Tag: tea

Tea. Lu’an Gua Pian

One of my favorite Chinese greens. A classic. And while I am mostly focused on Japanese green teas, this one made a comeback to my tea cabinet.

Purchased from Nannuoshan. 16 April 2023 harvest.

Origin: Qitoushan, Jinzhai, Lu’an, Anhui, China

Soft texture. Not the grassy notes of sencha, but instead more aromatic. Gentle, mineral, toasty — this I wouldn’t have guessed, but “toasty” is on point, as described on the site.

In winter, I prefer oolongs and blacks, but this green is just what is needed for a sunny day. Brings in thoughts of spring and warmth.

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Tea and meditation

“I meditate to be more productive” (or efficient, or focused) is like saying, “I drink green tea to fight possible dementia.” Possibly, reducing risks of getting dementia (or Alzheimer’s, or ) is one of the benefits of tea. But no one drinks green tea like this, as a medicine. Depending on your preferences and effort you want to put it, you can keep a stock of your basic sencha or hunt down more expensive limited harvest gyokuro or anything like that, and that’s going to be for something other than medical reasons. You’re someone who enjoys tea. Who values it for its own qualities, and not for the side effects. Surely, you can take your tea as medicine, but I doubt anyone actually does that.

Meditation is the same way. It’s because you believe that it’s the right path for you. Be that enlightenment or something else you’re seeking. Or maybe you’re there in your practice that you don’t seek anything, it is just the way you live your life. But it’s not a hack to stay organized in the things that are very far from everything that meditation stands for or is part of.

And yet, the author here is ready to contradict herself. Who can judge what the day is for someone else? Maybe someone starts off meditating as a therapeutic measure, and finds something more than that.

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Carrying my home with me

Monday morning. I’m looking at people on the street, in the middle of what I think is their daily routine. People getting their morning coffee. A young dad with a toddler in a stroller, very leisurely looking. A girl with a yoga mat heading to, or from, her (socially distanced, appropriate) practice. I feel joy with a pang of envy looking at them. The others’ outside tells me that they are enjoying their morning habits, while my inside asks me, “why haven’t taken your longboard with you so that you could practice during your lunch break?”

I’m a creature of habit. I find comfort in the things that are familiar. Love my routines. Love my comfort zone. It’s about something different than never pushing myself out of it — the longboard is one of the things I’m currently exploring, way beyond my comfort zone; and trust me, it is definitely uncomfortable when I can’t brake. Yet, I have to admit, the simple routines — knowing that now it’s time to get dressed and go, now you have time for reading and making yourself a cup of tea, and now you have to dive deep into work — this kind of familiarity is essential to me.

I think of my young daughter and how her behavior deteriorated on one weekend trip when she was three. We drove to Dresden, and gosh that was tough! She was never happy, always fighting with everything. Acting out, refusing to eat anything (but ice cream and chocolate, which “is not food”), saying (more like screaming) “NO” to everything we offer. Even the playgrounds didn’t help for long — on the pretence of lacking trampolines. Spoiled little brat, in other words… Then we get back home to Berlin, and — fingers crossed it lasts — the gremlin is gone and the girl is back into her more adequate self.
All the while, I have to question myself. This disobedience was likely not a sign of a poor upbringing, rudeness and obnoxiousness, but a response to the changed environment. Just a certain sensitivity and lack of control because she found herself in an unfamiliar place. The first thing she did when she got home? Played with all of her toys. Ah, the relaxation of being at home, surrounded by habitual things. No need to fight anymore.

For sure having the elements of one’s routines around is comforting. (That’s why, for example, I often take my tea set on my travels.) But also, finding joy and comfort in the things that you do often, looking forward to them in your habitual, daily life, is crucial. Especially emphasized by the lockdown, I suppose. Sometimes our response to the unknown is like the toned down version of a toddler temper tantrum. We can fight something just because our need to feel secure outweighs the curiosity of exploration. In such situations, having something familiar at your hands, a piece of your daily that you can resort to helps to ground you up in your day, and to deal with the “chaos” around you.

