I've hit the motherlode!

In terms of tea. Good Foods Grocery in Richmond recently renovated their Stonypoint center and one of the main benefits is that they still carry the nutritional yeast that smells like locker rooms. But, they also have loose leaf tea that's selling for rock bottom prices. I stocked up on Assam, rooibos, and an oolong that I think is Dan Cong or some other sort of high fired type oolong.
On a personal note my life is just plain getting weirder and weirder. I had the most surreal and bizarre job interview today that consisted of me misunderstanding every single thing my interviewer was asking because I couldn't understand him through his thick foreign accent. When it was over, I was frustrated and angry, but at the same time I couldn't help but think, "This utterly hilarious."
Sometimes I wonder if my life were turned into a movie everyone one would be laughing, but I'd be watching it, grinding my teeth, and grimacing.

Book boxes part II

Time to make another set of book boxes! I decided to use my carcase saw for cutting the dovetails, and it's not agonizingly slow like it was with the gent-sized backsaw. Retensioning and straightening my Disston D-7's sawplate worked wonders; with it I can get crosscuts that deviate only a couple of 64ths of an inch. Not too shabby. That meant less time trying to edge joint the boards using a block plane in the burning hot sun. Right now I've got the side tail boards cut and will cut the top and bottom boards' pins and pare most of the waste away. As far as cutting dovetails go, I'm getting used to the aggressive cut of the carcase saw and am trying to teach myself to use as little pressure as possible when cutting, but I'm getting better at laying at dovetails which is speeding things up considerably. One thing I definitely need is a vise or some sort of jig to hold boards so that I can joint them lengthwise.

On another unrelated note, my Ti Kuan Yin oolong is almost gone. I'll definitely be getting more of this. It reminds me of lungching tea, but more robust with slightly flowery notes in the background whereas the lungching I've had tasted like nutty grass.

"Tippy Yunnan" Dian Hong

I picked up a small 50g bag of this tea from A Southern Season after the brush calligraphy exhibit in Chapel Hill.  I know I've had this tea before, but I can't place my finger on any specific date.  It's taste is reminiscent of chocolate, sweet orange, and a little bit of malt. Good stuff!  I started off using my mug infuser in a steel, double-walled mug which yielded extremely bitter results after 3 minutes of steeping.  If the $3 price wasn't a tip off to the lower quality, then the bitterness certainly was.  I guess this is probably not quite tippy enough to prevent that.

But, I had fun experimenting with the way the tea tasted in the steel mug and my yixing mug.  The steel mug had a harsh, bitter quality to it and the yixing actually removed the bitterness and enhanced the chocolate flavors of the tea.  I'm still not certain, but I think the tannins in the tea react with metal to create certain off flavors.  Afterall, the mug infuser has take on a blueish tinge because of the tannins...

A Demonstration of Chinese Brush Calligraphy

I had an unexpectedly pleasant Sunday.  I was expecting it to rain and sleet most of today while driving, but the nasty weather held off until I got back home.  That didn't prevent my leather shoes and pants from getting soaked, and me from getting frozen.

I went to the Ackland Art Museum in Chapel Hill because they were having an exhibit reception for a collection of Asian art (mostly Japanese and Chinese).  I didn't actually go because of the art exhibit, but I went because Jinxiu "Alice" Zhao was demonstrating Chinese brush calligraphy and painting, and Li-Ling Hsaio was playing the zheng, or Chinese zither.

I got there late, so I only heard one song by Professor Hsaio which she described as detailing the rape of a small village, which did not exactly improve my mood on the weather.  After that, Prof. Zhao sat at a small table and began to describe Chinese brush painting.  I've always liked the way that type of art looks: somewhat minimal with black ink on white rice paper and sparse coloring, but structured and flowing.  She began showing the different types of brushes used and briefly described the different weights of paper she uses along with her inks and chi related to painting.  Then, Prof. Zhao talked about the 5 main calligraphy categories.  "There are many styles, but most of them fall into the five categories."  With a smile, she said she was going to demonstrate the five different calligraphy styles by drawing the character for rain in each style which drew appreciable chuckles from the audience, most of whom were in slickers or mackintoshes.

