Like Picking Money from Trees II

To try to understand the problem better, let’s first consider what the ‘norm’ is in order to understand what over-picking is.

Methods of picking tea:

To cut a long story short, there are four basic methods of picking that vary according to whether the intention is to maintain or encourage growth, according to season and prevailing weather, and the condition of the tree.

Typical leaf formations that are picked are tip and one, two, three and even four leaves. The leaves that are left on the plant affect growth; anything from 3 or 4 older leaves to a ‘milk’ leaf can be left on the tree.

Also, the age of the tree and the intention of the tea farmer further determine how the farmer picks the tree;  whether they pick high or low, the outer or inner leaves, strong or gently.

See the notes at the bottom of the post for more detail

Here are images from Yunnan Cha Shu Zai Pei Ji Shu (云南茶树栽培技术) showing the basic approaches to tea picking. The fourth approach discussed below uses a combination of the the following methods. Puer tea uses the same approach though typically with Puer tea there has been less rigorous adherence to these standards with tip and four leaves not being uncommon.

 

Normal black and green tea picking standard

Normal black and green tea picking standard

image of picking the top out of a tea tree stem method - leaving more mature leaves further down the stem

Picking the tops out of the stem

Leaving a 'fish' leaf or 'milk' leaf on the tree

Leaving a ‘fish’ leaf or ‘milk’ leaf on the tree

Tree Age, Season and Picking Frequency

Tea trees are generally defined by three phases: young, mature and old. Tea plants in their prime have vigorous growth and can be picked several times a year. The picking encourages further growth so, in this way, productivity can be increased. Borrowing liberally from Yunnan Tea Cultivation Techniques:

A tree that has reached maturity is in its prime. It has many branches and its foliage is plentiful. It has a well developed root system and a strong capacity to transpire. Its ability to photosynthesise is strong. At this stage a tree is at the height of its productive cycle, producing plentiful, quality tea leaves. At this point it is important to maintain the trees abundant foliage. In this phase of the trees life the tree can be picked more lightly (i.e. leaving more leaves on the tree) in the spring, pick more strongly in the summer, and in the autumn leave ‘milk’ leaves on the tree.

To maintain the trees foliage density, spring picking should leave the ‘milk’ leaf, summer, leave one large leaf, and in the autumn again leave the ‘milk’ leaf. At the same time as paying attention to the trees condition, ‘leave fewer leaves higher in the tree, more leaves lower. Leave more leaves on the outside of the tree, fewer in the middle.

Once a tree has reached an old age, it’s growth is less vigorous, it’s ability to photosynthesise is no longer at its peak and the tree becomes weaker. The trees organic compounds are reduced. ‘Chicken feet‘ branches begin to appear in the crown of the tree and new growth is weaker. Branches begin to die. At this stage, picking should be stopped for one or two seasons to allow the tree time to recuperate…..

Typically, tea bushes are generally picked three times in the spring, again in the summer, and then again in the autumn. Occasionally, also in winter or very early spring.

Mature tea trees are typically not picked in the winter, but are still often picked two or three times in the spring and again in the summer and autumn.

When a tree reaches an old age, it is accepted practice to reduce the number of times it is picked. In this way, an older tree may be picked once or twice in the spring and then again in the autumn. Though summer picking is often considered necessary to promote an autumn harvest. Trees in their ‘N’ hundreds of years may well only produce leaves in the spring, so are only picked once.

Clearly, appropriate-picking must take into account the season and age of the tree in order to preserve tree health.

From Yunnan Cha Shu Zai Pei Ji Shu

1. The aim of this method is to encourage growth in the crown of a bush or tree. This is typically used when plants are only a few years old. In this method, a stem is left till it has 5 or 6 leaves on it, or until it stops growing further leaves, and then the tip and two or three leaves are picked, leaving 3 or 4 older leaves still on the plant. Each flush is picked one or two times in the same way – picking the upper leaves, leaving the lower to encourage the plant to branch and produce more profuse foliage in the crown.

2. The second method is a combined approach. In this method, trees are left to grow till they have tips and 3 or 4 leaves, or sometimes tips and 4 or 5 leaves before picking, at which point, tip and two or three leaf formations are picked, leaving one or two mature leaves on the tree. The aim is twofold: to encourage growth and to harvest tea. The decision to leave one or two leaves is determined by the season and the strength of the plant.

