Growing up in the late 70's, thru the 80's, air raid drills at school train us to go under the desk, cover our heads, fearing Communism we were steered to think China is an adversary. At 50 now, I've read a lot of China and my tea hobby, i see nothing but humble, friendly, hard working, genuine good people. I can watch these videos all day. There would be nothing more i would love to do than visit China. I would love to throw away my cell phone, cancel my decade of plans and live and learn the ways and culture of the Chinese. Be great where your biggest worry is how much it's gonna rain or not rain. No bills (maybe i would consider running up a tea tab, but I'll work it off). Thanks for these. I know they were 7 years ago, but i like this channel to pick up the stuff to make a better relaxing way of life. Since i tossed the coffee cups out and replaced them with little tea cups my life has many little pros. Less anxiety. Better confidence, better understanding myslef. I can go on and on.
I've been drinking pu er tea for years and learned a lot from this video~ it certainly makes me want to go to Yunnan again and explore the forest where the 1000-year-old pu'er trees stand...
This is such an underrated channel, the work you're doing is absolutely incredible and serves more recognition...I'm sure you'll get there eventually :)
Oh my god I cracked up as soon as the music played xD As a Thai, I immediately realized it was a Thai folk song from Northeastern Thailand. I must admit I didn't quite expect it. Anyway, been following your channel for a while. Please keep up the good work!
The Dai people of SW Yunnan are related to the Thai through language. There's a video of a Thai person speaking Thai to a Dai person and sort of communicating in a broken way.
I learned about Yunnan and pu er tea from reading "The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane" by Lisa See. That book made me use so much of my imagination lol I'd love to try pu er one day!
Thank you Don and Celine, for all the work you do, all the tea guidance and mastering you give us, and for sharing these amazing videos, I have found so much new respect for tea and the amazing people who produce it. Huge props to that lady sorting the leaves, so much skill and patience, and to all the pickers!
This was fantastic! For some reason I've always been a little....intimidated I guess to try PuErh tea. Thank you for showing this, I love when companies show where they get their teas and since I can see that it is all done by hand, it makes me a little less apprehensive to try the PuErh.
First: I do drink and like coffee. But, tea can definitely make you high, but it's varied between the varietals and processing techniques, e.g. raw puerh, ripe puerh, Wulong, green, red, hei cha etc. Coffee is much more one dimensional in the energy that you get from it. And drink too much, chances are you get jittery, and in a bad mindset. Tea, for most people I know is totally different, you don't get the jitters, but either a positive energy, or a relaxing calming, or something in between. Ripe puerh gives me vivid dreams, while coffee best allows me to sleep, at worst it does not let me. 😅 Anyhow, apologies for the tangent, just wanted to give some context.
Wait. I can understand the lyrics in the beginning of the this video. It's sung in Thai. If this is truly the music of the region, then the local folks may be ethnic Thai in Yunnan. Thank you for this video. Very educational for me. The process of making this tea is incredibly labor intensive.
The Dai people of SW Yunnan are related to the Thai through language, culture and architecture; there's video of a Thai person speaking to random people in the street and sort of communicating.
Thank you very much for this insight into puer plantation. Although videos on tea processing/manifacturing proliferate on youtube, it is rare to find clips as well done and as informative as yours. I am looking forward to your next doc. PS. Is there any agency in Europe that organizes visit to tea plantation in China and on spot classes (English or Chinese)?
+Irene Crosignani Thanks, we will continue to make little documentaries of our tea trips when we have an opportunity. There is no specific organisation that we know of for trips to tea plantations but if you contact the tourism offices of any province they should be able to organise something. The problem is that farmers are generally not that interested unless you are planning to buy a lot of tea!
Wow, simply... wow! (I wanted to 3x the wow, but decided not to dilute the concentration of it!) Liked and added to my "Development" playlist. This truly is amazing knowledge you're passing on! Thumbs flying in the air as a tradition for long time learning about tea and who knows what other Eastern wonders (I hope!)
