/kloc-More than 0/000 years ago, a small amount of Pu 'er tea was exported to Tubo (Tibet) and gradually became a greasy daily necessities for ethnic minorities, mainly cheese and meat. Therefore, there are "three days without eating and one day without drinking tea" and "one day without Chaze's diarrhea and three days without Chaze's disease". In order to buy war horses at a low price, the rulers of past dynasties strictly controlled the tea trade and indirectly controlled and governed the border areas by exchanging tea for horses. Therefore, tea has become a tight commodity, and the cultivation, processing and trade of Pu 'er tea have developed unprecedentedly. In the ninth year of Qing Qianlong, Pu 'er tea became famous all over the world because it was designated as "tribute tea". Even the famous works such as Dream of Red Mansions, Compendium of Materia Medica and War and Peace included the name of Pu 'er tea.
As the hometown of tea, Pu 'er not only has the most primitive wild tea trees, but more importantly, in the long historical years, Pu 'er has gradually formed a unique style in tea planting, processing and tea quality testing, and evolved a dazzling and varied tea culture.
After research and development in recent years, Pu 'er people have endowed Pu 'er tea with more and deeper connotations. Nowadays, Pu 'er tea is no longer a simple thirst-quenching drink. Want to know more about today's Pu 'er tea, its efficacy, or some ancient tea-horse roads full of tea rhyme, please go to Pu 'er!
I. Classification by tree species
wayside pavilion
bush
Second, according to the classification method
Raw tea
Cooked tea
Three, according to the storage method of classification
1. Dry storage of Pu 'er tea: refers to storage in a ventilated warehouse, so that the tea leaves are naturally fermented and aged for 10-20 years.
2. Wet-stored Pu 'er tea: It is generally placed in a place with high humidity, such as a basement cellar, to speed up its fermentation. It has stale mud or musty smell, and the aging speed is faster than that of dried Pu 'er. 5- 10 years is better. Pu 'er tea is classified by tree species.
1. arbor: the leaves of arbor are mainly used as tea cyanine, with large leaves, which was called Dashu tea in ancient times.
2. Shrub: Shrub leaves are mainly used as tea seeds, with small leaves, which are common dwarf tea varieties, now called lobular tea.
Introduce by appearance classification
According to different shapes, Pu 'er tea can be subdivided into the following categories-
1. cake tea: steamed into a flat plate, a bit like pie or pizza. In ancient times, most of the six tea mountains were pressed into one cake with 357g (that is, the old weight unit: 72), and seven cakes were packed in a bag, which was regarded as many children and grandchildren.
2. Tuocha: It is as big as a rice bowl. The intermediate and advanced products of Pu 'er tea are mostly Tuo tea and cake tea.
3. Brick tea: steamed and pressed into a brick-like rectangular pressed tea. Brick tea is mostly sold to Tibet and Mongolia. This shape is mainly for the convenience of transportation. Pu 'er tea is classified according to its production methods.
1. Raw tea: fermented in a natural way after picking, and the tea fragrance is more exciting. It should be cooked after many years, and the tea will become gentle. This method is usually used for good old Pu 'er.
2. Cooked tea: After 1973 scientific artificial fermentation, the tea is mild, soft and delicious.
Among many teas, Pu 'er tea is famous for its unique drinking method and wonderful efficacy besides its quality. Pu 'er tea is mainly brewed; Boiling Pu 'er tea for drinking is to make full use of the residual tea after soaking, supplemented by spices (onion, ginger, salt, sugar, etc. ).
First, wash and make tea:
1, first boil the tea set with boiling water and add the tea leaves; Turn off the fire after the water is boiled, wake up the tea with boiling water (to make the tea gradually disperse), and wash the tea (besides waking up the taste of the tea, there is also an important task of washing away the impurities in the tea together. )
2. make tea with boiling water. The first brewing speed should be fast, and the poured boiling water will be poured out immediately, because it only needs to wash the tea leaves without soaking its taste, then scald the cup with this boiling water and pour it out. Generally, raw Pu 'er tea is washed 1 time, and cooked Pu 'er tea is washed twice.
3, the head road. Pour boiling water for 3-5 seconds, pour the tea soup into the male cup, put a sieve on the male cup, and filter the broken tea to make the soup clear. Then you can pour it into a small porcelain bowl and drink it when it gets warm.
4, 2-4 courses of tea, each course is soaked for 5- 15 seconds, and then there is no need to heat the tea for three times, because the tea is gradually unfolded. The soup has been soaked for a long time, the color is too strong to look good and the taste is not good. Of course, the choice of shade can be decided according to people's preferences.
5, 5-N tea, every time you add a bubble, add 5- 10 seconds, and so on until it is tasteless.