3. The third method is in Chinese referred to as ‘Leaving a fish’ method because the tea picker leaves a small leaf on the tree which perhaps looks like a small fish. It is also referred to as ‘liu nai ye’ – leaving a ‘milk leaf’ method. This is the principal method used in picking many kinds of tea. Generally, picking is done when there are new tip and one, two or three leaf formations. The small ‘milk leaf’ is left on the tree.

It is typical to pick a bush ‘clean’ as if this is not done it will influence the following flush.

4. The last approach is to pick ‘according to local conditions’. This is understood as ‘whichever leaves sprout first, pick first, whichever leaves sprout later, pick later’. i.e. ‘Pick those leaves that have reached the standard (e.g. tip & one, two or three leaves), those that have not reached the standard, leave till the next phase of picking, those that have already passed the standard, pick according to the standard.’ Superfluous leaves are left on the tree. In this way, the tree is picked clean and there is an even distribution of both young and older leaves and whilst suiting the requirements of the tea farmer, picking is determined by the trees age, rate of growth, season, etc. In this way a tree can be picked many times in a year.

Autumn Tea – Flowers, Nuts & Yue Guang Bai

Autumn is the time for tea flowers and nuts.

tea fowers and fruit on old tea tree

This is an ancient tea tree near Shi Tou zhai near the old Nan Nuo Shan Cha Chang.

On the way, I dropped in on a tea farmer we work with who had made some yue guang bai. Made, in this case, from old tea trees Yue Guang Bai is shade dried and does not undergo any other processing.

white moonlight - yue guang bai drying

An inescapable sweet fragrance fills the work area where the tea has been drying. The tea is a little more astringent than spring harvest, but the fragrance is fine and the broth sweet. There is a little hint of fermentation, probably related to the slight oxidation that inevitably occurs during drying. This could be more or less, depending on   the weather.

autumn yue guang bai broth

The spent leaves look a little like black tea as there is inevitably some oxidation in the drying process.

yue guang bai leaves after steeping

 

picking basket - summer tea -

Like Picking Money from Trees

Over-picking Puer tea

Periodically, there is some comment online about Puer tea and over-picking of tea trees, so I thought it would be interesting to explore this further, and try to tease (‘scuse the pun) out what exactly this means in practice, and what the effects and implications are. It’s also important to consider this in relation to the Puer tea market to understand how it too may be impacting tea cultivation practices.

The broad picture is that concerns about the quality of Puer tea are becoming more frequent, and the explanations typically include climate/drought, overpicking and the use of a range of methods that are aimed at increasing productivity.

There are a number of factors:

1. The last few springs have been particularly dry which has inevitably affected yield, if not flavour.

2. At least in recent history, prior to 2005, the majority of people in the Puer tea supply chain –  farmers down to customers – didn’t distinguish between old trees and bushes when picking tea. Old tree tea was not specially sought after so there was not the potential to over-pick and stress trees that there is now.

3.There is increasing demand for tea, with ever more people seeking a limited, and probably dwindling supply of old/ancient tree Puer.

4. Farmers have been using practices which, for them at least, are new – from turning the ground around tea trees to applying chemical fertilizers – in an attempt to increase yield. There are concerns about how these practices are impacting tea quality.

4. In recent years, methods of picking have:

a) had the propensity to disregard time honoured wisdom about tea tree cultivation, especially vis-a-vis the impact of weather.

b) been minimally influenced by research and understanding that has emerged and is recommended by tea colleges, universities and government organisations.

b) possibly fallen prey to the pressure of demand amidst a growing global market and big economic shifts for local farmers, many of whom previously lived subsistence lifestyles.

If we assume that inappropriate-picking, above all other factors, is having an adverse effect on tree health and tea quality, we should first consider what is ‘normal practice’ for tea picking, and specifically for old tea  trees.

 

 

Ban Zhang & Hekai Old Tea Trees

ma hou pao – 马后炮

A friend told me today of some news from Lao Ban Zhang and He Kai: “Ban Zhang and Hekai have decided not to pick summer tea.” It seems a little disingenuous since we’re already into the autumn tea season, but it’s a step in the right direction, as long as they haven’t changed their minds by next year. Or is it?

The issue of over-picking tea, particularly on old tea trees is important, and not that straightforward. There are some seemingly common misunderstandings about exactly what ‘over-picking’ implies.

Not picking summer tea, the least sought after/cheapest harvest of the year, is not going to suddenly make everything right if other issues aren’t addressed. Ban Zhang autumn gu shu is on the market at 1,500 yuan/kilo, so the cynic might say they can afford not to pick summer tea, but whilst it would have given trees a chance to recover a little had it happened, it won’t necessarily improve next spring’s harvest.

