drinking old tea
Yesterday I thought to start a blog about old teas, meaning old sheng puerh teas. It is not easy to understand and grasp old sheng puerh teas. They are scarce and not easy to get and if there is and it is not a fake tea then it is some tea that has some defects and was not selling at the time of its young age.
Honestly I do not tend to write about how such tea taste like as it very misleading and I would rather prepare a tea for someone and let him for some drink without telling him what this tea is. Let him create his own perception of tea.
An old puerh tea big part of drinking experience is a body and ‘soul’ feeling. How we should feel/experience this if are disconnected from our bodies, our feelings and our mind leaves in this digital world? I can’t tell you this ofcourse, everyone makes his own choices. I would say the best advice here would be that once you drink an old tea or any tea you paid a lot for then try drink the tea only in relaxing and ‘awaring’ mode, being aware what is going on sensesational level of our body and mind.
Drinking good old sheng puerh
If we drink good old sheng puerh it does not have to be gushu puerh as such in the old ages (before 2000) was rarely made and the teas were not marked gushu or plantation puerh tea. I used to say that even a plantation puerh tea could be a good tea until the growing conditions of such tea is ecological.
The tea mountains of Yunnan are very suitable for growing good puerh tea. If this condition is ‘green’ then we have a good starting point and if the second condition of good storage is also fulfilled then we have a good old puerh tea on the table.
I believe that before 2000 there were not used much chemicals in the process of growing tea in Yunnan. This used be the most poorest and underdeveloped province in China. The craft of making tea was preserved only in state owned factories that were around 2000 slowly transforming to private owned ones. So old puerh teas from 2005/6 backawards that are of course not faked and well stored can pass the ‘green’ light.
Still in this category described in the previous paragraph you can find a lot of bad puerh tea in Taiwan in China and in Hong Kong. I will talk about about Taiwan as I did some ‘excavations’ there personaly.
….This idea just came into my mind. People who are new to old sheng puerh teas they should start drinking rather factory made plantation material teas. I have now listed Yuna’s Heroes 2014 thai sheng (which is not plantation tea but it’s better to go from younger teas to older ones), then go to the Xiaguan 2005 Tuocha and after Green Mark 1997. This should be a good introduction to old sheng teas.
This morning I needed to brew Yuna’s Heroes 2014 as I made this tea in yesterday’s small tea gathering. I brewed this tea in a porcelain Jiri Lang teapot. I was not satisfied with the tea at all was very shallow and far away off the Lao Man’E 2014 that we made comparison with, also in a similar porcelain teapot. Also this LMN was not as I knew it.
So I decided to brew it again, the YH2014 in a zhuni I use for many years. Slowly it evolved and showing its true face. One feature/attribute I realised again. An energy of old tea trees comes in subtle and growing body feelings, like sweating in back, energy going into veins, at least showing there. The taidi cha old tea has on the contrary a punchy, heavier feeling so that it is more noticed by beginners rather. Punchy in the chest area and in the head. Rather gushu puerh would spread slowly through the body unless you drink Lao Banzhang that sometimes hit my head straight.
Back to YH2014, for many people this tea might seem dull and shallow but when brewed in yixing and tasting out of Jiri Duchek cups, the details would show up. It is a very complex and very strong tea that will age into a gem. Ofcourse it is not delicate tasting like chinesse famous tea mountains still it delivers a lot.
this is blog is in progress but still can be read …