulness exercise. For those who don’t know, mindfulness is the action or process of being present in the moment and becoming aware of something. Mindfulness can extend to the realm of emotions by helping people acknowledge and accept the way they feel, but it can also include acknowledging external phenomena.

In Mandarin, “gongfu” (功夫) simply means “skill” or “art.” In the U.S. (and in other western countries?) we usually say “kung fu.” There’s a reason Kung Fu is called a martial art.

When it comes to tea, I interpret gongfu to refer to the art of brewing. I use the full gongfu process to take notes and write posts about tea, but when I’m just drinking tea for myself, I use a simplified brewing process. The following are the steps of the gongfu brewing process, with the steps I use in the simplified process in italics. I explain each step below the main list. If you’re more of a visual learner, scroll down and watch the brewing video below.

Weigh out the tea leaves and observe their appearance
Heat the utensils
Observe the aroma of the dry leaves
Rinse the tea ware with the tea
Observe the aroma of the tea liquor
Observe the aroma of the wet leaf
Serve the tea
Observe the color of the tea liquor
Observe the flavor of the tea

Step One: Weighing out the tea leaves and observing their appearance

I bought a pocket-sized kitchen scale specifically for weighing tea, though just about anything that’ll weigh leaves will work. You need something that can weigh in increments of grams (or ounces if you prefer, but I find grams easier to deal with since Chinese tea literature tends to use the metric system).

The amount of tea you need depends on the size of your gaiwan, the type of tea, and your personal preference. I use 5-6 grams for red tea, 5-8 grams for oolong, 1-2 grams for ripe pu’er, 5 grams for ripe pu’er, and 5 grams for white tea. Green tea typically is not brewed using the gongfu method. I’ll explain more in a future post, but basically you allow green tea to steep in a manner similar to western brewing.

Once I have weighed out the leaves, I place them on a small saucer (usually the one that comes with my gaiwan) and inspect them. I note the shape and color of the leaves, and check for broken pieces. Too many broken leaves means the tea is at best poorly processed and at worst poor quality. Broken leaves typically lead to bitter brews. There are many shapes and colors to look for, depending on the type of tea. I’ll give more information on that when I write posts about each individual type of tea.

Step Two: Heat the utensils

Usually, I start boiling the water before I weigh the tea. Since I’m using the stove, the water is just reaching optimal temperature by the time I write my notes on the appearance of the tea leaves.

After the water reaches the correct temperature (more on that later, in the individual tea posts), I pour some into the gaiwan then pour the gaiwan water into the fairness pitcher and swirl it around. Once I’ve heated the fairness pitcher, I pour the water into however many cups I need, then empty the pitcher and all of the cups. Warming the utensils prevents the temperature of the tea from dropping too quickly once it has been brewed. Temperature changes affect the taste of the tea. Sometimes I use a clay teapot instead of a gaiwan, but only if I’m in a tea house or if I’m brewing for company.

Basic gongfu tea cups. They are also called “three sip cups” because they are small. Image Source: Wanling Tea House

a yellow gaiwan — A typical gaiwan. They come in all colors and sizes.

One type of fairness pitcher, or gongdao bei (公道杯). Image Source: Yunnan Sourcing

Step Three: Observe the aroma of the tea leaves

Besides keeping the temperature of the tea steady, heating the utensils also serves another purpose: it makes it easier to detect the aroma of the leaves.

To smell the tea, pour your leaves into the heated gaiwan (after you’ve poured the water out!), cover it, and give it a little shake. Carefully lift the lid and sniff the aroma that comes off of the lid. You can also sniff the bowl of the gaiwan directly, but exercise caution when doing this because the gaiwan is hot.

While it is certainly possible to simply stick your nose in the tea and sniff, the heat of a gaiwan “awakens” the volatile compounds in the tea that give off its flavor and aroma. Use your imagination when describing the smell of the tea, whether you’re making notes for yourself or talking to others. If you’ve read the tea reviews I’ve posted so far, you know I use descriptors such as, “it smells like setting berries on fire.” I’ve tasted teas that smell like warehouses, fireplaces, and milk coffee. Anything that has a scent can be used to describe tea. It’s a purely subjective observation.