I would also recommend watching the "Drinking PuErh from 1600 Year Old Trees" that you have on TH-cam because my Tiger Spirit cake set just arrived (ordered on a Sunday, my time U.S. and received it on Wednesday!) and while I really want to "break open the seal" I'm drinking and savoring the Dinosaur samples first to see if I want to get that set of cakes as well. In short, Don, you really do source some fantastic brews! Thank you for your careful attention to the details and for the informative videos. This video presented here shows the entire process for making this ancient style of tea that many of us Westerners hadn't even heard of as few as 10 to 15 years ago when I found them from a seller in Yunnan on the web and wanted to try them. I knew that they were labor intensive but I really appreciate that you chose a traditional method "factory" for your cakes. Keep up the good work, while I've usually had some not so good cooked (such as you mention from the early part of your video with the "garden/plantation" style of production with younger plants that look more like bushes than trees) ones in different tuo shapes (and actually enjoy them as you say decent teas) I much prefer the traditional older tree leaf style and have regained respect for the raw style. THANKS and keep sourcing the good stuff so that we can drink (and prepare with your gong fu guru) the good stuff!!! By the way, how much was that tea you tried with the rich nutrients in the video and did you purchase some to bring back to sell to your customers?
Thank you kinghazzah! All of these comments gives us more fuel to continue trying to source the good stuff. I can't remember the price of the cake in the video but we sourced Tiger Spirit from the same producers and we preferred Tiger Spirit so you have a WINNER!
What does "Red Seal", "Yellow Seal", "Green Seal", designation mean on the labels of PuErh cakes? I also see "Dragon Seal" and "Lion Seal". Are any of these an indication of the quality? For example, I have found a 1988 Year Yellow Seal cake for sale. Am wondering how to know if it is ok to purchase. Thank you and love your videos!
It is just marketing of certain seller. what really make a difference is only the location and tree. Just like wine, there is no standard. It is a art not science. Warning: when you do not know this thing well, do not spend too much money on Puer Tea. As a example: xinyihao.jd.com/view_search-51142-6751307-99-0-24-1.html (do not buy them, they are overpriced and do not sell to the buyer outside of china)
I've been going to Mei Leaf in Camden a lot lately but haven't tried the Pu-erh tea yet. Which is the oldest Pu-erh tea you have in shop? I.e. harvested from ancient trees.
Cool Documentary. May I ask the song at the beginning of the video? I am trying to expand my musical horizons from Japanese and Korean into the Chinese culture as well.
I wish I could really understand the diference between cooked or uncooked, raw or ripe, it seems so like there are so many types and information is very confusing when coming from the tea shops online.
It is actually not so complicated - Raw/uncooked is made from leaves that have not been fermented artificially but are left to age naturally. Ripe/cooked is made from leaves that have been fermented by the producers before selling.
André Sontag Artigas Raw has a lighter colour brew (unless they are VERY old teas). Generally Raw is considered to be better because the flavour is more unique and the farmers usually save their best leaves for raw. But cooked can be very high quality and is a different taste really.
Simple, Andre. When talking about Puerh tea, there is Sheng, and Shu. Sheng = Raw. Shu = Ripe. Sheng also = Uncooked, and Shu = Cooked. The confusion is due to the terminology. The only reason that Shu, or "ripe", or "cooked" (all the same) was developed, is because for Puerh to achieve it's glory as a great tea, it usually (not always, but usually) needed to be aged for many, many years, as the bacteria would work its magic on the stored tea. However, as is human nature, many folks wanted to be able to taste that great aged Puerh flavor without having to wait forever for the tea to be ready... Voila! Someone figured out how to speed up the process by "cooking (or "ripening") the young Puerh by piling up loose Puerh on the floors of sheds, spraying water on the tea, covering with thermal blankets, and letting nature (natural fermentation) speed things up a bit. Every so often, the piles are turned by hand (or pitchfork), then sprayed again, and then covered again with blankets to let the ripening process accelerate even further. Soon, you have Puerh that tastes sometimes as good as very old aged green Puerh would taste. That is a simplistic explanation, but you get the point. Now, only one small problem with the "cooked" method of creating "old-tasting" Puerh: No matter how experienced the tea-master is at making good Shu/cooked/ripe Puerh tea, and no matter how good it might taste, it will still NEVER replace the full quality/taste/cha-chi experience of a true quality aged green Puerh tea (which some of us will never live long enough to actually experience:). Now, how old are you, and how much money do you have to spend on tea? Those questions help to balance-out your purchasing decisions. Just a small bit of advice, don't spend all your money on inexpensive young (green/raw/Sheng) Puerh, because it's a good idea to try and get some really good old tea to try to see if you would like it. Try to find a reputable dealer, through word-of-mouth, if possible. And then, if you like the taste/cha-chi/experience of good old Puerh tea, then if you are young enough, start stocking-up on some tried-and-true recipes (7542, 8582, 7581, e.g.), and put them away in hopes that someday you will end up with a few "masterpieces" of your own! But once again, don't spend all your money on inexpensive young Puerh just because it's cheap. Once in awhile, save up a bit, and try to find some good-quality aged Puerh to treat yourself to, while waiting for your stash to become legendary :). Also, try a few other teas such as Liu An, Oolongs, and some of the famous green teas. Some good resources: 1) Yunnan Sourcing 2) Dragon Teahouse 3) The Chinese Tea Shop (Vancouver), 3) Chawang Shop 4) Tea Life Hong Kong. That ought to get you started easily. Good luck on your tea adventure!
