This is Part 3 of the Wuyi Cliff Tea Series. Read Wuyi Cliff Tea Part 1 and Wuyi Cliff Tea Part 2 – Complexities here. It all started with a canister of tea (containing 75 grams) in a hand-beatened/hammered tin container. Tea leaves enclosed in calligraphy rice paper, sealed with a sticker with an image… [Read More…]
Tea
Wuyi Cliff Tea Part 2 – Complexities
This is Part 2 of a series on Wuyi Cliff Tea. Read Wuyi Cliff Tea Part 1 and Wuyi Cliff Tea Part 3 – A Tea Maker that cannot be helped. Why and How is Wuyi Tea “complex” today? It is hard to summarize everything into a single sentence, but I’ll let the photos take you… [Read More…]
Wuyi Cliff Tea Part 1
This is Part 1 of a series on Wuyi Cliff Tea. Read about Wuyi Cliff Tea Part 2 – Complexities and Wuyi Cliff Tea Part 3 – A Tea Maker that cannot be helped. There are 36 peaks at the Wuyi Mountains, and 99 valleys are formed by these 36 peaks. Running through this, is… [Read More…]
Traditional Dong Ding Oolong & the KZ Tea Experiment
A super long over due article! But mainly because I was waiting for survey results/replies from people. Many months ago, I held a free tea sample give away, a sample set that consists of 4 teas, 5 grams each, sent out at no cost to the recipients, only with the request that they fill in… [Read More…]
Installing Teapot filters
Oops, another hiatus in writing. Had been caught up in much work and was also away on a trip to Taiwan. As I should be re-starting to warm myself up by writing more posts.. I thought I would start with a simple, but important subject, installing filters in tea pots. To proper tea drinkers, and people… [Read More…]
Patina development of Yixing pots
Every yixing pot collector probably would have heard of the legend of seasoning yixing pots, that the longer you use it, one day, by just adding hot water to the pot, you can get tea! It is a myth and a huge misconception, partially due to poor translations of chinese texts. The original historical phrase… [Read More…]
Bad incense or tea day
Recently I came upon a post from someone on a forum that he had a bad tea day despite having followed the exact same procedures in the preparation, from the water quality, to the boiling, to the pot, to the quantity of tea leaves in weight, same steep duration etc, and the tea was not… [Read More…]
How the Structure of Water affects tea
We all know that the dissolved ions in water, i.e. iron, sodium, potassium, chlorides, carbonates etc affect the taste of the water. But apart from the usual chemical composition of water, there’s another lesser discussed aspect that also affect water and its taste, the physical structure of water! Water’s chemical formula is H2O, which means… [Read More…]
Wabi Sabi and the concept of Wu Wei
I was inspired to write this article when I had the fortune of viewing, and handling a 供春 “Gong Chun” Yixing pot made by Jiang An Qing (1920s). No pictures though, in respect of the owner’s preferences. Amongst the opinions of high end Yixing collectors in the world, no one could make a Gong Chun… [Read More…]
Chaozhou Gongfu Tea Brewing Method
This is the fourth article of the Methods of Tea Brewing series. Teochew Nang, Ka Ki Nang, Pah Si Boh Xiang Gang! 潮州人，家己人, 打死不相干. Its a funny greeting but if you are of Chaozhou heritage use it whenever you encounter a stranger from Chaozhou, there’s this immediate bond forged, a sense of good will and friendship. The phrase… [Read More…]