Steaming pressed puerh

[miig]

But is it still advantageous when the compressed tea has picked up a fair amount of age? 2009 is fairly young, irrespective of storage conditions.

I would be more careful with precious, old teas. However, I think that very often, the problem won't be there in the first place. Most people, and most cakes, become more relaxed with age, so steaming will often not be neccessary.

[kiwi303]

Watching that video, it looks like the standard commercial baozi/jiaozi/steamed bun steamers.

They just took an existing steamer and re-purposed it for their needs.

Living in CQ I'd get my breakfast from a hole in the wall shop on the way to the bus stop or the monorail station, they had one of those type of steamers but with the aluminium or stainless steel baskets up to 8 or 9 or even a dozen high, not just 2.

[PurplePotato]

I did some steaming of a few teas today. Most notable was the green shroom from white2tea's teaclub, or at least what was left of it, which is most of it. Basically followed the instructions of the aforementioned HouDe article, with the difference that I used a metal steamer, and left my final result a lot more "chunky". Some random thoughts about the process of steaming the shroom:

• >I had to steam the tea for over half an hour before I could successfully work with it, perhaps a lot longer, as I quickly lost track of time.
  
  >Specifically, I steamed the shroom until it was wet enough that I could pretty much bend it in half, with a some of elbow grease.
  
  >Despite this long steaming time, the center of the cap was bone dry, and completely unmalleable.
  
  >When preforming the separating, you can flex somewhat drier parts to the point when they would normally snap and create dust, and instead they break without creating dust.
  
  >This tea actually has some really nice looking intact leaves. From my previous sessions with the tea, you'd have no idea.
  
  >There was no need to be very careful in separation, and working quickly helped insure that I worked with the tea before it had dried out too much.
  
  >I was rather tempted to taste the steaming water, but was able to resist temptation. It was quite dark (for fresh puer), and I imagine it would have tasted revoltingly oversteeped
  
  >I have a blister on my left finger from the heat. Totally worth it, but next time I think I'll use gloves.

I'll comment again after tasting the results, but given how much broken leaves and dust I had to work with in the past, I already feel rather confident to call this a success.

[BW85]

PurplePotato, thanks for sharing

[Rui]

Lately I have been watching this thread as I also have problems with some teas from time to time.

Has anyone ever tried steaming a tea cake or brick in a kitchen pot with an internal strainer where one will simmer the water while the tea is in the strainer? That will save one's hands from getting blisters.

Something like this:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Kitchen-Craft-F ... mer+Insert

[PurplePotato]

That's basically what I used Rui. I'm not sure why you think it will prevent blisters. What caused the blister on my thumb is that the tea is quite hot when removed from the strainer, but I didn't want to wait for it to cool as it would have lost some malleability by doing so. With a tea that isn't super compressed, I don't think it would be as much of an issue.

Oh, and another thing I forgot to mention: as I was house sitting yesterday I didn't have a tea pick with me at the time, and in retrospect wish I did. I imagine it would have made it much easier to work open some more compressed bits, without really causing any leaf breakage.