Stinky Western Raku

[bi lew chun]

I bought a set of Western Raku pieces from a seller on Etsy, and to my dismay the tea bowl releases a strong earthy pottery odor when exposed to water. Hibiki-an says that if Raku-ware builds up an earthy odor it can be eliminated by using the piece every day for a week. I'm not keen on wasting 7-days' worth of matcha, so I've simply been exposing the bowl to hot water then drying a few times a day for the past week. The stink persists.

Prior to purchasing, I made sure to check with the seller about whether the pieces were tea-safe , and she reassured me that they were. She mixed the glazes herself and said there was no lead or other harmful substances to worry about. She sells a good amount of teaware on Etsy, including Raku, and has 100% positive feedback.

So, my question is, has anyone encountered stanky Raku before? I'm willing to simply chalk this one up to Western Raku being inferior to Japanese. It certainly sounds inferior when you read about the differences in the two processes, but perhaps this chick just doesn't know what she's doing. The set wasn't expensive, and it's still nice for display, so I'm not concerned about being ripped off or anything. I just want to know if there's something I can do to make this bowl usable.

I guess I should mention that I find the faint pottery odor of Yixing / Tokoname / Hagi quite pleasant, so I wouldn't consider myself overly sensitive here.

I decided to post this in ITD instead of Teaware to avoid any potential damage to the seller's reputation.

[Chip]

Interesting ...

You can try putting a bunch of dry leaf in it as well, not matcha. Dry tea absorbs a lot of odor. This works really well for smelly tins when new, takes the new manufacture smell out quite well.

You could also just put brewed green tea of your choosing in it every day for a week.

Or, I have some crappy matcha (it is Japanese anyway) I could send you. I also have a boatload of older green tea that I would be happy to contribute to the project.

The water may or may not help.

[bi lew chun]

You're probably right--I should be using tea and not plain water. I do have a bag of crappy "powdered green tea" and plenty of old sencha, so I'll give those a try instead. Thanks for offering to contribute to project de-stinkify.

[olivierco]

http://www.teatoys.com/kfacts.html

One way to help keep the bowl clean in the pores is to soak the bowl for about 5 minutes before using. I heard this directly from the present Kichizaemon15th himself. Especially in winter, if you use hot water, the bowl will not absorb the heat from the tea and even the last guest will get a drink of hot tea; too hot and the poor shokyaku can hardly drink it much less savor the flavor, so finding just the right temperature requires much experimentation. Soaking too long is a bad idea, I can say from personal experience, because the "special smell" of the clay becomes too strong.

NEW BOWLS
The way to prepare new bowls of rakuyaki or Kyoyaki, and I find it works for other wares as well, is to start the bowl in a pot of water deep enough to cover, and with a lining of towels, and to bring the bowl to a boil. Turn the heat off and allow the bowl to cool naturally. This should get the loose clay and the new smell out of the bowl.

[Mary R]

Nice find, Olivier.

I've never had any Raku pieces, but the hagi piece I use for tea was clay-y for quite some time. I boiled it, used it as I normally would, and stored it covered in Lipton green tea bags for a month or so.

[bi lew chun]

Last night I found some ancient Sencha with Matcha, so I steeped the entire bowl in hot tea soup until it cooled, then repeated. The odor may have diminished a little. I will try a full boil with towels as described above. Thanks Olivier.

[Chip]

Just discovered this today ... from the Hagi topic.

I have discovered oddly after a few uses, that this set has a lot of the earthy smell when hot. Weird that I did not notice immediately.

This is not that uncommon for Hagi, but this set is 30 years old and it may be a bit of a challenge to coax out.
Looking at the set carefully, I doubt if it was ever really used and sat in this wood box, sealed, for the entire 30 years.
So, it is either the earthiness of the clay, or it is the mustiness from sitting in the wood box somewhere all this time.

Phase one: I have buried it in surplus dry green tea leaf and will let it sit like that for a week.
I might take it out and place it in boiled water for a day, then back in the dry leaf.

Then I will brew green tea in it every day for a week or two.

[bi lew chun]

I never had any issues with my Hagi, so I figured it was a Raku issue. Seems I was wrong, which actually makes me feel a little better about this set.

Well, yesterday I did three towel boils, then another sencha/matcha bath, after which I noticed a significant drop in stink, perhaps as much as 60-70%. I wrapped the bowl up with bags of green tea, and I'll check on its progress later.

All this tea-as-deodorizer talk reminded me that the drawers in my small tea bookcase/hutch were infected with a nasty incense smell a few years ago. It's so strong that I wouldn't dare store anything other than porcelain in the drawers, so last night I filled them with a dozen teabags and 300 g of old white and green tea. I'm crossing my fingers.

[Chip]

Day 3 of my Hagi reclamation project. The first 24 hours I left it buried in dry green tea that I will never drink.

Then the last 2 days I did a boiling water soak each day. Brought water to a boil, turned burner off, placed entire Hagi set in the water carefully and let it cool to room temp, removed and dried over heat.

I was amazed how much water the Hagi absorbed as I was putting it in the water. This tells that the suggestions I have read about allowing Hagi to dry thoroughly for up to a week before placing them in storage is good advice.

So, the smell is getting better, but I know this is a process that will take some time.

[bi lew chun]

Five boils + even more tea soaks + dry tea wrapping has magic'd away most of the smell. I could probably use the bowl for matcha at this point, but I think I'll keep working at it until the odor is gone completely or rendered neutral. Thanks Chip, Olivier, and Mary.

And Chip, good luck with your reclamation project. I'm glad I held onto all my stale tea -- I had no idea how useful the stuff was.

Interestingly, I just received a Pagasari Raku chawan and it was odorless/usable right out of the box.

[Geekgirl]

I just received a Pagasari Raku chawan.

Nice. Pics please!