Tea Shop

NEW! 2011 Pu-erh Tea Cake Now in Stock
Now available!  The 2011 version of the most famous tea cake in the world.  Experts say that a experiencing a pu-erh take is like tasting a fine aged wine.  We agree!  Try our tea cakes and you won't go back to bagged loose tea again!  We guarentee it!

Pu-erh, Pu'er tea, Puer tea or Bolay tea is a type of tea made from a "large leaf" variety of the tea plant Camellia sinensis and named after Pu'er county near Simao, Yunnan, China.

Pu-erh tea can be purchased as either raw/green (sheng) or ripened/cooked (shu), depending on processing method or aging. Sheng pu-erh can be roughly classified on the tea oxidation scale as a green tea, and the shou or aged-green variants as post-fermented tea. The fact that pu-erh tea fits in more than one tea type does pose some problems for classification. For this reason, the "green tea" aspect of pu-erh is sometimes ignored, and the tea is regarded solely as a post-fermented product.

Unlike other teas that should ideally be consumed shortly after production, pu-erh can be drunk immediately or aged for many years; pu-erh teas are often now classified by year and region of production much like wine vintages.

While there are many counterfeit pu-erhs on the market and real aged pu-erh is difficult to find and identify, it is still possible to find pu-erh that is 10 to 50 years old, as well as a few from the late Qing dynasty. Indeed, tea connoisseurs and speculators are willing to pay high prices for older pu-erh, upwards of thousands of dollars per cake.

Pu-erh tea is available as loose leaf or as cakes of compacted tea.

The Chinese Tea Ceremony

The art of drinking and serving tea plays a major cultural role in China. It inspires poetry and songs. Mutual love of tea cements lifelong friendships. For centuries, the ritual of preparing and serving tea has held a special place in the hearts and minds of Chinese aristocracy, court officials, intellectuals and poets.

The Chinese tea ceremony emphasizes the tea, rather than the ceremony -- what the tea tastes like, smells like, and how one tea tastes compared to the previous tea, or in successive rounds of drinking. Ceremony doesn't mean that each server will perform the ritual the same way; it is not related to religion. Each step is meant to be a sensory exploration and appreciation.

Most teas used in the Chinese tea ceremony are grown in the mountains of Taiwan at around 4,000 feet. These teas are particularly refined, such as oolong teas which are lightly fermented and red teas that can be moderately to heavily fermented.

This style of tea-drinking uses small cups to match the small, unglazed clay teapots; each cup is just large enough to hold about two small swallows of tea. These tiny cups are particularly popular in Fujian and Chiujao, in southern coastal China above Canton. In Shanghai and Beijing they use large cups.

To Brew Tea Chinese-style

After heating water to boiling, the teapot first is rinsed with hot water. Using chopsticks or a bamboo tea scoop, fill teapot approximately 1/3 full with tea leaves and then pour boiling water into the pot. Hold the teapot over a large bowl, letting the overflow run into the bowl. Give the tea leaves a rinse by filling the pot half full with hot water, then draining the water out immediately, leaving only the soaked tea leaves. Now fill the pot to the top with more hot water, cover and pour additional water over the teapot resting in the tea bowl. Do not allow bubbles to form in the pot. When mixed with the tea, bubbles form a foam that is not aesthetically pleasing. Be sure to not let the tea steep too long; the first infusion should be steeped for only 30 seconds. In less than a minute, pour the tea into the cups by moving the teapot around in a continual motion over the cups so that they are filled together. Each cup should taste exactly the same.

After steeping, the tea can be poured into a second teapot or tea pitcher to be served at leisure. More water can be added to the teapot, and up to five infusions typically can be made from the same tea leaves. Be sure to add 10 more seconds for the second brewing and 15 additional seconds thereafter.

Each pot of tea serves three to four rounds and up to five or six, depending on the tea and the server. The goal is that each round tastes the same as the first. Creating consistent flavor is where the mastery of the server is seen.

The Importance of Water

The water used in the tea ceremony is as important as the tea itself. Chlorine and fluoride in tap water should be filtered out as they harm the flavor of the tea. Distilled water makes flat tea and should be avoided. High mineral content in the water brings out the richness and sweetness of green tea. Black teas taste better when made with water containing less Volvic. Ideal tea water should have an alkaline pH around 7.9.

Green teas are ruined by boiling water; the temperature is best around 170-185 degrees F. Oolongs made with under boiled water are more fragrant, which enhances the tea-drinking experience.

"Tea":  What's in a Name?

Is it Chinese?

Or is it from other Language?

"CHA", "TAY", "TEA" 

In Chinese dialects, pronunciation of "tea" is divided into two classes based on phonetic similarity. In mandarin, "tea" is "CHA"; in XiaMenese (FuJian province), "tea" is "TAY".

CHA and TAY had different time and route spreading out to the rest of the world.

It dated back to the 5th century that CHA went beyond the Chinese border. Japanese simply use the Chinese character of tea (see insert on right) for tea. In Persia, tea was CHA and then later evolved into CHAI in Arabic, CHAY in Turkish and CHAI in Russian. Tea was also brought to India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, and Bangladesh where it's called CHA.

TAY started spreading later than CHA but had reached much further than CHA did. Near the end of the Ming Dynasty, AD 1644, British merchants set up trading posts in XiaMen and came into contact with Chinese tea. What the XiaMen people called TAY, the British spelled as TEA. "Tea" then later has become wildly accepted by the English-speaking world. The French THE and German TEE are also decedents of TAY.