Step Four: Rinse the tea ware with the tea

This step is the true beginning of the actual brewing process. To brew tea using a gaiwan, fill the gaiwan with water (the tea leaves should already be in it), cover it, wait a few seconds, then pour the brew into the fairness pitcher, using the lid as a preliminary strainer. Once you are finished pouring, you can either remove the gaiwan lid and put it off to the side or simply slide it so there is a gap between the bowl and the lid. You do not want to leave the gaiwan closed; leaving it closed essentially cooks the tea. It’s not uncommon for some leaves to slip out of the gaiwan, which is why some people put strainers over their fairness pitchers for cleaner pours.

Rinsing the tea ware is essentially repeating the process in step two (heating the utensils), this time pouring water over the tea leaves in the gaiwan and using that first brew instead of pure water. This process reheats the tea ware and makes it easier to detect the aroma of the tea liquor.

Step Five: Observe the aroma of the tea liquor

Some gongfu tea setups include aroma cups, which are smaller but taller than tea cups. After rinsing the tea ware with the tea, flip the aroma cup upside down into the tea cup. When you lift the aroma cup slightly and bring your nose to it, you should be able to smell the tea. I don’t own aroma cups. Instead, I just sniff the fairness pitcher. You can also try smelling the tea cup, but because they are so shallow, the scent escapes quickly. As with smelling the leaves, let your imagination run wild.

Step Six: Observe the aroma of the wet leaf

CAUTION: STEAM CAN BURN YOU. To smell the wet leaf, bring your nose to either the lid of the gaiwan or the bowl and take a whiff. Because steam will still be rising off of these objects, be very careful.

Step Seven: Serve the tea

This is the fun part, brew the tea as you did in step four, this time waiting a few seconds longer before pouring it into the fairness pitcher. Pour the tea from the fairness pitcher into the tea cups. Tradition suggests you should pour the tea from left to right, but this matters less in informal settings.

Step Eight: Observe the color of the tea liquor

This step is somewhat self-explanatory: use your eyes to determine the color of the brew!

Step Nine: Observe the flavor of the tea

Even though the cups are called three sip cups, you can take as many or as few sips as you like. I like using three sips when I first try a tea because I can assess different things on each sip. The first sip is for gauging the texture of the tea. Is it thick and syrupy or thin like water? I use the second sip to thing about the flavor. Does the flavor make me feel warm inside, or do I get chills? Does it taste more like grass or like roses? The third sip is for the after taste. If I hadn’t been slurping the tea on the first two sips, I definitely slurp on the third. Slurping aerates the tea which changes the flavor slightly, especially if you’re drinking a phoenix oolong. After the last sip, I close my mouth and “chew” on the flavor. At this stage, the after taste starts dancing in my mouth. Is the after taste bitter or salty? Is the tea drying? Do I detect something surprising?

I’ve had trouble converting some of my friends to loose leaf tea. They insist that tea is bitter, but they’ve only tasted cheap tea bag teas. There’s a huge flavor difference between bagged teas and loose leaf teas. If you must buy bagged tea, try to get one with a fuller leaf. Tea is varied and complex. I often taste more flavors than I have words to describe. That’s partly why I decided to start posting tea reviews online, to try to put words to what I taste. I welcome additional opinions on all of the tea things I post.

One of my friends once described a tea as tasting like “tires covered in honey.” I can’t remember what tea it was, but I vaguely remember agreeing with her once I worked out in my mind what tires might taste like.

At the end of the day, tasting tea is fun. The above method may seem like a lot of work, but once you get the hang of it the steps go quickly, and you will find yourself opening your senses to the colors, smells, and tastes of the world. If you’re a coffee drinker, perhaps you can use a similar observation method for your brews, or even compare a light coffee to a strong tea. The possibilities are endless. Hopefully you’ll stay with me on this tea journey.