Andre, after such a long-winded explanation of the 2-differences in Puerh, just wanted to add something. If you do start collecting young Puerh for aging at home, don't think that you can't drink some of it as it ages! That, too, is part of the fun of aging your own tea. You should dive into your stash periodically, and drink some of it to see how your tea is aging. After sampling a tea, I would personally buy at least two cakes of each tea I wanted to age, that way I could use one for sampling, and keep the other whole for "just-in-case". You never know if you might want to sell a cake later. I just saw a 2005 Liu An tea basket for sale for $87. The 1992 basket, from the very same factory, was selling on another site for $879 (13 yrs difference). Big price increase, eh? Sometimes, but not always, Puerh and other teas can be a good investment, as well as being used for our own pleasurable drinking.
What do you feel is the best way to store pu erh cakes and loose pu erh? I hear mixed reviews. Thank you for your help and time. Blessings in abundance.
+frank gilapalo Woah this is a BIG question and so we will try to give you the basics. The method of storing depends on how quickly you want your tea to age. The obvious questions is 'Why would I want the tea to take LONGER to age?'. The answer is that the slower aged tea is considered to reach a higher quality than faster aged tea. This is why cake aged tea is considered to be preferable because it ages slower than loose. We know some manufacturers that age fresh tea loose for a few years for faster ageing then compress into cakes. Here are the basic factors: 1. Temperature - keep in stable temperature between 20-30 celsius 2. Humidity - keep between 50-70% humidity 3. Air - ensure that at least once a year the leaves are exposed to some fresh air 4. Light - keep in darker places 5. Aroma - keep away from other strong aromas 6. Container - paper bags or cardboard boxes are faster. Clay pots (unglazed and ideally Yixing) are slower ageing but perhaps higher quality. If you want to speed up the ageing then you can break the cake carefully into pieces to increase surface area for ageing. It is worth remembering that the highest quality aged PuErh is something like 40 years old so you probably won't be ageing many cakes from fresh to fully aged tea. We prefer to enjoy drinking our tea and go for a quicker ageing storage (break it up and keep it somewhere a little more humid) but if you have the patience then go for slow dry storage cake aged tea or if you have the money buy one that has been aged from the 1980-1990's but be prepared to spend a lot of money!!!!!!
+chinalife Tea House I cant thank you enough for the time you put to get back to me in such detail i really appreciate that . Do you plan on personally aging one of the sacred owls or tiger spirits for your self. How would you explain this feeling you get in the throat and do you feel you receive this from old growth dan cong oolongs from 500 and 300 year variety. Is it similar to a feeling of wanting to hack resin out of your throat. It is really nice to see the love you have of this amazing specimen. Thank you for your time.
+frank gilapalo Yes we are ageing a couple of tiger spirit cakes ourselves and we are going to be breaking up one and leaving the other in a cake to taste the difference! The throat feeling can be different between PuErh's - some are very dry, some feel like it tightens the throat or (like you say) coat the throat but one of the main joys of great raw PuErh is how this transforms to a minty sweetness. Proper old Dan Cong's have a very similar effect but they bring a deliciously powerful and fleeting bitterness and dryness which makes them so quenching and satisfying.
+chinalife Tea House Thank you very much for responding. I wish to experience this minty mouth feel some day it sounds really nice. If you don't mind me asking how long do you plan on aging your cakes? That would really be a great video review in the future. By the way the song you were playing in the start of the video was amazing. Who is that buy if you don't mind me asking sorry for all the questions that i have been sending you but who better than someone with such love and passion for tea.
frank gilapalo We will be tasting a bit every couple of years and it will age as long as we can resist drinking! The song is th-cam.com/video/q2OvKQ6ISz4/w-d-xo.html
I have recently had my first pu erh ever in a japanese restaurant in New Zealand. I have bought 3 different types of pu erh now but they all smell fishy/of seaweed. I know now that Im supposed to rinse it but how do I determine the quality of a tea before ordering it? Is there any way to tell if its traditional made tea or high quality?
