Aged pu'er air too dry

[PurplePotato]

A few years ago, inspired by Hojo, I sealed all of my humidor teas into food-grade vacuum bags 1-3 at a time. They have continued to age inside the bags. In some climates this is done to limit humidity. In my climate, I am actually trapping moisture into the cake/casing.

How did you ensure what level of humidity is trapped inside the bags? I've considered doing some sealing myself, but this detail eludes me.

you just need to know how much water is present in the cakes... it is all that matters..

humidity is just the amount of moisture in the air that is in the environment, and that indirectly will affect the cake based on how permeable and how much it can absorb or give up~~

Thanks for the replay. I get what you are saying (I read the great article about this on your blog, after all), so I guess I didn't word my question acurately. How do you ensure that the proper level of moisture is in the cakes before sealing?

[kyarazen]

Thanks for the replay. I get what you are saying (I read the great article about this on your blog, after all), so I guess I didn't word my question acurately. How do you ensure that the proper level of moisture is in the cakes before sealing?

i have a moisture analyser in lab, hojo has one too... its probably not necessary to spend a few thousand dollars to get one for home use if you are willing to sacrifice 5 grams of good tea and also a cheap weighing scale that goes down to 0.01g units.

if you have samples of very well stored, delicious tea with known conditions i.e. sealed. half sealed... in box, in bamboo tong?.. etc weigh out 5 grams and then bake off the water either using a saucepan over gentle fire or a proper roaster. roast it until it is crispy and then take its dry weight. the difference will be approximately how much water is "bound" inside the leaves.

assuming that the merchant/storer did not do any strange warehousing methods.. and had kept it stored that way all the while, the numbers you get here will help you decide how much water the cake should have at the moment of sealing. if the water content is insufficient, you can put it into a pumidor or somewhere for it to absorb more water.

but that said, do not rule out unique warehousing or processing methods by the tea factory/makers. some of the really delicious teas that became nice in about 10-15 years.. may have gone through different storage methods, i.e. very humid in the beginning, and dry at the later years. so if you probe this figure you may be misled. there are also some pu-erhs that are mildly oxidized first before compression.. and that in a short time they give a thick, reddish brew..

[PurplePotato]

Got it kyarazen, thanks!

[Cwyn]

Plastic sealing wrap and bags are not airtight. Over time they slowly leech and the tea becomes dry, unless the plastic is used to keep out/control too high external humidity. To me, too high climate humidity seems a very good reason to consider using plastic sealing wrap or baggies.

But I've tasted the results of plastic in too dry climates, and the tea is flat, overly dry and fairly tasteless. One of my tea friends specifically stored three samples of the same tea over a two year period, one in plastic, one in a pumidor, and one with no storage (open air). Then he sent unmarked, blind samples of all three to several of us. We all picked the pumidor stored as the best one. The plastic sample in particular was the worst, in my opinion.

Having said that, I still have a shrink wrapped cake I'm leaving as is. I have another reason for it, though. The cake doesn't have a paper wrapper and has a large intact leaf across the top. I use it for demonstrating how big Yunnan varietal leaves are, and people can handle the cake without problem. But the result will be some day I can taste the tea. In my climate, it is likely to not fare well.

[PurplePotato]

Interesting Cwyn. I have that same unwrapped cake you are referring to, and in significant quantity. I recently did a taste test of two different storages. One was the cake stored in a plastic ziplock with the ziplock inside a small cardboard box the tea is sent in. This cake was stored this way because I was drinking it down, about 1.75 years of this storage I was down to the last couple bits. The other was left in the original plastic, inside the original small box, with all of those boxes inside another cardboard box. Hope that makes sense. Humidity in the closet that both teas were stored in ranges from 50-60% year round; I have a little humidity gauge in the closet (It got hot during a summer, fwiw, the closet receives no AC and is on a third floor). The sealed tea won hands down; the unsealed tea had become a bit rough on the stomach, and was generally a bit "less" all around. I had noticed that the unsealed tea, which was easy on the stomach when first received, had been getting rough on the stomach over time. Perhaps a pumidor stored version would be even better; I don’t know.

The recently opened cake has been distributed between various containers (bamboo, metal, something else I’m forgetting), with a touch of water added to each. First result on the bamboo container are that the added humidity was pleasant and effective; perhaps I’ll crack open one of the others tomorrow and see. Adding water straight to the containers is a risk, but I think it is worth it, and the result of the experimenting will give me things to work with on future storage.

I’m considering adding some humidity around the sealed cakes; basically putting them into a mini-pumidor of sorts without removing the seal, to prevent just the scenario you are describing Cwyn. It could definitely help, and I doubt it would hurt.

Having only a few data points makes the statistician in me shrug, but I am a fan of experimentation all the same.

[PurplePotato]

perhaps I’ll crack open one of the others tomorrow and see.

It's tomorrow now, right?

Dipping into previously mentioned tea, stored in a simple metal canister (from teavana, of all places ), for about two weeks, with a touch of freshly boiled water added to the lid before closing. I added a touch more water today. Upon opening the tea smells great; not too strong but nice and sweet. Tea tastes great, and the qi is hitting me hard today, but still nice and pleasant. Woo.

ETA: To be clear, I do not recommend the above method of humidifying a tea. Only try it on a quantity of tea you are willing to risk loosing to mold.

[Cwyn]

Agreed, which is why I'm always running experiments with samples. With my crocks, I just wipe the inside of the lid on occasion in winter. But my climate is desert dry then. In summer, I move the tea to a three season porch, lids off on hot/muggy days. People using a pumidor use a bowl of water or humidity packs.

To give an idea of my climate contrast, in winter the temp is 18C/64F with RH at 24% or lower. This is dry and cold, so the tea must have its own environment. In summer on my three-season porch, such as today, the temp out there reached about 35C/95F and around 58% RH. Tomorrow is supposed to be even hotter and more muggy. So the tea is open to the air with a ceiling fan running. Next week a cold front will move through and drop the temp and humidity for a few days. Then I will cover the tea to keep in the humidity gained over the muggy days. My solution appears to be at least keeping the tea preserved, which would not be the case if I did nothing.

[Ria Toshniwal]

Excellent Thread!!