gurdymonkey | Today's tea: Duoyi Gushu Sheng Puer

The second of the two puer samples Jade sent, also from West China Tea in Yunnan.

5g/100ml @ 200F (package recommmended 205, but my kettle goes from 200 to full boil and I figured slightly cooler was the direction to err in. First steep 3-6 seconds.

Jade's notes say "Gushu means harvested from older trees versus cultivated tea trees. This is a mild puerh w/typical puerh notes."

This one had a smoky aroma and flavor, not unlike Lapsang Souchang, but subtler. Flavor is earthy, but not heavy, mineral aftertaste. Another nice sippin' tea with the mean temperature of the living room around 65 F during the day.

https://westchinatea.com/10g-2018-gu-shu-duoyi-village-sheng-puer/

These two puers have definitely made me much more willing to try this style of tea in the future, though I still like the oolongs a lot.

In other news, I tried this one in the gaiwan today and managed a one handed pour without burning my fingers or slopping it all over the counter. I must not allow myself to get tempted by tea wares. I already have a ridiculous number of chawan and not enough space to store them. The little $4 Daiso kyusu and the gaiwan are flavor neutral brewing pots, my unglazed tokoname tanuki pot can be my dedicated sencha pot. I HAVE ENOUGH TEAWARE. STOP THE MADNESS. STEP AWAY FROM EBAY.

As I look at the list, I have three Anxi oolongs from Fujian, a Yunnan black tea called Wu Liang Hong Mao, plus three more of the Obobu sencha samples left in the box.

Because of the pandemic, most Japanese companies are not shipping their products to the United States. Between that and shipping costs, I've been looking at internet sources already in the US, and was wanting to get some fresh sencha and houjicha. So when I discovered that Ippodo of Kyoto had a New York based location, I placed an order for a 100g bag of each. Between that and the three 25g packets of oolong from Yunnan Sourcing, I should be able to hold the fort through the winter and then some. It's just too soon for a tea shop crawl while Covid rampages.

In other news, I found some old Assam and Lapsang in tins that I think I bought at Llasa Karnak* in Berkeley - they have to be several years old. While tea stored dry and air tight is still drinkable, it's not necessarily fresh. I brewed up the Assam this morning and it was not bad but not at it's best. I might just cold brew the rest and drink it as iced tea. Haven't tried the LS. *Knowing now what I didn't know then, their teas may not be as fresh as they could be. Having some hippie chick with a 2 gallon glass jar and a scoop put your herbs and teas into little paper bags is as Berkeley AF, but who knows how long that stuff has been sitting there? This also reminds me to check the box in the back of the truck for leftover teas and see if they need to be tossed. Once the pandemic is over and the House of Cheerful Monkeys threatens to host a tea tasting, then I can put some fresh(er) tea in tins for the occasion.