Over the next few posts, I hope to explore this issue further and try to get to a deeper understanding of what the issues are, and how they would best be resolved.

 

* ma hou pao, is an expression that translates as something like ‘Firing the artillery after the horses have charged.’ Rather like ‘shutting the door after the horse has bolted’.

 

Nan Nuo Shan Dian Hong

I  was in Nan Nuo Shan yesterday where a friend of mine gave me some da shu black tea to try.

Nan Nuo Shan has a history of tea making. When Nan Nuo Shan Tea Factory was set up in the late 1930’s, it produced black and green tea, and in its heyday was producing hundreds of tonnes of tea a year, mostly for export. Although they planted large areas of tea trees, initially they made black tea from the old tea trees on the mountain which was, by all accounts, very good.

Fu Hai tea factory was set up later, also in Nan Nuo Shan. My friend worked there as a young man and learned the skills of tea making. He later was employed to teach new apprentices and was one of the first farmers in recent history in Nan Nuo Shan to start making his own tea: prior to that, the custom was for farmers to pick tea and then take the fresh leaves to the factory. Because of this, many farmers at that time had limited experience of making their own tea.

But making black tea is becoming quite popular in Nan Nuo Shan. My friend had made a couple of different batches. One we drank at his home, the other I tasted in Jinghong.

nan nujo shan black tea

It’s not the most beautiful Dian Hong – as Dan San says, there would be more tips in bush tea, but the leaves are impressive. Most people making tea in Nan Nuo Shan ferment it quite lightly. This is a little more heavily fermented. The dry leaves are still quite fragrant, but the flavour is deeper, stronger, more full bodied than typical Nan Nuo black tea.

It’s got what I think of as that kind of peppery sweetness which seems to typify Yunnan Dian Hong. Some hints of caramel and spices whose names don’t come to mind. The flavour is quite robust and has both some bitterness and a little astringence. The broth has that classic bright, golden – orange colour, but deepens somewhat on later steepings.

nan nuo shan black tea old tree dian hong broth

I was expecting this tea to be slightly more fragrant than the one we tasted in Nan Nuo Shan, but it was not obviously so. Muted, elusive, perhaps some hint of flowers, so it’s sweetness is the thing that stays with you – lasting for quite some time.

The leaves after a few steepings. As one can see, this is still not very heavily oxidised. The leaves are still very much intact and a testimony to the trees they came from.

nan nuo shan black tea broth after a long steepingAfter steeping for several  minutes, the broth darkened somewhat. It has nice clarity and lustre.

By the way, the small beaker above is Thai celadon, made in Chiang Mai using an ash glaze. They specialise in tableware and produce this quite ‘costaud’ style which feels very comfortable in the hand and is pleasant to drink from.

There and Here – more on puer storage

After comparing two Bulang Peak teas whilst I was in the UK, I thought it might be interesting to bring some of the 2010, UK stored tea back to ‘Banna to compare with some of the same tea that has been stored here in Jinghong.

This therefore, is more an ‘apples with apples’ comparison than the one in the UK which was comparing a 2010 tea stored in the UK for 18 months with a 2011 tea that had been in Jinghong. This time we have the same tea, same batch.

bulang peak 2010 cakes

UK cake on left, 'Banna on the right

The first thing is that the difference between the teas is not that obvious. Looking at the colour of the cakes, the broth colour and the dregs, there is some difference to be detected, but it’s not that pronounced.

bulang peak 2010 uk stored cake detailbulang peak 2010 cake stored in JinghongThere is a slight difference in colour between the two cakes – most visible in the tips which are a little darker in the ‘Banna stored tea and in the slightly ‘greener’ hue to the UK stored cake. The top photo (right) is the UK stored cake, the lower one the ‘Banna stored tea. It’s not obvious in the photos here but the ‘Banna tea also looks a little richer, more moist than the UK stored cake, but perhaps I’m just imagining that.

The broth also produces marked difference – at least of the kind that I might have anticipated.

The broth from the first steepings of both teas looks pretty similar in tone.

I started using these two cups – the UK stored tea is on the left – but then realised my mistake as the shape of the cups and their translucency was affecting the appearance of the broth.

bulang peak spring 2010 broth

So I switched to two identical cups to see how the appearance of the broth was altered. I tried to steep the teas as close to simultaneously as I could in order to minimise any differences caused by oxidation of the broth and steeped the UK stored tea first, so that oxidation would not exaggerate any difference.

bulang zhi dian broth comparison

As can be seen in the photo above, there is no very obvious difference. Possibly the broth on the left (UK) is a mite lighter than the ‘Banna broth. Both are the third steeping.

