Recommendations for first Pu-Ehr

[Ursinos]

so far I've been really enjoying my oolong teas, especially my TGY. I've started to be curious about pu ehrs though, and am thinking of picking up a sample packet or two in the next couple days.

anyone have recommendations for someone new to this type of tea?

[Tead Off]

Try to start with good, young sheng puerh or shou, ripe puerh. A young tea will fit in with your already established tea sensibilities. It will also allow you to follow the natural progression of aging. Ripe puerhs are very nice and smooth. It's hard to beat the young teas that Teaurchin is selling.

[squaretooth]

I won't make a recommendation because I believe everyone's tea journey, especially with puerh, is different. Mine started with trying a shou in Beijing. It was so different than anything I'd ever tried that it intrigued me. When I learned more about puerh's health benefits and it's ability to age and change, I knew that my journey had begun. After drinking only shou for awhile, I went to a tea shop in Shanghai with a friend and tried sheng and was hooked. It was a young sheng and for a few years, it was all I drank and all I purchased. But as my tastes refined and I learned more from trial and error and getting advice from others, I tried aged and semi-aged sheng. 5 to 10 years in age to be precise. It was then that I realized that the journey for me was to follow this path. I'm not a young man anymore and quite frankly don't have enough years left to allow a puerh to age 30 years for it to reach it's full potential. So taking that into consideration I no longer buy anything unless it's from 2008 or earlier. I think at about 5 years of age,sheng puerh makes a change if it's stored properly. It lets you know the direction it's going to take and what you can expect it to become. Granted older teas are going to cost more but that is where my journey took me. So what I will say to you is not to let conventional wisdom dictate the road you take. Where I began is not where I will end. Be open minded and patient with yourself and with puerh. It will tell you where to go.

[debunix]

I don't know much about the first puerhs I encountered--my father got it from an unknown source--but the first one I bought for myself was Rishi's tin of mini-tuos. After a while, I visited some local tea shops looking for more variety, and I still do not know if those first cakes I bought were sheng or shu, because at the time I did know the vocabulary to ask about that. And I continued to branch out from there.

It's been a while since I had Rishi's tuos, but my recollection is that they were pretty comparable to those first beengs I got, and I still have a little of those left, drink and enjoy them from time to time. So....that's a long way round to say, you could do worse than starting with Rishi's 'Ancient Tree' Pu-erh. They even have a sheng version now, but I haven't sampled that one. My other starter cakes would be fine too, but like most of the other pu in my experience, I wouldn't know where to send someone else for a comparable current equivalent.

[AdamMY]

If you do go with some of these Mini tuo cha's which are usually roughly 5 grams of ripe/ shou puerh. An interesting way to attempt to brew them would be sort of incredibly western style. In which steep the tea in a liter of boiling water for an incredibly extended length of time. By that I mean one tuo in one liter for 25 minutes. The result is a great coffee substitute but much milder and *smoother*.

It does get everything out of the leaf though, so don't expect to get much more than that liter out of the tea, and resteeping is pretty much out of the question. But it is a very interesting way to try and brew once or twice.

[debunix]

They did work quite nicely to brew up a thermos of tea for the road or the office: drop tuo in 1 liter thermos, add boiling water, wait an hour to several hours, drink and enjoy. I did something very similar today with some 2008 Bamboo-aged YiWu puerh from Norbu, a tea that is still available on his site (just checked, and there it is, surprise!). It's a sheng that takes a bit more care than a really simple shu pu, and today's tea was getting too strong by the end of the thermos--I had to dilute it with 1-2 parts hot water towards the end. Still a fairly friendly starter puerh, right down the the ease of breaking up the not-too-tight cylinders of tea--no puerh knife required.

[Ursinos]

thanks for all the advice so far. I'll keep it in mind, though I'm not sure I'll get anything of really find quality from the tea stores in town

[MEversbergII]

Order online! Most of us do, here.

M.

[Ursinos]

Order online! Most of us do, here.

M.

don't have a credit card to do so, and I find using paypal a gigantic pain in the butt

[sherubtse]

Order online! Most of us do, here.

M.

don't have a credit card to do so, and I find using paypal a gigantic pain in the butt

Well, Davids has an OK sheng in loose form:

http://www.davidstea.com/sheng-pu-erh?& ... 663F&DEID=

Best wishes,
sherubtse

[Ursinos]

Order online! Most of us do, here.

M.

don't have a credit card to do so, and I find using paypal a gigantic pain in the butt

Well, Davids has an OK sheng in loose form:

http://www.davidstea.com/sheng-pu-erh?& ... 663F&DEID=

Best wishes,
sherubtse

I was actually looking at that last night I want to check out distinctly tea's selection too (they don't really list all their teas on their website) but luckily they are only like 4 blocks away from the David's location in town so it's no big deal if they don't have anything that catches my eye.

[Exempt]

Order online! Most of us do, here.

M.

don't have a credit card to do so, and I find using paypal a gigantic pain in the butt

Well, Davids has an OK sheng in loose form:

http://www.davidstea.com/sheng-pu-erh?& ... 663F&DEID=

Best wishes,
sherubtse

I was actually looking at that last night I want to check out distinctly tea's selection too (they don't really list all their teas on their website) but luckily they are only like 4 blocks away from the David's location in town so it's no big deal if they don't have anything that catches my eye.

The kinds of puerh that you will be able to get from large companies or organizations are not going to be anything particularly good. It will be drinkable but it's westernized versions of puerh

[paxl13]

westernized versions of puerh

That's not necessary bad, real puerh is bold and excellent but I'm happy to have started drinking puerh with DavidsTea which is more soft

Anyway that my 2c
paxl13

[Ursinos]

I actually picked something up from Distinctly Tea called "king of leaf" will let you know what it's like when I brew it up. trying to decide whether to do it western style, or gongfu it.

[ClarG]

If you do go with some of these Mini tuo cha's which are usually roughly 5 grams of ripe/ shou puerh. An interesting way to attempt to brew them would be sort of incredibly western style. In which steep the tea in a liter of boiling water for an incredibly extended length of time. By that I mean one tuo in one liter for 25 minutes. The result is a great coffee substitute but much milder and *smoother*.

It does get everything out of the leaf though, so don't expect to get much more than that liter out of the tea, and resteeping is pretty much out of the question. But it is a very interesting way to try and brew once or twice.

Thanks for the reccomendation. I will try it. Do you break up the tou, or keep it intact?