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Vickie Tseng | all galleries >> Galleries >> Teapot Set > Pu-erh Tea
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01-JAN-2013 Vickie Tseng

Pu-erh Tea

Cha For Tea Fuxing Store Taipei

The manager Lee of Cha For Tea showed and narrated their precious Pu-erh Tea to me, I think it looks like the chocolate with nuts.

Pu-erh tea, also spelled as Pu'er tea is a variety of post-fermented tea, specifically Dark tea, produced in Yunnan province, China. Post-fermentation is a tea production style in which the tea leaves undergo a microbial fermentation process after they are dried and rolled.[4] This is a Chinese specialty and is sometimes referred to as dark, or black tea (this type of tea is completely different from what in West is known as "black tea", which in China is called "red tea"). There are a few different provinces, each with a few regions, producing dark teas of different varieties. Those produced in Yunnan are generally named Pu'er, referring to the name of Pu'er county which used to be a trading post for dark tea during imperial China.
Pu'er is available as loose leaf or in various compressed forms as a tea brick. There is also the differentiation of ripened (shou) and raw (sheng) types. The shou type refers to those varieties that have gone through an accelerated post-fermentation process, while the sheng types are those in the process of gradual darkening through exposure to the environmental elements. Certain selections from either type can be stored for maturity before consumption. That is why some are labelled with year and region of production.
Darkening tea leaves to trade with ethnic groups at the borders has a long history in China. These crude teas were of various origins and were meant to be low cost. Darkened tea is still the major beverage for the ethnic groups in the southwestern borders and, until the early 1990s, was the third major tea category produced by China mainly for this market segment.
There had been no standardized processing for the darkening of pu'er tea until the postwar years in the 1950s, where there was a sudden surge in demand in Hong Kong, because of the concentration of refugees from the mainland. In the 1970s, the improved process was taken back to Yunnan for further development, which has resulted in the various production styles today.
In recent decades, it has become more common for the crude tea to be sold as a finished product before it is darkened. This is called sheng cha, or "raw tea". The tea leaves are supposed to be darkened gradually through exposure to environmental elements during storage. The truly post-fermented type has thus been given a relative name, shu cha, or "ripened" tea. Whether sheng cha or shu cha, appropriate selections of pu'er can mature to acquire improved taste. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pu-erh_tea

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Tom LeRoy05-Jan-2013 17:37
Excellent details on the beautiful tea pot and so much to learn from the included information. V
Sheila05-Jan-2013 03:40
What a beautiful vessel.
Great phone shot, Vickie.
woody3405-Jan-2013 00:15
Lovely capture of this beautiful bowl...I can almost smell the tea..V
Stephanie04-Jan-2013 22:51
Great info and image Vickie! V
Guest 04-Jan-2013 21:27
speckled pot. great colors with the light blue ideograms
joseantonio04-Jan-2013 17:37
Amazing capture made lovely by your additional data...V.
Nestor Derkach04-Jan-2013 17:28
Vickie you Apple sure does treat you right .
Excellent image and a lovely tea storage and most excellent information .
Vote
Walter Otto Koenig04-Jan-2013 15:56
Very nice photograph of this beautiful pot. Very interesting information. Thank you. "V"
danad04-Jan-2013 15:54
A very fine composition for showing this precious tea. V.