The idea of a pumidor is simple. Create an enclosed space where conditions like relative humidity can be manipulated to better maintain and age pu’erh. In the west, this usually means creating an environment where the humidity is higher than the ambient conditions. Much of the western hemisphere west is a cold, and dry relative to pu-hotspots in east Asia. If Kunming is dry compared with places that pu’erh was traditionally exported and stored at, then a good chunk of the US is the desert. With the risk of the tea drying out or simply not evolving or maturing, it is no surprise that the western pu’erh world is filled with people trying to create artificial ways of aging. One such way is the pumidor, a riff on humidor, an airtight device for aging cigars. (more…)
Category: Tea Learning
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Pu’erh Home Storage — TeaDB James InBetweenIsode Episode #112
A non-drinking episode covering some topics of home storage. Basic ideas of storage, pumidors, and some dangers of storing pu’erh.
Further reading: Home Pumidor Survey, Kunming Storage
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How Dry is Kunming Storage & What Does That Mean For Western Home Storage?
“At least it’s not Kunming storage.”
“Stored in Kunming….. Maybe it’ll be ready in 50 years.”
-Anonymous Pu’erh HeadsKunming has developed a reputation as the whipping boy of storage locations. Anyone who’s sampled a tea aged in Kunming knows it’s way different and tea is much slower to change than something like dry Hong Kong storage. There’s a sizable group of pu’erh people who consider Kunming a pu’erh purgatory where tea neither ages nor dries out.. So let’s avoid Kunming and store all our pu’erh in Guangdong or Malaysia. Not so fast.. Yunnan itself certainly isn’t a desert, with places that are known to have decently hot and humid environments, such as Menghai County or Jinghong. Kunming is even described in the climate section of wikipedia as having a “mild climate”. So how dry is Kunming storage really? (more…)
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Extended Episode, YS 2004 Songpin, Gu Puer — TeaDB James InBetweenIsode Episode #111
An extended episode featuring a pair of Yunnan Sourcing wetter stored teas.
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Home Storage Pumidor Survey
Standard Chinese instructions for storing pu’erh: Store in a cool, dry, well-ventilated place.
How to eliminate all aroma, dry out your pu’erh, and/or stagnate the aging process in most areas of the west: Store in a cool, dry, well-ventilated place.Pu’erh storage for aging in the west is complex. This is largely due to two factors. (a) You’re probably a hobbyist and have enough pu’erh to horrify your relatives and significant other but not enough to fill an entire room. Pu’erh tends to do better in a high density of tea to space, which actually makes it easier for a vendor to store pu’erh. This holds less true if you are indeed a maniac with a room of cakes (#lifegoals). (b) The second problem is the considerably drier climates in Europe and North America. Kunming has a reputation as a pu’erh purgatory, but a good chunk of the west is even drier than Kunming, not to mention Taiwan or Hong Kong. As a result, many people have resorted to DIY storage solutions to combat these. I’ve been chatting with a number of people that have been storing some quantities of pu’erh since 2007-2008 in the effort to research some of the earlier efforts of hobbyists home storing pu’erh. (more…)
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Blind Spots (in the Western Market)
The west is a tiny blimp in the Chinese specialty tea market. Having had the experience of traveling and shopped for tea in Taiwan and Hong Kong it gives me some idea of how the market looks in parts of east Asia where tea culture is strong. There are some teas where the west does generally well and gives some access to. There are others where we have to pay a bit more and have limited access. And then there’s blind spots where the market where what we have access to is a pale shell of the real deal. (more…)
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Practical Brewing Nuances
There’s quite a bit to take into account when brewing. Most of us figure out how they work in our setup and fall into routines that eventually get filed away into muscle memory.. It can take being removed from our familiar home setups for us to really think and utilize improvisational gong-fu skills to bring the most out of a tea. Maybe, you’re used to serving one or two and are suddenly brewing for eight, or you don’t know exactly how much leaf you have or are using an unfamiliar pot. There’s an infinite number of important and less important factors to consider when brewing tea.. Knowing these factors and how they interact with the finished product are not only important for your own gong-fu but important when evaluating a tea, where you might not be brewing but are observing and drinking in order to make a purchasing decision. (more…)
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Extending a Session — TeaDB James InBetweenIsode Episode #102
This episode, James talks about different ways to extend a session to get the most out of your best teas. Tea featured is 2007 Yangqing Hao Qizhong.
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Wistaria Pu’erh Mini-Report [April/May 2016]
Wistaria (website) is an iconic, Taipei teahouse. The building itself is nearly 100 years old and lived through its share of history. As a teahouse, Wistaria and it’s proprietor (Zhou Yu) have played an important role in the development of modern chayi (tea art) and tea culture in Taiwan. For tea folks or people traveling to Taiwan looking for a tea experience, it’s usually one of the first places on the list. The tea menu is a mix of Taiwanese tea, older teas, green tea, pu’erh, etc. It’s also relatively English friendly with an English menu and a conversationally fluent staff. (more…)
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Ripe Pu’erh Learning & Basics [Episode 170]
This episode covers the basics of ripe pu’erh and how to brew it and get started on this very diverse category of tea. Teas included are the 2014 Yunnan Sourcing Year of the Horse Ripe and a 1990s HK-Stored ripe.