There is way too much fishy PuErh out there. Fishy PuErh comes from unwanted molds developing during the composting process and usually decrease with age and good storing. I would advise buying older Shu PuErh or higher quality tea that does not have this aroma. A good Shu PuErh should taste like a clean wet cavern, maybe with earthy, cellar/attic aroma but no (or very little) seaweed and no fishy smell.
buy 3kg first-class fresh puer cake each year and preserve them in a well-ventilated room. Each year you can test them to recognize the difference. About 5-7 years later you can enjoy them with full flavor. The price raise just like good wine.
I see you're hanging at the begining what I gess it is a tea tree flower. Why is there no tea prepared from flowers? I've seen tea scented with ornamental camelia flowers, but why not to use the flowers of the same tea plant? It sounds easyer to sell "flower tea" than kukicha as "stems tea".
How'd you get behind the scenes access to the fields and the production floor? Is it some kind of special arrangement or can anyone arrange a trip like that?
These are probably Shu Tuo cha. The best way to brew them is put a whole pellet in your infuser and pour over with boiling water. Leave for 10 seconds and then throw the rinse away. Have a sniff of the leaves. Good quality Shu Tou should smell like autumn leaves and large wet caves, maybe a bit like your grandmother's attic or cellar. If it smells a bit funky and seaweed then it is probably a bit young (or not great quality) and we advise rinsing it more until that smell has disappeared almost completely. Then infuse (the cake should have disintegrated into a mulch of broken leaves). Download our brewing guide at chinalifeweb.com/guides/the-tea-brewing-chart/ and follow PuErh (ripe) as a starting point for brewing.
Thousand year old tea tree? I’m always suspicious when someone in China tells you such and such is such age. Unless they’re showing off how young their mistresses are. Unfortunately with puerh tea, and the tree it’s from, it’s difficult to prove or disprove its age.
Interesting, what concerns me is the bacteria on the shoes of people, particularly when asian toilet floors are often covered in urine and fecal matter. How do I know, well I got infected this way. I wonder how infected this tea is.
Growing up in the late 70's, thru the 80's, air raid drills at school train us to go under the desk, cover our heads, fearing Communism we were steered to think China is an adversary. At 50 now, I've read a lot of China and my tea hobby, i see nothing but humble, friendly, hard working, genuine good people. I can watch these videos all day. There would be nothing more i would love to do than visit China. I would love to throw away my cell phone, cancel my decade of plans and live and learn the ways and culture of the Chinese. Be great where your biggest worry is how much it's gonna rain or not rain. No bills (maybe i would consider running up a tea tab, but I'll work it off).
Thanks for these. I know they were 7 years ago, but i like this channel to pick up the stuff to make a better relaxing way of life. Since i tossed the coffee cups out and replaced them with little tea cups my life has many little pros. Less anxiety. Better confidence, better understanding myslef. I can go on and on.
The man who looks 5 years younger, 5 years later! Well done Don. 👍🏻
Adrenochrome
@@cameron2900x you almot made me spit all of my tea
His face still the same today.
I'm from here, thank you so much for promoting our hometown.
I'm not saying this vid is badly produce, but, man, you really increased the quality of your productions. Congratulations.
Thanks, any excuse to spend money on photographic equipment and we grab the opportunity!
i would definitely say he's come into his own, he almost seems shy in this, distracted looks and shaky voice.
there are documentaries and then there are documentaries. awesome work.
+farkig gibble (RubberPants) Thank you!
I've been drinking pu er tea for years and learned a lot from this video~ it certainly makes me want to go to Yunnan again and explore the forest where the 1000-year-old pu'er trees stand...
This is such an underrated channel, the work you're doing is absolutely incredible and serves more recognition...I'm sure you'll get there eventually :)
+sasuke3690 Thanks, we will keep pushing out the videos and hopefully enough people will spread the word for us too :)
Oh my god I cracked up as soon as the music played xD As a Thai, I immediately realized it was a Thai folk song from Northeastern Thailand. I must admit I didn't quite expect it. Anyway, been following your channel for a while. Please keep up the good work!
The Dai people of SW Yunnan are related to the Thai through language. There's a video of a Thai person speaking Thai to a Dai person and sort of communicating in a broken way.
interestingly they celebrate songkran instead of chinese new yr.
Thank you, this was excellent to watch!
This was an amazing documentary, kudos.
