Pu-erh Tea

Tea Adventures: Ripe Pu-erh

About three weeks ago, I bought a lovely little gaiwan, or lidded cup, in the interests of furthering my tea appreciation. I adore oolong teas and I want to learn more about the traditional Chinese gongfucha tea ceremony and, generally, the style of brewing that focuses on multiple short infusions of the tea to get a lot of brewings out of a small amount of leaves. It's practical!

The gaiwan is totally adorable, and a much better learning tool than say, immediately jumping into a yixing clay teapot, because those things can be a serious investment (they were the best part of that crappy second episode of series 1 of Sherlock, IMO). The gaiwan is also way useful, since it's nice glazed porcelain it's not going to absorb the aroma and flavors of tea like unglazed yixing ware, meaning that I can try out a lot of different kinds of tea in the gaiwan and not be locked into just, say, tieguanyin. Granted if I had an yixing teapot I'd be drinking tieguanyin all the damn time, but that's neither here nor there at the moment. My first try with the gaiwan was with some gunpowder green that I have had sitting around for a year, I'm not gonna lie, because it's rolled so tight the tea keeps very well, and I've made a dent in this giant pound bag but man. 

It worked nicely, but I didn't get any pictures of the process. This afternoon,however, I decided to be bold and try a type of tea I've never brewed before: pu-erh. With the gaiwan came two little samples of pu-erh, one "raw" traditionally-processed bunch from 2008, and one "ripe" or artificially fermented (and therefore cheaper, more consistent, and easier to brew) sample from 2006. I went with the ripe sample, and I still have about half of it left over for another go, but I'm totally not done with the first brewing yet.

And now, photographic evidence of my adventures in being brave and a grownup and trying new things:

My gear all set up. Yes I am using a shot glass as a drinking vessel because I don't have nice small teacups.

The pu-erh before infusing. It came in a paper envelope but the large chunks mean it was picked off of a brick.

obligatory macro

delicious layers of compressed leaves!

after the first "rinse" infusion, the leaves haven't fully unfurled.

the mellow amber liquor of the second infusion.

This is the third infusion, ready to strain into the teapot.

After four infusions, the leaves have unfurled nicely but there's still a way to go.

So far, this tea is absolutely lovely. In small quantities the liquor is this sort of peachy-pink that deepens into warm amber and with two or three infusions together in the teapot for blending it looks really dark. 

The aroma is the most prominent characteristic of this tea: it's very earthy. It literally smells like fresh, rich soil. I love that smell so much, it reminds me of spring and new things growing. I adore it. There's also a bit of tree bark in there. Overall it's very much the smell of vegetation and soil, because, of course, these are leaves that have been fermented with kindly bacteria. I must stress that these are all very positive characteristics, there's nothing about this tea that smells moldy or stale or "rotten." it is just literally very earthy, and it's a wonderful experience.

The taste, on the other hand, is actually very mellow and wasn't really present in the first few infusions. The liquor is very smooth, has a great mouthfeel, and if I hold it in my mouth there's an echo of the earthy aroma on the back of my tongue, but the smell is the star of the show. Therefore, unlike my parents, you should not be afraid to try this tea based on how it smells. 

After the fourth infusion I was better able to detect a lingering sweet taste, and I think (hope) subsequent infusions will bring out a balance between the sweetness and the earthy aroma. We'll see! 

In conclusion: I love this tea and I love brewing it and I love my adorable gaiwan.