Does the Shape of Pu-Erh affect taste?

[Marco]

A question to our experts.
I read a lot about Pu-Erh and I found nothing about this question.
There are so many different shapes - Bing, Tuo, Brick, Melon, and even other forms.
Do they affect aging and taste in any form?
Is a specific shape better than the others?
And does size matter? (bigger vs. smaller cake)

Looking forward to hear your thoughts.
ciao
Marco

[tingjunkie]

From what I've been told, cakes and bricks are best for aging since there is more surface area exposed to the outside world. Also, they are easily stackable, and when you can age a whole tong or more of the same tea all together, the cakes and bricks actually scent and improve each other.

If you are just drinking raw puerh and not planning on storing or aging it, then the shape won't really matter at all. The only thing I can think of would be very tightly compressed shapes will make it harder to pry full leaves off, and that will affect the quality of the brew.

[teaskeptic]

From what I've been told, cakes and bricks are best for aging since there is more surface area exposed to the outside world.

Wouldn't loose leaves, i.e. no compression at all, age best using this logic?

[Proinsias]

age faster, probably. Not sure about better. Breaking a cake up should let it age quicker but good things come to those who wait.

[tingjunkie]

As Pronsias said, it might age faster, but it won't be as complex. I'm struggling to come up with an appropriate analogy, but the different layers of leaves need to interact with each other and age at slightly different rates- building on each other over time. There's strength in numbers I guess, but with thicker shapes, the inner leaves don't see enough atmospheric love.

[auhckw]

A tea shop owner to me...

In order to make it into shape, they have to steam the leaves. The leaves get wet. Definitely there will be some degrade to it.

Why ppl still compress it? Main reason is for convenient. Back then ppl carry these in horses and travel long distance.

[gingkoseto]

I've been thinking about this for a while and didn't get a clue. I assume aging of puerh is a processing with oxidation (with oxygen) and fermentation (without oxygen) combined. Aged Fu Bricks get their favored "golden flowers" (blooms of beneficial fungi) mainly inside the brick instead of on the surface. This seems to indicate fermentation is important than oxidation.

If fermentation is the dominant process, why is exposing to air important? But it indeed seems that loose puerh, smaller size compressed puerh and puerh broken into pieces lose their harshness faster.

Why?

[auhckw]

I've been thinking about this for a while and didn't get a clue. I assume aging of puerh is a processing with oxidation (with oxygen) and fermentation (without oxygen) combined. Aged Fu Bricks get their favored "golden flowers" (blooms of beneficial fungi) mainly inside the brick instead of on the surface. This seems to indicate fermentation is important than oxidation.

If fermentation is the dominant process, why is exposing to air important? But it indeed seems that loose puerh, smaller size compressed puerh and puerh broken into pieces lose their harshness faster.

Why?

A tea seller is also moving towards this theory. Why those tightly compressed puerh tasted well after long/aged fermentation. He was also thinking that in those tightly compressed puerh, inside the brick there is minimum oxygen level.

So he is experimenting on the same concept. Take loose/compress puerh and vacuum seal it. When vacuum sealed, oxygen level is even minimum, which he is hoping it will end up good. He has successfully tried a 7 years vacuum sealed oolong which turned out very special compared to non long term vacuum sealed. He hopes the same theory can be applied to puerh. And if he is successful proving his experiment, it will be quite amazing how puerh may turn out.

Only time will tell...

[Proinsias]

I've heard, maybe from Mike Petro?, that some cakes from the early 1900's whilst being sublime had perhaps lost a little too much of thier character and strength, compared to some cakes from the 50's. I can't really comment as I've never had anything anywhere near that age but get the feeling that the longer you plan on storing it, the larger and/or more heavily compressed you want it to be.

[nicolas]

From what I've been told, cakes and bricks are best for aging since there is more surface area exposed to the outside world.

Wouldn't loose leaves, i.e. no compression at all, age best using this logic?

No, because the flavour and scent would dissipate as more surface area is exposed.

[Marco]

I assume aging of puerh is a processing with oxidation (with oxygen) and fermentation (without oxygen) combined.

Yes that is an argument for the engineer in me
What I've learned so far - and I am no expert at all - is that it is mainly about fermentation. And fermentation happens inside without oxygen.

And when we think about it as a combination of fermentation and oxidation then the compression rate will be important.

So we would see the biggest differences in melon/pomello form compared to loose leaf form.

What is better for ageing? What is better for drinking in an early state and what is better for drinking in decades?
Who did recognize differences?
And besides all that - what shape do you prefer for your Pu-Erh?