Second, the main points:
1. When brewing Pu 'er, the amount of tea leaves accounts for about 1/5 of the pot body. Tea cakes, tea bricks and teapots are best exposed after separation.
Let it dry for two weeks, and then brew it to taste better!
2. Be sure to make tea with boiling water.
3. Pour it into a fair cup and drink it slowly every time. Don't soak in the pot for too long, or the tea will be bad.
4, every bubble interval 10-20 seconds, cooling to the fourth bubble, reheating, and then soaking for more than one time. Old Chaze may be everyone.
The second bubble is heated, but the interval is longer.
5. In addition, you can cook several dishes together, drink tea and soup together, and Pu 'er tea will still have ten flavors even if it is cold.
That's enough, so you can drink it cold in summer or drink it after freezing.
One of the seven indicators to judge Pu 'er tea: quality.
Quality means good raw materials, which is the first basic element and the first material basis of any high-quality tea; Without this, other advantages of Pu 'er tea would be out of the question. Due to the differences in climate, soil and vegetation, each producing area has its own characteristics. For example, the teas produced by Yi Wu in Xishuangbanna, Monkou in Lincang Shuangjiang and Jingmai Mountain in Simao Lancang should all be the best in Pu 'er tea, but their characteristics are very distinct.
The standards of "quality" include the following categories:
1. Origin: The raw material of high-quality Pu 'er tea must be Yunnan big leaf species. The most important traditional Pu 'er tea producing areas are Lincang, Simao and Xishuangbanna in Yunnan, and there are some remarkable good teas in other places such as Dehong and Baoshan. The tea in these three producing areas has its own characteristics and personality, and which one you like depends entirely on your personal hobbies.
2. Timing: Based on the delivery time. Spring tea, summer tea and autumn tea (tea farmers are also called autumn tea valley scented tea). Among the three kinds of tea, spring tea is the most important, followed by autumn tea; Old tree tea, spring tea and autumn tea have their own advantages, and spring tea is full of gas. No matter what kind of tea tree, summer tea is the worst.
Another pair of important concepts is the problem of old tea and new tea; In the long years, the quality of Pu 'er tea, the colorful changes of tea products, and the psychological touch of tea drinkers in the face of the long river of time have made drinking old tea a rare enjoyment. Generally speaking, old tea is divided into ancient tea, grade tea, grade tea and so on. The common time division is: ancient tea is about 100 years, such as tribute tea left over from the Qing dynasty; No, grade tea has been produced for more than 50 or 60 years (the production time of old tea brands varies), but it all disappeared around 1949; Indian grade tea is a tea product variety since Fohai Tea Factory 1952 resumed production. There is some truth in this classification, but because most of these teas have a history of storage except ancient teas, and the locations are basically concentrated in Hong Kong and Taiwan Province in subtropical high temperature and high humidity areas, there is not much reference value for the taste and style of Pu 'er tea stored as old tea in the whole country or even the whole world in the future. So what is the real future old tea? There must be different styles in different places, but the basic quality of "the older the tea, the more fragrant it will be" will not change. The specific place needs to be verified by the practice of tea friends from all over the world-a tea friend in Beijing has a very good saying: good tea should be saved from yourself.
For new tea, some people think that it takes about 10 years for raw tea and one or two years for cooked tea. This statement is also one-sided. Stored for 65,438+00 years, the effect to be achieved is that the color and taste of the soup are based on the ripe tea, and the subconscious still thinks that cooked tea is the prejudice of Pu 'er tea; In fact, the biggest difference between drinking raw tea and cooked tea is that cooked tea nourishes health and raw tea is full of energy. Of course, the two are not completely different, either one or the other. For daily life, drinking cooked food has obvious effects of sobering up, nourishing and protecting the stomach, reducing fat and weight, and regulating the three highs. Besides the function of cooked food, raw food can also give people psychological aesthetic enjoyment. However, as a new kind of tea, you can't drink it in ten or eight years or one or two years. The key of Pu 'er tea is the raw material base. The raw materials are good. It was just taken off the stone mill. Why not drink it? What's wrong with it? The strong sunshine in Shan Ye is refreshing; After being stored for one year, it has changed; In another year, there will be further changes. If this goes on, every year will be a new realm and a wonderful enjoyment. Therefore, if the family raises tea (in view of the reality of family planning in China), if a family of seven counts, each person in the same batch of tea will open one cake of soup every year for 50 years, which is most suitable for collecting one large piece (84 cakes) and two small pieces (42 cakes each) every year. In this way, after 50 years, in addition to drinking enough, a small number of people will be left to communicate with tea friends and enjoy good tea. In addition, the freshly squeezed ripe tea is a little fresh to varying degrees, but the quality is still good. After two or three months, it tastes good. For example, the cooked tea made by Zou Bingliang and Rong Jiasheng, who are skilled in fermentation technology, has only been out of the factory for three or two months, but it is often considered by drinkers to be two or three years old.
