Official Pu of the day

[Zacherywolf7]

Drinking the Tuhao as *freak* today. I love Bulang and this tea has the characteristics in spades, easy to tell it is of very high quality. The bitterness turns into a very implemented sweetness. The flavor plays off the balance of malty and flowery/fruity aspects. The liquid is very thick and does pool in the throat, even 5 minutes after my last sip its as if I have something in my throat. And yes, the qi is strong.

[William]

Drinking right now some Da Xue Shan maocha (2015) from hojotea .. so yummy!

[mr mopu]

Today I revisited a shu from my very first puerh order, the 2004 Old Youle ripe brick from puerhshop. This has been buried away for quite awhile now!

There's some really sketchy looking material in this cake! Lots of twigs. (I'm hesitant to even call it stem material because they are so woody.) At least there's no hair or anything, just crappy-grade tea!

I gave it a couple rinses which came out a nice ruby color. By the time I got to the 3rd steeping, (the 1st actual pour after the rinses,) it had already opened up quite a bit and was super dark-brown with a little red around the edges of the cup, and that was just with a quick flash steeping.

Honestly, it's better than I remember, for shu. The body is pretty huge, for one thing! The flavor isn't overly complex, but it is very buttery which works well with the full mouthfeel. There isn't any residual off-flavor from the shu-processing either, so that's a plus.

Lastly, QI FOR DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYS! I actually had to drink less of this than I normally would in a session because it packs a punch!

All in all, I'm glad I dug this back out. I don't drink much shu lately, but I enjoy this. It's probably my second favorite shu after Dayi Golden Needle White Lotus.

I echo those notes on this. When I got it I was like what the heck!
Turned out well though.

[bryan_drinks_tea]

The 1980's loose leaf pu-erh from teaClassico made me very ill. Has anyone else had this issue?

[shah82]

'09 Ziyun shu. Much like Star of Menghai crossed with GNWL. Has a touch of qi. The flavor wasn't very durable, about five brews or so.

[Puerlife]

I was in Kuala Lumpur last week and contacted Essence of Tea about a clay kettle they have listed online. David and Kathy graciously invited me to their home for tea. My memory is fuzzy but I think we started with the same three-month-old Yiwu that they gave me a sample of, and then I think we moved on to a brick from 2003. Great qi but we were hungry after that young one and went to eat. I thought that was it because we’d already had a good session but then they invited me back for more tea! My throat was destroyed because I’d drunk two cups of a fake 8653 in a shop in the Five Elements building in Chinatown earlier that day, so I hesitated, but fortunately I accepted the invitation. (A word to the wise—if you go the that building just go straight up to the 9th floor to Mei Ling’s shop.) After all, my taste buds were fine. This was the main event—three Liu Baos. But first, let me mention David’s setup. He had a charcoal brazier fired up on his veranda and initially heated the water there in a standard stainless steel snub-nosed kitchen kettle. At the table he had an aged zisha clay kettle heated by an alcohol flame, the same kettle that is on his website. OK, so the first was a late 80s/early 90s Wu Zhou Tea Factory product. This was a fantastic Liu Bao, so I bought some. That was the limit of what I was able to pay but never mind, they gladly treated me to another one, ten times more expensive. It was a completely different level of tea, in taste and qi, and the final one, from the 60s, was yet again better. Mind blown.
I've just edited my post, taking out an attempt to describe my chaqi experience. I've decided that's a personal, unrepeatable thing that words can't capture anyway, so suffice it to say that it was chaqi I will never forget.
We also were using Qing Dynasty cups, hundreds of years old.
In closing, I’ll just say that David and Karen are the nicest, most unassuming and genuine people you could hope to meet, and very savvy about tea and I’m glad I live just a three-hour flight away in almost the same time zone.
The next day a local friend and I were at a shop and I got tired of politely drinking some new, over-priced Dayi so I pulled out David’s Liu Bao. The master of this shop is heavily into Liu Bao. He brewed it using a stainless steel kettle despite having a tetsubin and a silver kettle side by side ready to go. I could taste the kettle. It makes the water very hard and bitter. After the experience of the night before the tea just didn’t taste right to me but my friend and the tea shop people gave serious respect to the tea.

[JakubT]

The 1980's loose leaf pu-erh from teaClassico made me very ill. Has anyone else had this issue?

Yep, and a couple of other teas there as well, strange storage I'm afraid.

[puyuan]

There is always the issue of fake tea... Some of the things you see posted on facebook ads...

[ethan]

Puerlife, you had a memorable tea-drinking day! I think people enjoy drinking w/ you because you have a discerning palate & you get high from tea (=chaqi).

I am surprised that the stainless steel kettle made the water hard & bitter resulting in the same tea not being as good as it was the day before when the water was boiled differently. I taste water from my bonavita kettle about once a month as a test. The stainless steel has not seemed to effect water significantly even when I see that the kettle is due for a cleaning of mineral-buildup.

[BW85]

Puerlife, I am envious of your day with David see how green I am!

Were you able to get one of the zini kettles? They are fantastic, it's been my kettle of choice 99% of the time since acquiring one

[puyuan]

Puerlife, I am envious of your day with David see how green I am!

Were you able to get one of the zini kettles? They are fantastic, it's been my kettle of choice 99% of the time since acquiring one

Mine as well!


Unfortunately it developed hairline cracks due to my own stupidity.

It's been holding well with the hairlines only slightly increasing over a year and a half, but still.

[Puerlife]

Puerlife, I am envious of your day with David see how green I am!

Were you able to get one of the zini kettles? They are fantastic, it's been my kettle of choice 99% of the time since acquiring one

I ended up buying a cheap but nice looking glazed ceramic kettle (from Taiwan) the day before while out shopping with a friend and I'll pair it with an infrared burner. David told me the charcoal is for liveliness and the zisha rounds and thickens the mouthfeel so hopefully I get a bit of both with my new setup. Mind you if I could roll back the clock a few days I'd definitely buy it. Oh well, baby steps.
Puyuan--Hm, sorry to hear that. Did you boil it dry accidentally? Bump it? I wonder how long mine would last. I did notice that both David and Kathy handled the kettle with great care.

[Puerlife]

Puerlife, you had a memorable tea-drinking day! I think people enjoy drinking w/ you because you have a discerning palate & you get high from tea (=chaqi).

I am surprised that the stainless steel kettle made the water hard & bitter resulting in the same tea not being as good as it was the day before when the water was boiled differently. I taste water from my bonavita kettle about once a month as a test. The stainless steel has not seemed to effect water significantly even when I see that the kettle is due for a cleaning of mineral-buildup.

When you walk into a KL tea shop and the vendor automatically brews you a cup, he/she almost always uses a stainless steel kettle. It's a standard, a friend explained to me. I have only been using ss for a month. Before that I used a Japanese thing that you push a button on and water comes out. I don't know what that material was but it didn't have that aspect, but the mechanism delivering the water cooled it too much. I'm not a super taster but I seem to struggle with ss for some reason. SS is of course incredibly convenient so if it doesn't bother you I'd say go for it. As for the scale on it, I wouldn't worry about that at all as long as it's minerals.

[PolyhymnianMuse]

Before that I used a Japanese thing that you push a button on and water comes out.

Zojirushi?

[Puerlife]

Before that I used a Japanese thing that you push a button on and water comes out.

Zojirushi?

Panasonic, but yeah, same thing. Fully boiling water in it cools to 91C by the time it's in the gaiwan. At my elevation, 300 meters, water boils at 99.6C. Water from a stainless steel kettle will still be over 94C, maybe 95. It may not sound like much of a difference but it is with puer.