Here is the broth from both teas after steeping for 5 minutes. This time the broth on the right (‘Banna) is more noticeably darker, but it’s still not much.

bulang peaks broth after five minutes steeping

The difference is most clear in the flavour – perhaps as one might have expected. The UK stored cake has kept more of its youthful floral/fruity notes and is very sweet. At the same time it is very slightly more astringent than the ‘Banna stored tea.

The ‘Banna stored tea has lost most of those fruit/floral notes and has started to show hints of something deeper, though as yet, no obvious chen wei. Both teas, when pushed, show a decent kuwei and both resolve quickly to produce a good huigan.

So is there a conclusion?

Of sorts, there is an interim one. It could be that the astringence in the UK stored cake is due to the fact that it has aged more slowly than the ‘Banna tea (and we have forgotten how it was when young) and that with further storage it will diminish. The other possibility, it seems, is that it has been influenced by the dryness of the UK conditions and this has produced the astringence. Only further storage time will tell.

bulang peak broth and dregs

 

 

Here and There – on Storage

I was recently in England for a few weeks and had gone with a little of last year’s spring tea tucked under my arm.

The previous time I had been in the UK was nearly 2 years earlier, and on that occasion I had also taken some tea which was spring tea from that year – 2010.

I had left a couple of cakes with a friend who had stored them in no particular way in his bedroom. I feared the tea would be nigh on ruined, so was pleasantly surprised to discover that it was actually quite decent.

I decided it would be interesting to compare a couple of cakes – a Bulang Peak from 2010 that had been in England since September 2010 (i.e. a 2 year old tea that has been in England for 20 months +) and a 2011 Bulang Peak that had been in Jinghong for a year. True, it wasn’t comparing like with like, but I thought it might prove interesting nonetheless.
bulang peak raw puer cskes - 2010 and 2011
I borrowed a camera to take a few photos -They don’t bear too much scrutiny, but give a reasonable impression as it was the comparison that I was interested in.
zhi zheng bulang peak 2010 spring puer cake
The first thing that was obvious was that the 2010 cake had aged quite well. It is clear from the photo that the leaves are darker.
zhi zheng tea shop bulang peak 2011 spring puer cake
The UK stored cake is slightly drier, which is not so easy to detect in the picture, but it has not dried out as much as I thought it might and the tea has a little chen wei. It has lost some astringence, has a nice fragrance and huigan. The wet leaves have some fruity-tobacco scents and the broth was an amber-orange.
bulang peak 2010 broth
I pushed the 4th steeping which produced a pleasant kuwei, but this was soon followed by a sweetness in the throat and mouth, and some fragrance floating up into the nose accompanied by a lingering bitterness on the upper palate.
bulang peak 2010 and 2011raw puer tea broth and leaves
The 2011 cake was somewhat similar as one might expect, but with more kuse, a lighter, more amber orange broth colour as well as a less distinct chenwei than the older cake.
bulang peak 2011 broth
So what seems interesting in this is that England, at least in the last couple of years, in my friends house, was not a bad environment for storing Puer. Of course, a longer storage time might bring out problems that are not so obvious now – the tea may dry out too much – but for now the result is not bad.

I’m quite sure that the tea kept in Jinghong has aged more quickly than the tea in England, that would be normal, but the UK stored tea compared well and highlights that the ‘Holy Grail’ of an ideal Puer aging environment might be worth striving for, of course, but may not be absolutely necessary. If one accepts that your tea is going to age more slowly, as the Bard of Oxford maintains, a cooler climate may work fine.

 

 

Humidity

There has been some stuff online in the last few months about Puer storage and humidity/temperature, so I thought it would be interesting to explore the issue a little. See the links at the bottom for reference.

The long dry spell here broke finally with a decent downpour. Prior to that, relative humidity (RH) had got as low as the fourties along with temperatures in the low thirties, which is exceptionally dry for Xishuangbanna.

Aini village long ba men - protective gate. Nan Nuo Shan

Since then, in the last couple of weeks, the temperature has seen highs of 35°C and a low of just above 24°C. The relative humidity has been as high as 84% and as low as 44%. The highs and lows of temperature and humidity don’t of course necessarily coincide in that way; within the broader context of seasonal fluctuations, typically (here at least) humidity tends to drop as daily temperatures rise. Sitting in the shop now, at around mid-day, it is 30°C and 68% humidity.