[gingkoseto]

I've heard, maybe from Mike Petro?, that some cakes from the early 1900's whilst being sublime had perhaps lost a little too much of thier character and strength, compared to some cakes from the 50's. I can't really comment as I've never had anything anywhere near that age but get the feeling that the longer you plan on storing it, the larger and/or more heavily compressed you want it to be.

I've read a story for many times but never found the original source. But it seems true. The story is that in 1930s (and there are similar stories with time lines of 1960s and 1970s) researchers in the Palace Museum of Beijing tasted some tribute puerh "golden melon" of 70-100 years old. The tea turned out of beautiful dark red color but not much of tea taste.

Nowadays most puerh manufacturers only say puerh is "the older the better". But basically everything has a life span, shorter or longer. I think it's a big problem in puerh industry that they give people tea that's "promised" to be good in the "future", without specification on how far or how near future.

[gingkoseto]

What is better for ageing? What is better for drinking in an early state and what is better for drinking in decades?
Who did recognize differences?
And besides all that - what shape do you prefer for your Pu-Erh?

I think these are very important questions! Sometimes when I like a cake, I don't know if I should finish it now or get a lot of it to save for future. It's very hard to gain the skill of predicting the future of a puerh. Even for people who have the skill, it's still up to the years to come to prove it.

[alan logan]

I've heard, maybe from Mike Petro?, that some cakes from the early 1900's whilst being sublime had perhaps lost a little too much of thier character and strength, compared to some cakes from the 50's. I can't really comment as I've never had anything anywhere near that age but get the feeling that the longer you plan on storing it, the larger and/or more heavily compressed you want it to be.

I've read a story for many times but never found the original source. But it seems true. The story is that in 1930s (and there are similar stories with time lines of 1960s and 1970s) researchers in the Palace Museum of Beijing tasted some tribute puerh "golden melon" of 70-100 years old. The tea turned out of beautiful dark red color but not much of tea taste.

Nowadays most puerh manufacturers only say puerh is "the older the better". But basically everything has a life span, shorter or longer. I think it's a big problem in puerh industry that they give people tea that's "promised" to be good in the "future", without specification on how far or how near future.

+1000
everything that has a life also has a death. the problem is, we don't know the day for sure. it's all a matter of skills with probabilities... and a bit of luck too. so... never procrastinate drinking pleasure

[legend]

The answer to this question lies in the characteristics of the leaves used to make each shape (or loose leaf). The most important thing to note is that a great tea makes a great ages tea and a bad tea makes a bad ages tea. "Garbage in - garbage out"
The common shapes may have some of the following characteristics although there is no rule:

(Chi zi bing cha) round cakes - tend to use the most presentable leaves especially on the faces of the cake. These leaves are not subject to direct steaming and heat as they are in a tea block, so therefore they retain a more natural appearance. If it is an authentic cake of good quality then it should showcase a given company's premier leaves, especially if it uses the leaves of the spring harvest.

(Zhuan Cha) brick tea - tend to use smaller leaves of slightly less consistent quality and mix and usually much more stem matter than cakes. In the making of a brick the leaves are directly heated and steamed in the press machine resulting in the hard, stiff brick. It makes sense that the brick is not neccesarily meant to "show-off" the the leaves per say, but to make use of less attractive though in many cases, delicious leaves.

(Tou cha) - mushroom shaped - these tend to use a mix of smaller leaves of good physical appearance though broken leaves are usually part of the mix. As with cakes they are not directly heated so they retain their look. The famous producer of Tou cha is 下关 Xia Guan and their products always have a distinctive flavour. Tou cha is convenient to sample, but in my opinion the leaves are usually to small for my liking.

(Jin Gua) melon or ball shaped - these types are usually for show rather than for drinking although many are produced with high quality leaf and therefor would be just as valuable for drinking. This is highly dependant on the manufacturer.

(San cha) loose tea - comes in the greatest leaf variety so close attention must be paid to the source of the leaves and the actual leaves. Loose tea though is easiest to sample and evaluate, but it is less common for Puer manufacturers to produce than other blach teas, especially Liu Bao Black tea which is mostly in loose form. Storage is important for loose black teas - bamboo skin or straw baskets work well. A porous non-glazed ceramic pot or jar is actually best but more costly.

Overall, consideration must be given to the manufacturer, season, and leaf appearance of any tea, compressed or loose. A promise that a tea will get better over time is relative to its initial quality. A poor tea cant actually get better it just loses flavour and gets less poor.

PS - Never break compressed tea, only pry away leaves that you are going to drink. If you find that your tea tastes better afte is broken, it is likely that the tea was not processed properly and was forced through processing, especially a problem with (Shu cha)
cooked Puer in this case.

Daniel