The Shou/Ripened/Cooked Puerh process was originally created as an attempt to imitate the effect of long aging on Raw Puerh tea cakes. While, instead, they mostly created the new class of Puerh, Ripe.
With Riparian White2Tea has returned to those roots of attempting to imitate the character of long aged Puerh with an experimental blend of semi-aged raw puerh and lighter ferment ripe puerh. Still very freshly pressed, it's already almost convincing in the color and early steeps. Later steeps are a bit thin, but It will be interesting to see what shape Riparian settles into in a year or two.
Song Luo Cha green tea is an historically significant tea from Anhui Province. This example is from the MyTea Pal Club. Light flavor, slight (not unpleasant) bitterness if you oversteep, zippy energy.
For International Tea Day, my Green Tea Chemistry print. This linocut illustrates green tea and its chemistry. There's a tea pot, two cups of tea and a tea plant (Camellia sinensis) on a tray, and in the steam, you can see some of the organic chemicals found in green tea. Up to 27% of the composition of green tea can be a member of the flavonoids called catechins like the molecule illustrated on the right. 🧵1/n
#tea#greenTea#chemistry#linocut#sciart#printmaking#InternationalTeaDay
Cool, my home nitro drink machine finally arrived. Gonna experiment making nitrogen-infused drinks, especially teas over the weekend, I guess. Gotta dismantle and wash all the parts thoroughly first.
2020 Imperial Pure Bud Yunnan Black Tea of Simao from Yunnan Sourcing. I actually like this tea a lot more 4 years out than when I first got it. Not that it has developed in any meaningful way, like Puerh might, mostly it has just mellowed.
Ever tried a chai latte from Starbucks? Years ago, I did, and then I got obsessed. After some searching, I finally found a way to recreate it at home. Here's my recipe: 20ml Monin Syrup Chai tea + 200ml Vanilla Oat Milk. Voila! Homemade perfection. #photooftheday#photo#photography#tea
Xiaguan 2003 Cang'er raw puerh. I would call this a pretty typical upper middle Xiaguan aged raw puerh. Rock-like compression, light smoke, umami, and forest floor; well integrated flavors. Via Liquid Proust, I don't remember any details they might have provided about storage, but seems dry-ish considering age.
That thing, where it is early in the morning, you've fixed your breakfast of a single packet of instant oatmeal and dry wheat toast, you've added the boiling water to the oatmeal, poured a mug of water with Earl Grey to steep, you eat the toast to allow the hot water in the oatmeal to expand a bit, you start eating the oatmeal, and then BAM. You didn't stir the oatmeal enough so halfway through you get all of the sugar added to the packet in one bite and your world is UPSIDE DOWN.
That will wake you up much quicker than the Earl Grey could ever hope for.
2024 Meng Ding Mao Feng green tea from MyTeaPal club. This is the Sichuan Mao Feng, the other was from Guizhou. This one is an earlier pick than the other and it shows in the cleaner, sweeter flavors/scents of the tea. They're both great green teas, but if I picked one to drink more of, I'd probably pick the Mei Tan Mao Feng from Guizhou.
If you like #Tea, I think the teaware at Yunnan Sourcing is one of the best you can do without getting into super high end stuff. Most Chinese teaware for the Western market has a very high markup. This one is reasonable.
I read Chinese and can technically buy this stuff direct but I prefer their curation and service
When I complemented the proprietor of MyTeaPal on their 2024 Mei Tan Mao Feng they said, "For the two Mao Feng teas, the picking grade is lower than the other two teas, but having more leaves makes the flavor more rich. I can see why that's the case for a puerh drinker like you." Which, I dunno, is that a bit of a slam? Heh, well, it is true, I like richer flavored green teas...
Bada Manle black tea. This is a sun dried, hand processed Yunnan red tea grown in the Menghai region, very close to the Myanmar border. Bit of a spicy undercurrent to this one, with notes of dried fruit and honey.
This is the kind of tea that gets better with age, like a year or two. But will I be able to hold on to it long enough to enjoy it in a year or more? I only got 3kg and last year I went through 2kg.