This recent blog posting by discipleoftheleaf on one of our teas – Bulang Peak 2010 seems to bring home, apart from the fine palate and descriptive skills of the author, the importance of good tea storage, and the quality of water used for steeping.

Each time we send out tea, we continue to emphasise the importance of giving tea time to acclimatise to a new environment – in my experience, this typically takes around 3 weeks. So it makes sense, if the tea has arrived from anywhere with a climate that is different from one’s own, to wait at least a couple of weeks before even bothering to try it. There is always a handful of people who can’t wait, or don’t think it matters. But it does. And I think this is particularly true of more nuanced teas.

The importance of water quality is also fundamental. There is an essential choice to be made; find teas that suit your water, or find water to suit your tea.

There’s not much point in using water with significant amounts of dissolved solids, and along with that, probably quite high alkalinity on a complex, fragrant, nuanced tea. If one is set on water with a higher pH, better to seek out teas that work with that kind of water. Younger teas seem more fickle than older Puers which, with age, are more robust and tolerant of a wider range of conditions.