Here's one for Padre

[Salsero]

Padre,

In response to your blockbuster film epic http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-y5A8kUTK6Y


Here's how I hold the lid while I pour. Actually, it turns out I use my thumb.


(Any blur is the result of my lightning fast technique and in no way due to my 14-year-old son's lack of enthusiasm for documenting his father's eccentricities.)

When I want to up the ante a bit and clear that tea out quick, I lift the lid to let more air in and the pot empties much faster.

[olivierco]

How is the taste of the tea improved by this "open lid technique"?

[Chip]

Nifty thumb work, Salsero!!!

[Salsero]

How is the taste of the tea improved by this "open lid technique"?

It just helps make the difference between, say, a 10-second and a 15-second steep. A shorter steep can help control a tendancy of some young puerhs to be rough on the mouth.
(Also, since I am just a tad obsessive, it allows me to feel like my 30-second or 45-second steep is really exactly that.)

Nifty thumb work, Salsero!!!

You wouldn't believe what I can do with the rest of my appendages!

[Wesli]

Your technique is much like my own.

[Chip]

But you, Fuka, are a much younger dog...woof.

[hop_goblin]

Nice and seasoned pot! WOW Sal, I never thought of lifting the lip with my thumb to eccelatate the the liquor out of the spot!

[Sydney]

I've actually been doing the lid lift (and some times a bit of a pumping action my camera's probably not good enough to film) from the start, because I observed it worked just like a manual carburator.

As of yesterday afternoon, I've also been using the same thumb position you suggested, and it's working out just fine.

[scruffmcgruff]

As far as the pumping goes, MarshalN recently commented on my video (where I do it a little) that it's not something one should try to do.

The other thing is that it is better to not pull the pot when you pour -- better to not make a lot of splash when you are pouring. Part of it is aesthetic, but I have also been instructed long, long time ago that it distrubs the tea a bit when you do that, and dispersing the taste a little.

Who'd 'a thunk it?

[Sydney]

The "don't splash" part I can see. The part about disturbing the tea and dispersing the taste doesn't make as much sense.

[LavenderPekoe]

Sounds a lot like "never shake vodka or you will 'bruise' it" to me.

[scruffmcgruff]

Yeah, I'm not really sure what the rationale behind it is either, but I do know MarshalN has *far* more experience than I, so I tend to trust him. That said, his 90% dry leaf measure for yancha still seems like a crazy amount, at least to my unskilled hands.

[Warden Andy]

To me, it sounds like squeezing a teabag. Forcing the stronger juices out of the leaves, making a not so pleasant tea. Well, I now know what todays brewing experiment will be.

Salsero, that pot looks ancient from those photos. Did boiling it with tea age it well?

[Salsero]

Salsero, that pot looks ancient from those photos. Did boiling it with tea age it well?

It looks dirty and stained and I won't be soaking any more overnight in the old tea. I have even thought of throwing this one into a bath of unflavored denture cleaning tablets in order to try to go back to square one. But it seems to make good tea and who wants to mess with that?

I think the whole process of soaking it in tea did more to adjust me to using that pot than anything. It's the one I turn to almost automatically now for sheng and sometimes even oolong.

[Mary R]

Sounds a lot like "never shake vodka or you will 'bruise' it" to me.

Are you referring to shaking/stirring martinis? If so, it's the vermouth that'll 'bruise,' not the vodka or gin. You could put vodka in a cement mixer and it would still come out saying, "Who wants another round?!"