What an amazing proces! Love nature love life.
It's extremely cool and useful kind of content! Thank you very much!
I learned about Yunnan and pu er tea from reading "The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane" by Lisa See. That book made me use so much of my imagination lol I'd love to try pu er one day!
i love pu erh and now i'm going to read that book!
Thank you Don and Celine, for all the work you do, all the tea guidance and mastering you give us, and for sharing these amazing videos, I have found so much new respect for tea and the amazing people who produce it. Huge props to that lady sorting the leaves, so much skill and patience, and to all the pickers!
Jingmai mountain is absolutely beautiful area and dreamland for tea lovers! I'll have to visit it again !
Ngl this video is really refreshing for some reason
Thank you for making for us this magnificent tea!
This stuff jus turned up at my jungle jims store and I am buying it by the masses ! So good!!
I’m impressed with this video. Thank you
This was fantastic! For some reason I've always been a little....intimidated I guess to try PuErh tea. Thank you for showing this, I love when companies show where they get their teas and since I can see that it is all done by hand, it makes me a little less apprehensive to try the PuErh.
now this is a real documentary, keep it up
tea seems a lot better than coffee
where tea especially this one doesn't get you high but it's a nice drink with flavour
First: I do drink and like coffee.
But, tea can definitely make you high, but it's varied between the varietals and processing techniques, e.g. raw puerh, ripe puerh, Wulong, green, red, hei cha etc.
Coffee is much more one dimensional in the energy that you get from it. And drink too much, chances are you get jittery, and in a bad mindset. Tea, for most people I know is totally different, you don't get the jitters, but either a positive energy, or a relaxing calming, or something in between.
Ripe puerh gives me vivid dreams, while coffee best allows me to sleep, at worst it does not let me. 😅
Anyhow, apologies for the tangent, just wanted to give some context.
Thank you, that was very interesting!
So awesome let's have tea
So fascinating...!
Wait. I can understand the lyrics in the beginning of the this video. It's sung in Thai. If this is truly the music of the region, then the local folks may be ethnic Thai in Yunnan. Thank you for this video. Very educational for me. The process of making this tea is incredibly labor intensive.
The Dai people of SW Yunnan are related to the Thai through language, culture and architecture; there's video of a Thai person speaking to random people in the street and sort of communicating.
Great video, many thanks!
Inspiring.
Good stuff thank you! Im loving the Cha Dao
beautiful
my hometown｡◕‿◕｡
Great documentary thanks
More videos like this! I would so watch a travel TV series filmed this way, The World of Tea
great!
thanks so much for these great insights into the heart of puerh! much appreciated.
Thank you very much for this insight into puer plantation. Although videos on tea processing/manifacturing proliferate on youtube, it is rare to find clips as well done and as informative as yours. I am looking forward to your next doc. PS. Is there any agency in Europe that organizes visit to tea plantation in China and on spot classes (English or Chinese)?
+Irene Crosignani Thanks, we will continue to make little documentaries of our tea trips when we have an opportunity. There is no specific organisation that we know of for trips to tea plantations but if you contact the tourism offices of any province they should be able to organise something. The problem is that farmers are generally not that interested unless you are planning to buy a lot of tea!
Ahah! I see, thank you for the tips!
a bit off topic, but this song in the background is sampled by alchemist in the action bronson - the chairmans intent track
Anton Malmi lol I noticed that too
This is it! If you're down there sourcing next time please do another vid of the cake pressing and so on.
yum tea!
Wow, simply... wow! (I wanted to 3x the wow, but decided not to dilute the concentration of it!) Liked and added to my "Development" playlist. This truly is amazing knowledge you're passing on! Thumbs flying in the air as a tradition for long time learning about tea and who knows what other Eastern wonders (I hope!)
More tea trip videos are being planned and we will no doubt venture into other Eastern ideas.
I would also recommend watching the "Drinking PuErh from 1600 Year Old Trees" that you have on TH-cam because my Tiger Spirit cake set just arrived (ordered on a Sunday, my time U.S. and received it on Wednesday!) and while I really want to "break open the seal" I'm drinking and savoring the Dinosaur samples first to see if I want to get that set of cakes as well. In short, Don, you really do source some fantastic brews! Thank you for your careful attention to the details and for the informative videos.