Some of such things that I have are:
1. Notebook. A physical notebook is good, and I often (but not always) carry it on me. If not, then notes — on phone or tablet. This is also a place to go to. Yet, recently I got a little notebook in addition to a bigger one, so that I can carry it around and use anytime I need a mind cleanse.
2. Tea. On trips, I prefer to have a small travel-sized teapot/cup combination with me, and a thermos tumbler to keep water hot. And one or two sorts of tea. This helps me to slow down when needed, and even in a hotel room, make a good cup of tea. When going on a long walk (an approximation of travel that we now can afford), normally there’s also some tea in the thermo bottle.
3. Music. I have to admit, I resort to reading more than to music lately. Yet, for as long as I can remember myself, from childhood, whenever I didn’t have access to music, I was starting to feel uncomfortable very quick.

I don’t know if there’s anything else that I need to make myself feel “at home” — meaning, peaceful and more of myself. But these for sure are my essentials. Doesn’t mean that I always have them with me or even if I do, I always use them. These are just a few hooks that I can use throughout the day to feel better.

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Tea: Japanese black: P&T Kyoto Red No 921

My Notes

2020/12/20

This is wakoucha, which literally translates as “red tea”. First time I’m tasting Japanese red (black) tea.

Astringency is low, the taste is very mild. I didn’t taste chocolate this time, but the earthy-woody-yet-smooth taste won over my heart. This is nothing like Indian Assam or Ceylon tea, the “blackness” is there, but also something very different, much milder and with a different aroma.

From P&T Site:

A rolled japanese black tea

A special and rare treat, Japanese “red tea”, or Wakoucha, is a form of black tea produced in small quantities using native cultivars. Compared to more familiar black tea varieties, Wakoucha is mellow, with little astringency, and some malty sweetness with hints of chocolate.

TASTING NOTES
chocolate, fresh pine, malty

Quantity: 2 tsp / 250 ml
Temperature: 90° C / 195° F
Time:
1st infusion 60 sec.
2nd infusion 40 sec.
3rd infusion 90 sec.

BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE
In a region famed for its green teas, its black teas are magnificent in their own right. As thus, we sought one of these teas for our latest limited harvest. Black teas hailing from this part of Japan are particularly recherché, a product of different cultivars than those found in India or China. These teas are known as Wakoucha. They typically maintain the earthy, sweet flair of black tea, while also retaining a delicate flavor with little astringency. The beauty of Wakoucha’s rolled leaves are second only to the resplendent amber colour they produce. To drink this tea is to experience hints of chocolate and woodyness with a sweet malty finish; exactly what you’d want from a high quality black tea.

Links

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Tea: Biluochun (Green Snail Spring)

My go-to tea is Japanese sencha, but I can’t deny the pull of Chinese greens.

This morning, I had biluochun (or pi lo chun), “green snail spring”, one of the well-known Chinese green teas. While enjoying the tea, I read about it, and here, I found a legend about the tea:

Pi Lo Chun originates in the Dongting Mountain region on Jiangsu province. These days, it is also grown in other parts of China, most notably Zhejiang and Sichuan provinces, but the ones from the Dongting area are by far the best. Biluochun from other regions has larger and less uniform leaves and a nuttier and fruitier flavor.

As mentioned, the name translates as Green Snail Spring, which refers to the shape and the early harvest time. But that wasn’t the original name. This tea was first called “scary fragrance”.

Legend has it that a tea picker carried some of the tea leaves between her breasts when she ran out of space in her basket and after a while, her body heat warmed the leaves and they began to emit a strong smell.

It was renamed to the much more pleasant current name during the Qing Dynasty. An emperor visited the area and loved the tea, but did not think the name was appropriate. He renamed it to the current “Green Snail Spring.”

Drinking tea is pleasure enough. But sipping from a cup, thinking of a story, something that might have happened or not, a long long time ago, even if the story contains tea carried around between the breasts, mixing with the heat and, I’m guessing, the sweat — I don’t really know if that’s supposed to be attractive or a tiny bit disgusting… Anyway, with a myth of its own attached to it, you drink age, you drink centuries, you drink tradition. A sudden awareness of where the tea was grown, the generations of cultivation it went through, transforms tea drinking into a cultural experience, giving you a sense of tradition and of the realm of the simple things that remain unchanged, and can be relied on as often as you need them.

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