Which teapot for which tea?

[time]

Hello.

Need help.
I like to stick to one teapot for one tea type. But which

Here is a list of the pots:
1) Red clay Dahongpao yixing for ??
2) Purple clay yixing for ?? (oolong tea mostly now..)
3) Small/normal size tokoname for ?? (Gyokuro?)
4) Normal banko for ?? (sencha?)

What about Chinese green teas? Which should I use?

[debunix]

For my chinese greens, I like my porcelain gaiwans, or my tokoname kyusus, or my little glass teapot, or even the plastic kamjove 'gongfu art' infusion pitchers. I don't use the 'yixing'-type pots for them, but anything else seems to work well, as long as the water temp and concentrations are right.

[time]

Thanks for advices.

I consider to buy a Baolan zhuni or a zhuni or even duanni yixing for green teas (chinese green and sencha etc). The small tokoname for gyokuros.

What do you think?

[Chip]

A smaller Houjin (spelled many ways) is best for gyokuro, but there are alternatives. They might be made of Tokoname, Banko, Bizen or Hagi ... or even Arita.

A regular sized kyusu is best for sencha, but there are alternatives. Materials can be similar as the Houjin.

[britt]

What about Chinese green teas? Which should I use?

I've been going through this for a while and finally gave up on using Yixings for Chinese and Taiwanese green teas. Glass is fine, but I personally prefer a porcelain gaiwan. The best clay Yixing I have for Chinese green tea is a very light, thin Duan Ni teapot. I still prefer porcelain, but this one does a decent job with green tea. However, I've found it does much better with white tea so I've dedicated it to that and I'm back to porcelain for greens.

[tingjunkie]

Start reading... http://www.teachat.com/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=11539

There is a much larger Yixing world outside of the one vendor you are looking at, time. I urge you to look deeper.

[debunix]

For fine-leaved japanese teas, where time as well as temperature of brewing is so critical, I love the large-surface sasame filters built in to my tokoname kyusu. The filters on my yixings and my chao zhou pot are not large enough to drain a 10 second 2nd infusion of a sencha. So I would not use a yixing for japanese greens for that reason alone.

But the other way around--using a kyusu designed for sencha with a chinese green tea--works great.

[britt]

But the other way around--using a kyusu designed for sencha with a chinese green tea--works great.

Enough people have said this that I guess I'm going to have to try it.

[Chip]

But the other way around--using a kyusu designed for sencha with a chinese green tea--works great.

Enough people have said this that I guess I'm going to have to try it.

Around 10 years ago I purchased my first kyusu. It was a standard run of the mill reddish clay, unglazed Tokoname. I mentioned this before on the forum, so my apologies if you already read this.

I loved using it so much, so I used to brew everything in it, black, oolong, greens, but nothing scented or flavored or roasted. And I used it constantly. After several years of daily use in this manner, I noticed every tea had a similar sweetish amoma/taste as part of the profile.

Unfortunately I found it to be annoying since I wanted to taste the tea, not some residual effect, but it was my first exposure to this concept. Perhaps if I had given it a long hot soak it would have subsided, but info back then was very limited and very inconsistant (the latter has not changed ).

So, Tokoname can and does pick up flavor/aroma from teas ... I felt it was somewhat relevant to this discussion.

[Tead Off]

What about Chinese green teas? Which should I use?

I've been going through this for a while and finally gave up on using Yixings for Chinese and Taiwanese green teas. Glass is fine, but I personally prefer a porcelain gaiwan. The best clay Yixing I have for Chinese green tea is a very light, thin Duan Ni teapot. I still prefer porcelain, but this one does a decent job with green tea. However, I've found it does much better with white tea so I've dedicated it to that and I'm back to porcelain for greens.

Why do think Duanni would be good for green or white tea? Even the Hojo-god has said that duanni clay is one of the least desirable of yixing clays for tea. I tend to agree but I like the color of the light ones.

I often brew Long Jing in my 40ml Tokoname pot when I am alone. Really excellent. I often use a 100ml Banko pot for the same tea when I drink with another. One of the keys to getting the most flavor from greens is to increase the amount of leaf and lower the temp. I commonly use 55c. I can never get the richness out of the teas with gaiwan compared to clay although the perfume is always nice with gaiwan.

[britt]

What about Chinese green teas? Which should I use?

I've been going through this for a while and finally gave up on using Yixings for Chinese and Taiwanese green teas. Glass is fine, but I personally prefer a porcelain gaiwan. The best clay Yixing I have for Chinese green tea is a very light, thin Duan Ni teapot. I still prefer porcelain, but this one does a decent job with green tea. However, I've found it does much better with white tea so I've dedicated it to that and I'm back to porcelain for greens.

Why do think Duanni would be good for green or white tea? Even the Hojo-god has said that duanni clay is one of the least desirable of yixing clays for tea. I tend to agree but I like the color of the light ones.

I often brew Long Jing in my 40ml Tokoname pot when I am alone. Really excellent. I often use a 100ml Banko pot for the same tea when I drink with another. One of the keys to getting the most flavor from greens is to increase the amount of leaf and lower the temp. I commonly use 55c. I can never get the richness out of the teas with gaiwan compared to clay although the perfume is always nice with gaiwan.

I think the Duan Ni Yixing worked okay for green and white teas due to it being extremely thin and light. I don't think the clay helped on it's own. It seemd to mellow out the flavor of green tea a bit too much for my taste. I did find it to be very good for white tea. Jing Tea Shop actually recommended this pot for green and white tea, but the description seemed to base this more on the thin walls and light weight than the clay.

I agree with the more leaf and lower temperature as giving good results. I normally use 160 degrees F for all green teas.

[britt]

So, Tokoname can and does pick up flavor/aroma from teas ... I felt it was somewhat relevant to this discussion.

I think it's very relevant. I use a glazed Somayaki for genmaicha and houjicha and unglazed Tokoname and Banko kyusu for all types of sencha.