To my untrained eye, the first four characters looked roughly the same.  The last character which was in a cursive type, was definitely different, although she pointed out that it's somewhat difficult to read that type of calligraphy.  And with that she began doing her stuff.

Her first drawing was of bamboo stalks with leaves.  Dipping her brush into water, she swirled the tip onto a splotch of ink in an inkstone until the consistency satisfied her, and then began by painting the stalks.  To these she added delicate leaves in a lighter ink by a light flicking motion with the brush.  When it was finished, she wrote several characters on the top which she said described the "noble character" of the bamboo.  And to put her mark on it, she took a small jade stamp, dipped it into red ink, and firmly pressed it onto the paper.

Her next painting was of a pine branch.  Pine, she said, is indicative of longevity, and is important to artists because of this, but I also think she was painting it for us since North Carolina is well-known for its pine trees and everyone there could relate to the image of a pine.  She drew the main branch with limbs jutting out of it, and added tiny, sharp needles to each small limb.  While waiting for it to dry, she wrote a poem underneath the painting describing moolight on a floor looking like frost.  When the painting had dried, she started painting bark on the limb.  This required a drier ink, she said, and pointed out to us the importance of keeping the brushes slightly wet so that the bristles come to a taper, and that larger brushes absorb more ink.  With the pine branch finished, she pulled a tray of watercolors closer to her and used another brush to mix several colors and ink together to get the correct green shade of the pine needles, and began coloring the needles on her painting.  Her stamp and signature were added and concluded the simple and beautiful painting.

Watching her paint and draw calligraphy was incredible and also prodded me into realizing how little I know about Eastern art.  Thankfully I had a good view of Prof. Zhao, so I could see the way she mixed her ink and drew.  But occasionally the view was interrupted by some simpering man in his 50's who reeked of old lady perfume, who couldn't be bothered to say "Excuse me," when he leaned in front of me and nearly knocked me over.  I was also gravely concerned that he was going to wet his pants when he saw the finished paintings.  But I guess each of us has a different way of expressing appreciation of art.

With her last painting finished, the demonstration ended but my mother introduced me to her.  Apparently she had one of my siblings as a student for a class, so there's no telling what stories Professor Zhao has heard about me: "Oh, my brother would like doing this calligraphy, professor but he hasn't mastered fingerpainting yet." "Aw, that's too cute! How old is your brother?" "In his mid-20's."

She referred to me as didi, but I wasn't sure if this was because my mother said I was the eldest or the youngest of my siblings.  It was nice meeting her, and I wanted to ask her so many questions about her paintings and training, her selection of inks, and what types of brushes she prefers.  I also wanted to ask her what sort of tea she likes and where she buys it along with teaware.  But, maybe it's best I didn't actually ask her about the tea.  I probably would've overwhelmed her with questions.  

Actually meeting her was short since I had to get back on the road because of the heavy rain which was supposed to turn to sleet and then snow.  On the way out of Chapel Hill I stopped by A Southern Season and noticed that they actually had gaiwans!  One highly decorative one was something I'd probably use for company, but was a little bit pricey at $14, and extremely large at 7 ounces.  I didn't consider buying it, because it was too large to actually fit into my palm and pour, and I do have pretty big hands.  The other gaiwan I spied was a simple white one that was a little bit smaller at 4 ounces, but was expensive at close to $30!  They also had a white porcelain gongfu cha set for $75 which was well beyond my price range and tastes.  I browsed the tea section and settled on "Tippy Yunnan" which was on sale.  Happy with my purchase, I stepped out of the store and braved the weather to the car to head home.

Problems with Fernal Humidity

This crazy weather is playing havoc with my body.  Usually I'm used to the humidity being around 40% or so in the winter and going up past 100% in the summer.  For spring and fall, the humidity ranges somewhere those values.  But this winter's been colder and drier than past winters.

Humidities have varied from 10-30% which is awful for tea and violins.  My skin and hair are dry beyond belief and I keep having to retune my violin.  I'm only wondering what effect this will have on my pu'er.  For right now, I have a humidifier running in my room for the violin, tea, and my sake, but I'll be grateful when warmer, moister weather comes back.