This video presented here shows the entire process for making this ancient style of tea that many of us Westerners hadn't even heard of as few as 10 to 15 years ago when I found them from a seller in Yunnan on the web and wanted to try them. I knew that they were labor intensive but I really appreciate that you chose a traditional method "factory" for your cakes. Keep up the good work, while I've usually had some not so good cooked (such as you mention from the early part of your video with the "garden/plantation" style of production with younger plants that look more like bushes than trees) ones in different tuo shapes (and actually enjoy them as you say decent teas) I much prefer the traditional older tree leaf style and have regained respect for the raw style. THANKS and keep sourcing the good stuff so that we can drink (and prepare with your gong fu guru) the good stuff!!!
By the way, how much was that tea you tried with the rich nutrients in the video and did you purchase some to bring back to sell to your customers?
Thank you kinghazzah! All of these comments gives us more fuel to continue trying to source the good stuff. I can't remember the price of the cake in the video but we sourced Tiger Spirit from the same producers and we preferred Tiger Spirit so you have a WINNER!
perfect :)
nicely done
so that's why puer is so much more expensive, it's very very labor intensive
my home xishuangbanna has so many tea moutain, i thnik some puer tea was made in another moutain not bad.
Oh now I want a big 'ol dish of Som Tom!
What "nutrients" are these plants absorbing in this area, that perhaps they are not in others?
Watching some Vids... This best one so far... And good exercises on the making pu-erh... LoL
IT means they never wash the tea leaves before going through any of its processes! Would really like to know abt it. Thanks 🙏
What does "Red Seal", "Yellow Seal", "Green Seal", designation mean on the labels of PuErh cakes? I also see "Dragon Seal" and "Lion Seal". Are any of these an indication of the quality? For example, I have found a 1988 Year Yellow Seal cake for sale. Am wondering how to know if it is ok to purchase. Thank you and love your videos!
Please send a link so we can be sure of your meaning.
It is just marketing of certain seller. what really make a difference is only the location and tree. Just like wine, there is no standard. It is a art not science. Warning: when you do not know this thing well, do not spend too much money on Puer Tea. As a example: xinyihao.jd.com/view_search-51142-6751307-99-0-24-1.html (do not buy them, they are overpriced and do not sell to the buyer outside of china)
Hello. Is it possible to go to work in this tea fields? Thank you
Nice
I've been going to Mei Leaf in Camden a lot lately but haven't tried the Pu-erh tea yet. Which is the oldest Pu-erh tea you have in shop? I.e. harvested from ancient trees.
How do you store big amounts of loose tea?
It is a documentary about Yunnan, China but the music that starts at 00:30 is in Thai haha
Cool Documentary. May I ask the song at the beginning of the video? I am trying to expand my musical horizons from Japanese and Korean into the Chinese culture as well.
What shops/where would you recommend for buying pu-erh and shipping it to the US?
So cooked Pu’er is the same thing as ripe Pu’er? Just a different term?
Is there a tea made from just the buds?
I wish I could really understand the diference between cooked or uncooked, raw or ripe, it seems so like there are so many types and information is very confusing when coming from the tea shops online.
It is actually not so complicated - Raw/uncooked is made from leaves that have not been fermented artificially but are left to age naturally. Ripe/cooked is made from leaves that have been fermented by the producers before selling.
Raw have a lighter color brew and ripe are darker, is that right? Is raw considered better or just different?
André Sontag Artigas Raw has a lighter colour brew (unless they are VERY old teas). Generally Raw is considered to be better because the flavour is more unique and the farmers usually save their best leaves for raw. But cooked can be very high quality and is a different taste really.