These short term fluctuations have little impact on the ageing process of Puer tea. More long term, seasonal conditions are what is important.

You only need to tout your temperature/humidity guage around a little to realise a few things:

The first thing that is clear is that making assumptions based on generic weather record figures – assuming they somehow reflect the temperature and humidity inside one’s house, shop, or whatever – is of little value. It gives no more than a broad idea of what might be happening.

In Jinghong, where I can live with all my windows and doors open maybe 360 days of the year, there is a difference in both temperature and humidity between the inside of my apartment and the balcony (outside in the shade), and there is a further difference in a room where I have a little tea stored, to which the door is shut most of the time.

Anyone living in a climate where they are not afforded the luxury of the near ‘al’fresco’ experience that we are here, would be wise not to assume that what happens to the weather outside the house reflects too closely what happens inside.

There is also a significant difference in Jinghong between the ground floor and say the 5th or 6th: Most people in Jinghong will tell you that the ideal storage for tea is between the 2nd and 4th floors. The ground floor may be too damp, the higher floors tend to be dry.

Secondly, as MarshalN has said, it’s of questionable use to consider relative humidity without talking about the thing that it’s relative to. i.e. temperature.

Absolute humidity is the expression in g/m3 of the maximum mass of vapourised water (moisture) that a given mass of air can hold at a given temperature. RH is an expression, in percent (%), of the ratio of actual humidity to the absolute humidity.

Some dim recollection of schoolboy chemistry tells me that the more heat a volume of air contains, the more energy it has, so the faster the molecules are moving around. i.e. they are less likely to condense out and the air can consequently hold more water.

To make a couple of comparisons:

Air with a temperature of 30°C and an RH value of 70% – fairly typical for Jinghong – contains more than two times more moisture (21.36g/m3) than air at 15°C 70% RH – fairly typical of northern Europe – with an actual humidity of 9g/m3. What this means is that with the example given here, a cake of Puer tea in Jinghong would be exposed to twice as much moisture as one in say, the south of England.

Pushing the humidity without increasing temperature is not going to resolve this difference. You need both to achieve a decent Puer ageing environment.

Another example might be to compare Jinghong with say, Nan Nuo Shan, where temperatures are a good 5 to 10 degrees lower, but humidity – there is often mist in the mornings – can be high. So tea that is stored by tea farmers in sacks in their houses can often end up with a musty smell and not infrequently, obvious mould if kept there for extended periods.

nan nuo shan long ba men detail

It seems like dew point is perhaps a more useful measurement of humidty:

Dew point is the temperature to which air would have to drop, for a given absolute humidity, for moisture to condense out – as rain, mist etc.

The dew point in our first example with 30°C and an RH value of 70% would be 24°C and for the second, 9°C. Both are quite feasible, but assume that the amount of moisture in the air would remain constant as the temperature dropped. This is perhaps not likley, but even so, dew point gives a better indication of how ‘wet’ it is than RH does. i.e. how close to the dew point air temperature is.

What this suggests is that on a day in say northern Europe, during which the RH is 70%, if the temperature fell from 15 to 9°C, water would condense out of the air and on to or into something – like your Puer tea.

long ba men - protective village gate nan nuo shan

The fact that that doesn’t happen (hopefully) is because your home is likely not as cold, or humid, as it is outside.

The other thing that is important, is written on every Puer cake wrapper, but few people seem to talk about is airflow. This does not mean a draught. But there is a big difference between 30°C and 80%RH with a little air circulation, and the same temperature and RH with no air circulation.

Half Dipper

MarshalN

Mcintosh Tea

Neighbourhood Watch

I was back in the Hekai area the other day with the guys from Cha Ye! We had dinner with the village head of Guang Gang, one of the villages that makes up He Kai.

He was explaining to me how their system of monitoring works to police the use of agro-chemicals. In 2010, the government designated seven villages in the He kai area: Ban Pen New and Old villages, Man Mai, Man Nong New and Old villages, Man Nuai and Guang Gang,(帮盆新寨,帮盆老寨,曼迈,曼弄新寨,曼弄老寨,曼囡,广冈), as having ancient tea tree gardens which must be preserved and no agro-chemicals used.

These villages together have 9,100 mu (亩), that’s just over 600 hectares, of ancient tea tree gardens.

If anyone identifies tea gardens that are being treated with agro-chemicals, the land will be taken away from the offender and given to the person who identified the transgression.

