3rd & 4th steeps:
I have been very surprised a the color of all of these steeps. None of them have been particularly dark in color. This is a big part of why I insist that sheng and shu really should be discussed as almost completely distinct teas, these days. Yes, initially, shu was an attempt at a short cut. But the results, even very high quality, long shelved results, are nothing like sheng. Good shu is amazing tea. But it doesn’t come close to replicating sheng in anyway way, and at this point we’re better served severing the mental connection and in the same way that you wouldn’t really compare Assam to Yunnan just because they are both “black” tea, we should stop thinking of shu as somehow the bastard step-child baby brother of sheng. Yes, they’re both pu-erh. But they fulfill radically different niche in my wants and desires when choosing a tea.
This particular sheng is fairly wooly while having enough age on it that you don’t feel like you’re being rubbed raw and bleeding by the rough edges. It is a tea that forces you to be present every time you sip it. There is no way to have this tea “in the background”. During a hectic day, this tea snaps you out of your wool gathering and says “STOP” and be awake for a moment.
By contrast, good shu does nearly the opposite. It buries your underground, slowly, quietly, softly, piling on fresh earth and old loam until the present couldn’t be further away. Shu is a cocoon.
(WE JUST FOUND OUR LOST DOG!!!!!)
OK forget tea. Back later.
People who liked this
Comments
Well said again….
What he said.
I don’t know why I keep preaching. A few weeks ago I saw someone make a comment about a sheng along the lines of “this is what shu is trying to imitate” and it really stuck in my craw. To suggest that the people who spend their lives crafting these teas are, at this point, simply seeking to imitate, rather than pursuing a craft in its own right struck me as extremely arrogant.
Maybe I read way too much into it.
I’ll try to go back to talking about wet stone and pine beams in a sun streak tomorrow.
You tell it like it is and I admire that.
Well said again….
What he said.
I don’t know why I keep preaching. A few weeks ago I saw someone make a comment about a sheng along the lines of “this is what shu is trying to imitate” and it really stuck in my craw. To suggest that the people who spend their lives crafting these teas are, at this point, simply seeking to imitate, rather than pursuing a craft in its own right struck me as extremely arrogant.
Maybe I read way too much into it.
I’ll try to go back to talking about wet stone and pine beams in a sun streak tomorrow.
You tell it like it is and I admire that.