New Teapot

I got a new teapot from Puerhshop. It's the real deal, so to speak.  Its pour is great, its lid fit is great, and I'll be able to tell in a couple of months if the clay is great.  All it holds is 120 ml, but that's plenty for me.

The teapot has a neat design which I chose because I figured it was better to have the tea leaves expand outwards rather than upwards.  It's squat and circular, and the lid fits flush with the top of the pot perfectly.

Xiaguan 2007 Xiao Fa tuocha 100g

This tuocha shu pu'er is quite attractive in appearance with a melange of tan, brown, red, and black tea leaves, and with a nice aroma.   However, the resultant tea is simple, with a nuttiness and sweetness standing out from a smooth background flavor.  The nuttiniess doesn't last very long and appears at the beginning of the sip, with the sweet taste appearing at the back of the tongue and a few seconds after swallowing the tea.  Different steeping times didn't cause any bitterness, which was a boon to me.  

For $4 this isn't really all that bad, but I don't think I'll buy anymore for the time being.  The taste is really just average, but comforting.  There's so much tea out there, that I'm still trying to figure out the tea that resides within my tastes. 

Teavana business practices

I already posted my experiences with Teavana's saleswomen trying to sell me stale, over-priced tea, while I deftly ignored them and searched for the tea I wanted. Well, here's an employee describing what it's like to actually work for them. Whatever happened to honesty, or is it buried somewhere in a bottle behind the snake oil?

Simple Pleasures

I haven't had any tea today, so this afternoon I was itching for something hot and wet (that's what she said), and decided that I didn't want any sheng pu'er, or the two bricks of shu that I have. I have two tuochas of sheng that I haven't cracked open yet, and Lord knows what I'm waiting for, but I'll get around to opening them once I make a dent in Xiaguan Bao Yan. So pu'er was definitely ruled out, and I selected Teavana's lung ching in my unglazed yixing cup.

I keep expecting the taste of the tea to change. And it did. Whether it was the yixing absorbing some of the flavors or the tea getting old and stale, I didn't find the harsh vegetal taste that I'd noted before. The tea was by no means great, and I still feel I paid $10 too much for it, but it was drinkable. Certainly a nice change of pace from the pu'er.

Tonight when my tea-tooth was flaring up with a serious case of Immediaticus satisfactionus requiredum, I reached for my tin of Twining's Darjeeling Broken Orange Pekoe, and thought to myself, "When it comes down to it, I wouldn't mind drinking this everyday." With this tea I really think the yixing cup took off. With the cup swollen from broken tea leaves of a mottled green, black, and rust red, I was unable to get a bitter tea even though I didn't pay attention to steeping times. And though the tea wasn't fresh or complex, it was simple and satisfying.

Currently I've got clean water in my yixing teapot to get rid of the lingering clay smell and taste. It's tapered off since I first got it and began using it, but it's very noticeable in the later infusions, marring the delicate tastes of the sheng pu'er.

Tomorrow I'll try uploading some more of my tasting notes for sheng pu'ers since I've had time to sit and taste them, and since my bags of sheng are airing out, I think tomorrow will be a Chawang 2006 Yunnan Silver day.

The Importance of Heat

Tea and temperature go hand in hand. I try and aim for about 120-140 degrees Fahrenheit for green tea and a little cooler for white tea, a little more for rooibos and wulong, and boiling or close to it for black (or Chinese "red" tea) and pu'er teas. I'm really not that choosy when it comes to tea steeped at approximate temperatures, because I can only tell 3 things about tea and temperature: if the tea has been brewed in tepid water, hot water, and boiling water. And honestly, the taste gives the water temperature away. Tepid water yields weak and watery tea, hot water yields a better tasting, thin tea, and boiling water produces good tea.
But, the next thoughts in this next paragraph don't hold any water (har har) for green and white teas. Today I brewed up some sheng pu'er, the Xiaguan 2007 Tibetan BaoYan, in a porcelain mug. The taste was a little different than what I was used to, much cleaner in a sense, but I attributed my taste familiarity with this tea to my yixing teapot and unlined yixing cup which I use for this sheng. Maybe I was getting flavors from other teas previously brewed in the teapot and the cup, and that this brew of Baoyan with "tea masala" is what I'm used to. But as the body of the porcelain mug got unbearably hot to hold and forced me to grip its handle, I realized that the water was not staying quite as hot as it would in my yixing.
I noticed this in later infusions where the tea tasted very good, but somewhat dulled. I tried warming up the mug with hot water and then infusing my tea, but I still got the dulled taste. I guess porcelain doesn't insulate quite as well as clay. It's interesting because I've never noticed this before with green and white teas, but they only require semi-hot water for good tea. Pu'er just seems to like very hot water to brew properly.