It’s certainly cannot be failsafe as there may well be people willing to collude or look the other way. At the same time, it sounds a little reminiscent of earlier times, but maybe it can work…

Tea with the Chens – From He Kai to Ge Deng

I have recently had cause to hang out with two different Chens – a Chinese name something akin to the English Smith. One in Hekai, on the edge of the Bulang Mountains, and the other from Guangdong who sources tea from the Six Famous Tea Mountains area.

Chen No1 is based in He Kai. I went up there a few weeks ago and then accompanied him to Lao Ban Zhang where he got 30 kg of fresh leaves. The cost of fresh tou chun leaves in Ban Zhang this year was anything from a little over 400 to over 600 RMB/kg, and this Spring, just over 4 kg of fresh leaves was making a kilo of mao cha.

We got back to his place with the tea around mid-day and spread it out to wilt for a while. He started frying tea later in the afternoon and continued till almost midnight, putting the tea out to dry the next morning, which is normal practice.

His sha qing approach is a little different from some tea makers as he tends to fry the tea for considerably longer than is typical, and then rolls it for a relatively short period of time. When tea is heaped in the pan during frying in the fashion described above, it is locally described as ‘dui de‘ or piled.

He Kai Chen left his tea to wilt for a fair time even though the weather’s very dry – although it had been raining a little at night when I was there – (one reason for wilting, apart from allowing the moisture content in the leaves to drop, is to allow it to even out, so that there is a more uniform amount of moisture throughout the leaf – from tip to stem. If this is not done, it’s easy to burn the leaves).

Typical tea frying woks in the Bulang Shan/Hekai/Ban Zhang area are set flat on a brick oven. Initially, the tea leaves are kept moving in the pan which must be done to stop the leaves from burning and to produce an even roast. As the tea is roasted, the heat is allowed to drop a little and the tea moved less. After frying for a while – maybe as much as 15 minutes – during which time the tea is turned and shaken out repeatedly (this allows some of the heat to disperse), the process slows down and the tea is turned and then piled in the centre of the wok and left for a minute or so. This process is repeated many times.

Chen Lao Ban then takes the tea out of the wok and leaves it on a tray for several minutes – again piled as opposed to spread out, which is the more common practice.

Making tea in this way, he then machine rolls it in an old electric roller with a wooden drum and tray, but only for a few minutes. The result is a tea that is very fragrant, has good body, with a light clear broth, little astringence and good hou yun.

When He Kai Chen makes tea completely by hand, as he did with some of the Ban Zhang tea, he does not follow this method, and has a more typical approach to frying and rolling.

Across the other side of Xishuangbanna, a few weeks later, I was in Ge Deng and bumped into another Chen. Chen Lao Ban is from Guangdong where he sells tea. He spends quite a lot of time in ‘Banna and has been sourcing/making tea in the Liu Da Cha Shan area for 5 or 6 years. He has set up a few small chu zhe suowhere he both processes fresh leaves and collects some mao cha.

Guangdong Chen has had a wok made according to his requirements: the wok is also set flat on the oven in a manner similar to Bulang Shan woks, but it’s a fair bit higher. One only has to fry tea for a few minutes in a wok in say, Nan Nuo Shan, to realise how important the height is! Most Aini people are relatively short, and build their ovens accordingly, so this can be back breaking for anyone taller.

His approach to tea making is almost as far from Hekai Chen’s as Ge Deng is from Hekai. The wilting time is probably about the same – somewhere between 3 and 5 hours, but his approach to sha qing is quite different. Tea Urchin referred to this style as ‘medium rare’. I like that description. I think a lot of people I know here would say it was ‘sha bu tou‘ – not fried enough, but Guangdong Chen (and lots of other people in Guangdong) seem to like tea with this kind of flavour; a little less smooth feeling in the mouth than is typical, a fair bit of astringency, and not much obvious fragrance; either in the leaf or the cup. And virtually none of the retro-olfactory aromas that He Kai Chen produces.

Chen Lao Ban says that when the tea is stored (in Guangdong), the astringence mellows, though I have to say, that in my (limited) experience of drinking tea in Guangdong, even after several years, tea is often still markedly ‘apre’. He Kai Chen also says his tea ages well. I have had some which was 3-4 years old which was reminiscent of a rather older tea; very smooth, good hou yunand a pleasant chen wei.

What is most interesting in all this is that Puer making methods, within a broader understanding of the process, can vary considerably. There is not necessarily any ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ way of doing things – and I suspect there never was – although it is easy to find people who will swear by one particular approach.