endless dirt in cup

[Ti]

What is this endless dirt that looks like very fine black sand in the bottom of the cup? (crappy pic I know) I find this more persistent with pu than with other tea. Here is my strainer and sludge in the bottom of the cup. This is after two rinses. Infusion #12.

[AdamMY]

This happens a lot with Puerh, and also sencha's. Puerh it is because when you are breaking up the cake, tuo, what have you you often get a lot of little leaf bits that find their way into the teapot/ gaiwan. Sencha's becuase the steaming breaks down the leaf. It would make sense to think they should all come out in the rinse or first infusion or so, but it seems they all slowly work their way out bit by bit often getting caught in the other leaves and such in the teapot.

[gingkoseto]

I usually just bear with it A friend suggests using sharing pitcher in brewing so that the dust will precipitate at the bottom of the pitcher and easy to discard. I am too lazy to do that and usually just discard the last bit of each cup.

Some puerh doesn't have so much dust, some has a lot, including some tasty ones. A manufacturer once told me that in the pan toasting process of puerh making, after toasting a bunch of leaves and remove them from the pan, there will be some debris left. If the worker doesn't completely clean the pan before adding the next bunch leaves, then the final products will have more dusts and sometimes more smokiness. That sounds plausible to me.

[nickE]

I usually just bear with it

Yep, dumping out the bottom of each cup is a habit for me.

[David R.]

I just drink it.