And I'm still wondering if perhaps I should dedicate my yixing cup to one type of pu'er, or if it too will season along with the pot and enhance teas in one way or another.

Chunming 2007 Yunnan Pu'er Seven Color Spring

Today I had the pleasure of trying this small 100 gram bing of sheng. It's fairly mild and benign, but it still has a good taste to it, not unlike the Kunming Guyi 2006 JingMai Spring bing I have which is considerably bigger (350g) and has a bigger kick to it. Camphor and menthol tastes are there along with a little sweetness, but the overly medicinal taste and sweetness of the Jingmai bing isn't present. At first when I tried this tea two days ago I kept thinking that I was tasting the Jingmai's flavor that had seeped into the yixing clay. I scrubbed, scrubbed, scrubbed, and soaked the teapot, rinsed it out, and kept trying to brew the tea and taste drastic differences between it and the teas I'd already had. No such luck.

Still, it's not as sharp as the Jingmai, and a nice light fruit note contrasts with the very heavy mouthfeel of the tea. The finish is very clean, with maybe a little sweetness lingering on the back of the tongue. The last infusion hasn't yielded very much change from the first infusion, apart from a slight reduction in astringency. However, there was not much astringency to begin with.

Overall, I like this little bing. I think its small size may have contributed to some slight aging that took the edge off any bitterness or astringency, which is still very much present in the Jingmai bing. It's not strong in taste nor caffeine, but the flavor that is there is good and simple. I'm beginning to wonder if all spring cakes are supposed to have a camphor taste to them (who knows? Maybe that's when the camphor leaves start to fall in Yunnan), but I'll obviously have to have more spring teas to determine that for certain. However, I don't think I would save a bing of this tea for later drinking. It's pleasant and mild enough that you could drink it immediately.

Nov. 15th: I've had a total of 11 infusions of this tea, and it's still good. The tastes have gotten lighter, with the fruit and camphor fading into the background, but a simple green sweetness pervading throughout the tea. It kills me how I can spend so little on tea leaves that will last for two days of continued brewing, and spend 4 times as much on chopped store brand tea leaves that will last for 2 steepings.

21 Nov: The same tasting notes as the last time. Using enough leaf to fill the teapot up halfway, there's a rustic sort of taste to it that I can't pin down. I can taste the camphor of the tea leaf, the bitterness, and the sweetness, but there's an underlying taste that's hard to describe in the first three infusions. It smells somewhat like the leaf. Later infusions make me think this is a similar tea leaf and recipe to the Kunming Jingmai spring bing. It's heavily mentholated with camphor, and a nice taste underneath it, but it's not quite as sweet as the Jingmai bing. Still, I like it.

29 November: 15 second rinse

5s infusion: mild and timid at the start of the cup yielding a satisfying taste with wonderful aftertaste that is sweet, but with rustic, woodsy tastes lingering.

5s infusion: bitter with "chewy" feel and wood note. Mild sweetness.

mid-cup: same taste with sweetness poking around. Mild astringency.

Bottom: sweet, sour, same tastes as above.

15s infusion: too long, mostly middle tastes with bitterness and no sweetness. I've used too many leaves. Instead of a good strength, the tea is overwhelming, coating my mouth, and hard to taste subtleties of subsequent cups.

~I've removed several of the leaves from the teapot and the familiar taste is coming back with camphor and menthol in the aftertaste.

22 December 2008: Using enough leaf to fill the yixing up to the lid has yielded 5 very wonderful infusions. The sheng really hit its stride in the 3rd and 4th infusions with ephemeral sweetness that is impossible to describe. It's sweet, but with a chewy texture to it. Very good stuff.