I do most of my shopping on amazon, so I’ve selected a few items that may help you get started. I haven’t picked any tea from amazon; I have yet to find one that’s actually worth recommending.

Gaiwan link — Moyishi Traditional Gaiwan

A note on the video: I do not own the rights to the video, nor am I affiliated with chinalife or Mei Leaf. I simply enjoy the content they produce.

These Tea Leaves Made Me Cry with Happiness

By now I’m guessing you all know that I read and taste test things a couple of weeks before I get around to publishing the article. Having tasted 4 of the 5 Teasenz tea samples I have on hand, I can say with certainty that this brand is a keeper. The leaves are of remarkable quality, and the prices are so low even an unemployed student can afford them.

For the sake of being concise, I’ve decided to make separate posts with pronunciations and gongfu information, because including all of that into each post is a little messy.

Teasenz Packaging This week, I’m focusing on Yunnan Gold, a tea that will probably be forever seared into my memory. Yunnan Gold (云南金芽, yunnan jinya ) is a type of Dian Hong (滇红) tea. I first discovered Dian Hong about a year ago at my school’s cultural fair. After just one sip, my mouth exploded with the different flavors and colors of the tea, and I knew I would be interested in trying more.

When I received Teasenz samples, I was overjoyed to find not one, but two different types of Dian Hong. Until then, I’d only tried medium-grade Dian Hong, which has a mix of gold and brown leaves. Yunnan (Pure) Gold is the highest quality Dian Hong there is, named for the strikingly golden fur on the leaves. Despite traveling across the Pacific Ocean to reach my doorstep, Teasenz’s leaves kept their shape, color, and aroma. I teared up when I opened the package because the leaves were just that beautiful.

Because Yunnan Gold is a red tea, I chose to use 5 grams in a 100 ml gaiwan with water boiled to 100 degrees Celsius.

The dry leaves of Yunnan Gold smelled like artificial strawberry and grape flavorings (which I consider to

Dry Yunnan Gold Tea Leaves — Dry Yunnan Gold Leaves

be a positive smell), with a lot of warmth and depth. I detected notes of mahogany furniture in the mix. When I added the water, they smelled like I had set berries on fire. The tea liquor was a vibrant yellow-orange/ amber, clouded by the tea’s fur. For some reason, the liquor smelled like a chlorinated pool. I’m guessing that has something to do with my water because several teas have had that smell. At any rate, Yunnan Gold’s tea liquor was much brighter than regular Dian Hong’s tea liquor.

When I took my first sip, I was somewhat disappointed by how thin it felt in my mouth. I expected the fur to give Yunnan Gold a thick, syrupy feeling but that was not the case.

Regardless, Yunnan Gold was super smooth; it slid over my tongue and felt like I was being wrapped in a plush blanket. Yunnan Gold’s flavor was much more delicate than other Dian Hongs I’ve tasted, and it was almost more floral than fruity.

The second brew was more orange than the first. It fell more on the red side of the color spectrum than the previous brew. As I continued drinking, I started to taste a metallic flavor dancing around the tea. At the same time, I discovered hints of mango chutney. The more I brewed the tea, the more the flavor began to resemble an unsmoked Lapsang Souchong. There was no bitterness in Yunnan Gold, but I did taste some of

Yunnan Gold and Dian Hong Tea Liquor — Yunnan Gold (left) and low quality Dian Hong (right) Tea Liquor

the saltiness that is common among red teas. Each infusion lead to a slightly more red liquor; I found the transformation interesting to watch.

Yunnan Gold’s aftertaste is like perfume. It reminded me of Marc Jacob’s Daisy Eau So Fresh. That happens to be my favorite perfume, so I was more than pleased.

If you’re looking to try this fantastic tea, head on over to the Teasenz website.