Section Three
Brewing of Pu’er Tea
I. Brewing Pu’er Tea with a Purple Clay Teapot
Take the brewing process of Product No. 7542 (Batch 1701) as an example.
(1) Tea set preparation and choice of water
Prepare a purple clay teapot, a “fairness” cup, a tea filter, teacups, a tea-leaf holder, a tea tray, a bucket for holding used water, an electric kettle, and a chadao toolkit. Local purified water recommended.
(2) Weighing of tea leaves to be used
Weigh and take eight grams of tea leaves (quantity may be adjusted based on personal preference, ratio of tea leaves to water about 1:20).
(3) Warming and cleaning the tea set
Use boiled water to warm and clean all utensils used to brew tea. This will not only serve the purpose of re-cleaning the utensils but will also help diffuse the tea leaves’ aroma.
(4) Putting tea leaves into the teapot
Observe the appearance of the tea leaves.
(1) Waking up the tea leaves
Brew the tea leaves with boiling water before quickly draining it. This step is meant to wake up the tea leaves and bring out their best.
(2) Injecting water into the teapot
Inject water at regular intervals, avoid injecting water at highpoint and maintain the right water temperature.
(3) Watering the teapot
Water the teapot with hot water to warm it up so that the aroma of the tea can spread better.
(4) Pouring out the tea soup
Brew the tea leaves for five to eight seconds before pouring the tea soup out to serve. Increase the brewing time appropriately after three brews.
Serve the brewed tea in separate cups in equal portions.
(10) Tasting the tea
Take three sips to taste the tea and avoid getting scalded.
TAETEA’s Tips
(1) Teapot for exclusive use
Because purple clay teapots feature strong absorptivity and tight sealing, we suggest one purple clay teapot be used to brew the same type of tea.
(2) Waking up the tea leaves
We suggest spending 5 to 10 seconds to wake up the essences of the tea leaves.
(3) Water temperature and methods of water injection
We suggest that boiled water be used to brew unfermented Pu’er tea in consideration of the tea’s degree of compression and durability. We further suggest that hot water be injected from a low point to better maintain the heat of the soup.
(4) Immersion time
To be determined based on the tea’s durability of immersion and other properties.
II. Brewing method involving use of lidded bowl
Taking the brewing process of Product No. 7572 (Batch 1701) as an example.
(1) Tea set preparation and choice of water
Prepare a TAETEA lidded bowl, a “fairness” cup, teacups, a tea-leaf holder, a tea tray, a teapot holder and a bucket for used water. Local purified water recommended.
(2) Weighing of tea leaves to be used
Weigh and take eight grams of tea leaves (quantity may be adjusted based on size of the lidded bowl, ratio of tea leaves to water about 1:20).
(3) Warming and cleaning up the tea set
This will not only serve the purpose of re-cleaning the utensils but will also help diffuse the tea leaves’ aroma.
(4) Putting tea leaves into the teapot
Observe the external features of the tea leaves.
(5) Waking up the tea leaves
Brew the tea leaves for about 5 seconds with boiling water before draining out the brew. This will help wake up the tea leaves and bring out their best.
(6) Injecting water into the tea pot
Inject water at regular intervals, avoid injecting water from a highpoint and maintain the right water temperature.
(7) Pouring out the tea soup
Brew the tea leaves for about five seconds before pouring the tea out to serve. Increase the brewing time appropriately after three brews.
(8) Serving
Serve the brewed tea in separate cups in equal portions.
(9) Tasting the tea
Take three sips to taste the tea and take care not to get scalded.
TAETEA’s Tips
1. When using the dry brewing method, heed must be taken to keep the table clean and tidy. This requires that the person brewing the tea be skillful enough to avoid splashing the tea soup.
2. Since the boiling point of water differs with regions of different elevations, we suggest that brewing time be appropriately prolonged in regions where the water temperature cannot reach 100°C.
3. Once the tea soup is poured into the bowl, the lid should be removed in time to avoid further braising the tea leaves.
4. The tea’s brewing durability is determined by the nature of the tea involved.
This is the method of directly boiling the tea leaves with water in certain utensils, which was the most common teamaking method used before Tang Dynasty. Today, we typically boil in water aged, unfermented Pu’er tea and fermented Pu’er tea of high brew durability to maximize leached tea soup and nutrients. Tea leaves are better off brewed in boiling water, and for better control of the thickness of the tea, the quantity of tea leaves used should not be overabundant. The boiling time of the tea is suggested not to exceed two hours (counting from the first serving of tea soup). On one hand, long-term soaking and boiling can cause the tea leaves to leach out substances that are hard to extract otherwise and hence change the flavor and mouthfeel of the tea soup. On the other hand, it can increase the tea soup’s acidity and cause some relatively insoluble salts such as calcium salt, cupric salt, and ferric salt to get into the tea soup and affect its quality.
Take the boiling of Laochatou as an example.
(1) Preparing tea utensils
Prepare a teakettle, an alcohol burner, a fairness cup, teacups, and a tea holder.
(2) Putting tea leaves into the teakettle
After brewing the Laochatou ten times, put the tea leaves in the teakettle, add water, and boil it.
(3) Pouring the tea soup into the fairness cup
After the water reaches the boiling point, pour the tea soup into the fairness cup.
(4) Serving the tea soup
Pour thetea soup into teacups in equal portions.
(5) Enjoying the tea
Take three sips to taste and take care not to get scalded
TAETEA’s Tips
1. Follow safety procedures when using the alcohol burner. When the teakettle is boiling, stay away from its spout to avoid getting scalded.
2. Do not put in too many tea leaves lest the tea soup becomes excessively strong. Generally, the ratio of tea leaves to water should be 1:50 (10 grams of tea leaves for every 500 ml of water).
3. Tea leaves should be awakened once or twice before getting boiled, to obtain the best mouthfeel.
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