28 December 2008: I've finally polished off this bing. I have enjoyed its camphor taste and creamy sweetness but the fruit tastes I noticed in earlier tastings have diminished, perhaps caused by the lack of aged pu'er or tips, in the center of the bing. I don't really think this would be a great candidate for aging; it's already tame and enjoyable as is. I wouldn't say this sheng knocks my socks off, but I really enjoyed the chewiness and creaminess of the tea.

Teapot size

I haven't been able to get my head unwrapped from this problem. I've heard from several different people that large yixing teapots used for a gongfu type brewing result in tea that's subpar. I'm not completely sure why that is though; the most immediate answer is something to do with the temperature, in that small pots hold in the heat better than bigger, roomier pots. But I'm just not convinced. I've learned about this in Biology and I've done the math. Objects with a large surface to volume ratio lose heat quicker than objects with a smaller surface area to volume ratio. Take for instance my little yixing pot which is 180 ml/cc. V=.75pi*r^3 and Surface area=4pi*r^2. For the sake of simplicity, and the fact that I have no clue what kind of equation would give me a graph of my teapot's shape, I'm assuming the teapots are spherical. With this I get a ratio of 5:6 (or 5/6). But if I use a teapot that is considered to be a good size, 120 ml, I get a ratio that's approximately 1. All that really means is that the surface area is the same amount as the volume, but it will lose heat faster because it's has more surface exposed compared to its volume. This ratio and reasoning also explains why small animals have high metabolisms. But I'm not completely sure how this could be a benefit to teapots. For right now I'm going with the two-fold assumption that: yixing teapots are traditionally small which allows for large leaf to water ratios producing better brews of tea, and the small size was originally intended for the use of one teapot per person.

Kunming Guyi 2006 Jingmai Spring

This tea has really changed since I first tasted it.  It could be my dry storage or it could be the additional months added to the bing.  Whatever the reason, the taste has gone from strong medicinal camphor with a sweet finish, to more refined tastes.  This sheng starts off with a prominent green taste that melds with a smooth creamy taste and mild sweetness. Camphor is still present, but it's more of an accent.  

The bitterness of the first few infusions has given way to an assertive astringency that eventually yields to a green tasting tea with mild sweetness, and progresses to an creamy, airy sheng in later infusions.  In other words, the tea's tastes gradually progress.

Caffeine-wise, this'll blow your head off if you're not careful. 

So to sum up the tastes in three words: astringent, green, sweet.

Yixing the Day After & Before the First Cup

Yesterday I cracked open my bing of Kunming Guyi factory's 2006 Jingmai Spring sheng pu'er. I like it; it's sweet and medicinal so far. But I used it in my little yixing teapot and the camphor scents of that specific tea seem to have lingered in the pot which makes for an interesting cup of Xiaguan Tibetan Flame brick!

I decided to also read online about the different ideas for maintaining yixing teapots. The information tag I got with my purchase was laconic. It simply said, "heat water, add one teaspoon to pot, steep 1 minute. Empty tea leaves when done and rinse teapot with water."
Very little information as to where the clay was sourced, how it was made, what benefits it has over porcelain, and all that jazz.
I found this odd, considering this is Chapel Hill; all the health food stores have massive poster displays on stands that go into great length with details and photos on where you're buying your food from, the farmer's name, the farmer's region's troubles with politics or threats of logging, and why buying this farmer's crop will allow him to have an extra goat or three chickens more. And then I wonder if all the store's chains have this poster display with the same amount of ink and paper, and then I wonder if the potato farmers have the same displays for them along with the bok choy farmers, and then I begin to wonder if perhaps the store would've saved money in the long run by simply buying the farmer a goat or three chickens with the amount of money spent on paper and ink and just have a handwritten sign saying, "GOOD FOOD."

So, buying something food related that doesn't have a display that goes into great depth about the digestive problems of the crops' earthworms is mighty suspicious. So, to the internet I went to find out more about the care of yixing.