Simple, Andre. When talking about Puerh tea, there is Sheng, and Shu. Sheng = Raw. Shu = Ripe. Sheng also = Uncooked, and Shu = Cooked. The confusion is due to the terminology. The only reason that Shu, or "ripe", or "cooked" (all the same) was developed, is because for Puerh to achieve it's glory as a great tea, it usually (not always, but usually) needed to be aged for many, many years, as the bacteria would work its magic on the stored tea. However, as is human nature, many folks wanted to be able to taste that great aged Puerh flavor without having to wait forever for the tea to be ready... Voila! Someone figured out how to speed up the process by "cooking (or "ripening") the young Puerh by piling up loose Puerh on the floors of sheds, spraying water on the tea, covering with thermal blankets, and letting nature (natural fermentation) speed things up a bit. Every so often, the piles are turned by hand (or pitchfork), then sprayed again, and then covered again with blankets to let the ripening process accelerate even further. Soon, you have Puerh that tastes sometimes as good as very old aged green Puerh would taste. That is a simplistic explanation, but you get the point. Now, only one small problem with the "cooked" method of creating "old-tasting" Puerh: No matter how experienced the tea-master is at making good Shu/cooked/ripe Puerh tea, and no matter how good it might taste, it will still NEVER replace the full quality/taste/cha-chi experience of a true quality aged green Puerh tea (which some of us will never live long enough to actually experience:). Now, how old are you, and how much money do you have to spend on tea? Those questions help to balance-out your purchasing decisions. Just a small bit of advice, don't spend all your money on inexpensive young (green/raw/Sheng) Puerh, because it's a good idea to try and get some really good old tea to try to see if you would like it. Try to find a reputable dealer, through word-of-mouth, if possible. And then, if you like the taste/cha-chi/experience of good old Puerh tea, then if you are young enough, start stocking-up on some tried-and-true recipes (7542, 8582, 7581, e.g.), and put them away in hopes that someday you will end up with a few "masterpieces" of your own! But once again, don't spend all your money on inexpensive young Puerh just because it's cheap. Once in awhile, save up a bit, and try to find some good-quality aged Puerh to treat yourself to, while waiting for your stash to become legendary :). Also, try a few other teas such as Liu An, Oolongs, and some of the famous green teas. Some good resources: 1) Yunnan Sourcing 2) Dragon Teahouse 3) The Chinese Tea Shop (Vancouver), 3) Chawang Shop 4) Tea Life Hong Kong. That ought to get you started easily. Good luck on your tea adventure!
Andre, after such a long-winded explanation of the 2-differences in Puerh, just wanted to add something. If you do start collecting young Puerh for aging at home, don't think that you can't drink some of it as it ages! That, too, is part of the fun of aging your own tea. You should dive into your stash periodically, and drink some of it to see how your tea is aging. After sampling a tea, I would personally buy at least two cakes of each tea I wanted to age, that way I could use one for sampling, and keep the other whole for "just-in-case". You never know if you might want to sell a cake later. I just saw a 2005 Liu An tea basket for sale for $87. The 1992 basket, from the very same factory, was selling on another site for $879 (13 yrs difference). Big price increase, eh? Sometimes, but not always, Puerh and other teas can be a good investment, as well as being used for our own pleasurable drinking.
What do you feel is the best way to store pu erh cakes and loose pu erh? I hear mixed reviews. Thank you for your help and time. Blessings in abundance.
+frank gilapalo Woah this is a BIG question and so we will try to give you the basics. The method of storing depends on how quickly you want your tea to age. The obvious questions is 'Why would I want the tea to take LONGER to age?'. The answer is that the slower aged tea is considered to reach a higher quality than faster aged tea. This is why cake aged tea is considered to be preferable because it ages slower than loose. We know some manufacturers that age fresh tea loose for a few years for faster ageing then compress into cakes.
Here are the basic factors:
1. Temperature - keep in stable temperature between 20-30 celsius
2. Humidity - keep between 50-70% humidity
3. Air - ensure that at least once a year the leaves are exposed to some fresh air
4. Light - keep in darker places
5. Aroma - keep away from other strong aromas
6. Container - paper bags or cardboard boxes are faster. Clay pots (unglazed and ideally Yixing) are slower ageing but perhaps higher quality.
If you want to speed up the ageing then you can break the cake carefully into pieces to increase surface area for ageing.
It is worth remembering that the highest quality aged PuErh is something like 40 years old so you probably won't be ageing many cakes from fresh to fully aged tea. We prefer to enjoy drinking our tea and go for a quicker ageing storage (break it up and keep it somewhere a little more humid) but if you have the patience then go for slow dry storage cake aged tea or if you have the money buy one that has been aged from the 1980-1990's but be prepared to spend a lot of money!!!!!!
+chinalife Tea House I cant thank you enough for the time you put to get back to me in such detail i really appreciate that . Do you plan on personally aging one of the sacred owls or tiger spirits for your self. How would you explain this feeling you get in the throat and do you feel you receive this from old growth dan cong oolongs from 500 and 300 year variety. Is it similar to a feeling of wanting to hack resin out of your throat. It is really nice to see the love you have of this amazing specimen. Thank you for your time.
+frank gilapalo Yes we are ageing a couple of tiger spirit cakes ourselves and we are going to be breaking up one and leaving the other in a cake to taste the difference!
The throat feeling can be different between PuErh's - some are very dry, some feel like it tightens the throat or (like you say) coat the throat but one of the main joys of great raw PuErh is how this transforms to a minty sweetness.