And the amount of info I found was large. On youtube, I found a video of a guy boiling a teapot in water, and then adding tea leaves to season the pot. After all of this, he put toothpaste on a toothbrush and with some elbowgrease gave that pot a good, clean, fresh feeling. Hmmm. Another tea blog had a simple "rinse three times, brew a pot of tea, rinse teapot and let dry" for its advanced seasoning and maintenance advice, and offered that seasoning an yixing teapot closes its pores and makes it similar to a porcelain teapot. And one upscale site had a bunch of monotonous made-up advice which I've paraphrased: "One should first take into mind what sort of teapot would go best with a type of tea. Upon meditation and discovery upon the type of tea corresponding to the shape of the yixing, or as the Chinese are found of saying, Eyashwong, you must then put the teapot in a larger pot boiling water and place tea within the boiling pot, but take care! One must not make the resulting tea bitter or this shall affect the taste of the Eyashwong! When it is finished, one must then put on kidgloves or use all natural, unsealed bamboo tongs such as the type used in the Ming Dynasty (which we conveniently happen to have for a mere $45) to remove the teapot. But do not touch it with the bare hands! The oil of the hands might stick to the yixing, or Eyashwong, and forever mar the enjoyment of your teabags!"

For right now, I've decide to ignore all the advice except for the blog that said to rinse, brew, and enjoy. I drink tea to relax and enjoy it.

Synesthesia of shapes and tastes

I've never studied culinary arts or anything like that, so I'm unaware as to how people objectify and quantize tastes, but I always think of a cartesian graph with a y axis representing the melange of flavors in a drink or dish (lower coordinates represent heavy, dark tastes, and higher coordinates represent lighter, delicate tastes) and the x axis representing the time that the flavors progress. I'm sure this sounds confusing, but it gives me a better understanding and physical expectancy of the taste of something.
Here this inverted airfoil shape represents the way everyday average coffee tastes to me. The first part of the shape is the actual start of the way I taste coffee: the coffee's taste gradually becomes more apparent, hence the roundness. The middle portion of the shape represents the majority of the tastes in the coffee. The coffee that I'm drinking now is mostly bitter without any sugar in it, so the tastes that I'm getting are dark and heavy which is why the bottom portion of the shape is bowed downwards. The last portion of the shape represents the coffee's finish. I'm tasting a lingering bitterness, so the last portion is tapered and ends in a slanted point.

The only problem with this tasting shape is that it doesn't give you an exact idea of the flavors that you can expect. Bitter chocolate would have a similar shape to coffee; however, they're completely different in tastes. But, I think it does a decent job at describing the character of food and drink.

A circle would have a mellow start, a middle that has a wide range of flavors, and a finish that doesn't linger. A square would have an abrupt start, a wide range of flavors in the middle, and a quick finish. A half-rhombus flipped on its side would have an abrupt start, a distinct middle, and a finish that tapers.

How do you objectify your tastes?

Gourd and Vine Yixing

I picked up an yixing teapot at A Southern Season. I'd never given much thought to the details of the teapot display, since I assumed that it was really just a display and not for sale. They should consider moving it to their tea section, because the first thing people are liable to see when they walk in the door is the coffee section with its 40-some glass jars filled with different types of various coffees, and not the teapots tucked away into a wooden, partitioned wall. I walked up and down the length of the display and recognized teapots from different tea cultures and countries. I recognized yixing easily, and I recognized some of the Japanese teaware including the distinctive teapot with a handle and their cast iron kettle.
I paused to look at the ubiquitous glazed porcelain British teapots in lime and coffee-brown when I glanced upwards to find harlequin glasses with a strangely shaped teapot. I didn't recognize this, so I read the placard to find that the tea set was part of Moroccan tea culture. This jogged a dusty memory of me being in France and seeing street vendors "pulling" tea in a rather sketchy and unattractive neighborhood, where nearby a entrepreneur was roasting corn in a shopping cart that served as a grill.
I moved back to the yixing pots. I was disappointed in them. I had no reason to doubt their authenticity, but quite a few seemed to be for the sole purpose of buying them for display or for use while serving tea to guests. And, most of them were just too big for me and meant to be sold with a gongfucha ceremony set.
All of them were at least 8 ounces, most close to 10, and didn't captivate me. I did see one that I liked, a horse, but it didn't come in a small enough size for me, and if I had a well-paying job, I certainly would have purchased the fu dog yixing teapot set that I saw. But, I decided to go with the gourd and vine yixing. It's small enough for two, and simple in design compared to the others I saw. I do wish A Southern Season had smaller teapots with less whimsical designs at lower prices to be more inviting to people who are not familiar with tea in general. I think I'll probably get a smaller plain yixing when I buy more tea online to dedicate solely to shu pu'er. But for right now I'll enjoy discovering the best way to make tea with one of these.

After some more reading online, I think the clay is actually Duanni and not Zisha based on the beige and cobalt oxide hues of the teapot. And it seems there's a small crack on the bottom handle that I didn't notice before, but I think the crack is superficial and seriously doubt that it'll cause the handle to come apart.

PS I also forgot to mention that the company I bought the teapot from certifies that it is lead free and genuine yixing. I'm not sure just how many lead-laced, faux yixing pots make their way into the US market, but I figure my recommended daily value of lead should be kept to a minimum.

Visiting Chapel Hill

Friday, Lara and I went up to Chapel Hill to see KK and Sarah Lizabeth. We flapped our gums with Kristina for awhile and heard how her research was going, and then went to lunch with Sarah. After lunch, we went to A Southern Season to pick up some cheap wine and an yixing teapot for me. I found both in a roundabout way, and afterwards we headed towards supper and Late Nite with Roy. TOO BAD it was incredibly hot and lacked wattage for the sound system or else I might've enjoyed it.

2006 Menghai Yue Chan Yue Xiang

Right now I've got a mug full of this stuff and my initial impressions with the taste are as follows: the first steeping is yielding a taste that is earthy and not unlike whole-grain bread. Overall it has a very heavy mouth feel.

Pu'er tea.

I know I did a basic info post about pu'er tea on the beginning of my blog, most of the info I learned from a shaving forum and Wikipedia. I bought loose leaf pu'er from A Southern Season and enjoyed it. Looking back, it was probably a type of shupu, which is a pu'er that's artificially aged by storing tea in dampness and heat. Compared to others' experiences, my first one with this tea was good: I liked it. It was woody, earthy, not bitter at all, and overall complex. My best description would be if you were to go into a forest in the fall and attempt to taste the scents that fallen leaves give off. So, after hearing a lot of good things about shengpu or raw pu'er, I decided to buy some from puerhshop.com. I've never had a shengpu before, which is green tea from the old tea trees that has not undergone fermentation processes, so I didn't spend a whole lot of money on the tea. Overall, I bought a 2006 bing (cake) of Jingmai Spring, a brick of 2006 Menghai Yue Chen Yue Xiang, and a brick of 2007 Xiaguan Tibetan Flame Brick. The first two are raw, and the Xiaguan is shupu. And the great thing about buying this type of tea? You can get decent tea for roughly 30 cents per 5 grams. And since you can steep it multiple times, you can have about 5 cups of good tea for about 6 cents per cup. But because I bought everything on sale, I'm getting about .05 cents per cup.

Teavana Keemun

I finally finished Teavana's Keemun. My overall impressions changed each time I drank it, swaying from grudgingly drinking it to sipping with aplomb. I guess my tastes change from week to week. When I first got it it had a distinct smoky taste, with an overall leathery tone to it. I still think the lady who sold me the tea used the tea scooper previously on lapsang souchong and got quite a bit of the dust in my keemun. Eventually the tea's taste changed as I dug further into the bag, but predominantly to a bland, woody, tannin cup character with wet leaves that smelled like a delicious keemun. The overall body was creamy and had a very heavy mouthful even though there wasn't a large amount of dust in the mix. But after finishing the last little bit of the tea and viewing the leaves at the bottom of my mug infuser, I'm beginning to wonder exactly what I paid for. It mostly seems like I got a bunch of stems with tea leaf bits on it and some tea dust. Bummer.
Overall my tasting notes for this were:
start: creamy
middle: orchid, flowery (but very subdued and altogether bland)
finish: slightly tannic, pine smoke.

And after all of this, no matter how many tea leaves I used, the taste never changed for the better. Major bummer.