Proper old Dan Cong's have a very similar effect but they bring a deliciously powerful and fleeting bitterness and dryness which makes them so quenching and satisfying.
+chinalife Tea House Thank you very much for responding. I wish to experience this minty mouth feel some day it sounds really nice. If you don't mind me asking how long do you plan on aging your cakes? That would really be a great video review in the future. By the way the song you were playing in the start of the video was amazing. Who is that buy if you don't mind me asking sorry for all the questions that i have been sending you but who better than someone with such love and passion for tea.
frank gilapalo
We will be tasting a bit every couple of years and it will age as long as we can resist drinking!
The song is th-cam.com/video/q2OvKQ6ISz4/w-d-xo.html
I have recently had my first pu erh ever in a japanese restaurant in New Zealand. I have bought 3 different types of pu erh now but they all smell fishy/of seaweed. I know now that Im supposed to rinse it but how do I determine the quality of a tea before ordering it? Is there any way to tell if its traditional made tea or high quality?
There is way too much fishy PuErh out there. Fishy PuErh comes from unwanted molds developing during the composting process and usually decrease with age and good storing. I would advise buying older Shu PuErh or higher quality tea that does not have this aroma. A good Shu PuErh should taste like a clean wet cavern, maybe with earthy, cellar/attic aroma but no (or very little) seaweed and no fishy smell.
Mei Leaf
thank you
buy 3kg first-class fresh puer cake each year and preserve them in a well-ventilated room. Each year you can test them to recognize the difference. About 5-7 years later you can enjoy them with full flavor. The price raise just like good wine.
Im drinking some at the moment and just thinking that!
msbabye87 I'm also)
Can you buy those online or you have to get it?
If the value of the tea comes from the age of the tea tree there will surely be many 1000 year old trees around
I see you're hanging at the begining what I gess it is a tea tree flower. Why is there no tea prepared from flowers? I've seen tea scented with ornamental camelia flowers, but why not to use the flowers of the same tea plant? It sounds easyer to sell "flower tea" than kukicha as "stems tea".
It is a quite nice taste and some people do sell or blend with the tea but it is nowhere near the taste of the leaves.
How'd you get behind the scenes access to the fields and the production floor? Is it some kind of special arrangement or can anyone arrange a trip like that?
We build strong relationships with the tea farmers and producers to learn their secrets! You could join a tea tour if you travel to Yunnan.
Pu erh oolong yamcha
why u put at Thai song in this video,hahhahaha
I am so jealous .
Wondering why the two brands of pu’er tea I have come out so much darker than the cup you brew at the end of the video?
My guess would likely be a difference in brewing times and maybe brewing temperature.
I thought the original recipe for Puer was lost during the cultural revolution?
Wait…I missed it. What mountain is he on?
+David Galvin We were on JingMai mountain
donmei8 Haha I know. I was only poking fun since he (you?) said it so many times. :)
Many more buds, not much more.
I have small pu'erh bullet cakes, I found them and had to have them. I have no idea how to brew them. Help?
These are probably Shu Tuo cha. The best way to brew them is put a whole pellet in your infuser and pour over with boiling water. Leave for 10 seconds and then throw the rinse away. Have a sniff of the leaves. Good quality Shu Tou should smell like autumn leaves and large wet caves, maybe a bit like your grandmother's attic or cellar. If it smells a bit funky and seaweed then it is probably a bit young (or not great quality) and we advise rinsing it more until that smell has disappeared almost completely. Then infuse (the cake should have disintegrated into a mulch of broken leaves). Download our brewing guide at chinalifeweb.com/guides/the-tea-brewing-chart/ and follow PuErh (ripe) as a starting point for brewing.
Kubar yapıyorlar
Plz use
"Picking is only permitted by ethnic minorities"
White man: "hold my beer"
Haha. But you probably already know he mean the ethnic minorities native to China
Thousand year old tea tree?
I’m always suspicious when someone in China tells you such and such is such age.
Unless they’re showing off how young their mistresses are.
Unfortunately with puerh tea, and the tree it’s from, it’s difficult to prove or disprove its age.
You couldn't do it all this mount
Interesting, what concerns me is the bacteria on the shoes of people, particularly when asian toilet floors are often covered in urine and fecal matter. How do I know, well I got infected this way. I wonder how infected this tea is.
idk man ... any soil on this earth is "probably hundreds of millions of years old" .... 🤣🥴🥴🥴