In addition, regarding the ancient Pu 'er tea in the Forbidden City, Mr. Deng Shihai said on page 83 of Pu 'er Tea (Huzhong Tiandi Edition, Taiwan Province Province): 1963, the Forbidden City in Beijing handled more than 2 tons of tribute tea from the Qing Dynasty, some of which were Pu 'er tea, the largest being like melons, the smallest like table tennis, and the largest being five and a half pounds. This batch of Pu 'er tea is well preserved and has no mildew. I took some samples and commented that "the soup is colored, but the taste of tea is old and light".
Mr. Deng quoted an article "Pu 'er Tea and Qing Dynasty-On Promoting Pu 'er Tea Culture" published in the journal of Agricultural Archaeology by Mr. China Tea People's Association.
There are two things that Mr. Deng didn't explain:
(1) Mr. Wang Yufeng tasted Lu 'an or black tea at that time, not Pu 'er tea; This will mislead tea lovers and infer what it feels like to store Pu 'er tea in the age of ancient tea in the Forbidden City. Moreover, the weight conversion is also wrong, which is inconsistent with the records in Pu 'er Tea Records and Pu 'er Official Records.
(2) Mr. Deng did not point out that this article was quoted from Mr. Deng's work. Just reading it, readers will think that the person who "used" Pu 'er tea in the Forbidden City was Mr. Deng himself, but in 1963, considering the situation across the Taiwan Strait at that time, it was no ordinary event.
Knowledge of Pu 'er Tea Remains in the Forbidden City in Beijing: In the early 1960s, there were tons of unfinished tribute tea in the Qing Dynasty in the tea warehouse of the Forbidden City in Beijing, including Pu 'er tea, daughter tea and tea cream. 19631On October 23rd, the Forbidden City handled more than 2 tons of tribute tea from the Qing Dynasty. By chance, I saw this batch of aged tribute tea in Beijing Tea Factory. Generally, bait tea is as big as watermelon (slightly flat) and as small as tennis and table tennis. It is brown and red, not moldy and well preserved. There are traces of tightening cloth on the surface of the tea ball, which shows that the tea leaves are wrapped in cloth, kneaded and dried. I once selected a large Pu 'er tea group and weighed it with a scale, weighing 5.5 kg (the old scale in Qing Dynasty was 596.62 g). This group tea is shaped like a human head. According to Zhao Xuemin's Compendium of Materia Medica in the Qing Dynasty, Pu 'er tea is said to be "a man's head, and a famous man's head makes tea". It is consistent with the record that tributes are paid every year and people are not easy to get.
At the same time, this batch of tribute tea in the Forbidden City is treated with modern white-hair silver needle tea (all with long buds), baked green tea (such as Lu 'an tea) and rectangular black brick tea (thinner than today's tea bricks). I once took back a few samples to try soaking. The soup was colored, but the tea taste was old and weak.
In the early 1960s, tea production was reduced, and the domestic market was in short supply. This batch of Pu 'er group tea in the Forbidden City was crushed and screened, and then mixed with loose tea for sale. In June199265438+1October 13, I met an old expert of the Forbidden City, Mr. Shan Shiyuan, and asked about the tribute tea of the Forbidden City. It is reported that Pu 'er Tea Group and tea cream still have samples. I don't know which emperor left Pu 'er tribute tea in the Forbidden City when he was in office. It is speculated that it should be the historical tribute tea left by Empress Dowager Cixi and Emperor Guangxu at the latest.
3. Tree products: there are wild type, transitional type and cultivated type; There are also old tree tea (or ancient tree tea, which tea farmers generally call Dashu tea), platform tea (tea garden tea) and waste tea (barren mountain tea and wild tea). In addition, there are some variation or rare tree products, such as purple bud tea and rattan tea.
Remarks: ① Occasionally, some strange products that are not tea but look like tea will be sold at high prices. Fortunately, this strange product is harmless to health, but it is also harmless. ② The problem of Qiao Mu tea. Many people who love tea usually regard Qiaomu tea and terraced tea as opposing concepts. In fact, trees should correspond to shrubs. Moreover, the big leaf species in Yunnan are all arbor tea, even if its shape is terrace. Terraces are built on the hillside of tea gardens. In order to facilitate picking, it should be pruned every winter to prevent the tea trees from growing taller. In other words, if it is not pruned, it will continue to grow to more than ten meters or even dozens of meters, showing the main characteristics of Qiaomu tea: it has trunk and lateral branches; If it is real Bush tea, many teenagers are also Bush. For example, eighteen tea trees in Ganlong and Yufeng beside the Old Longjing Temple in Hangzhou West Lake have been less than two meters high for hundreds of years. In addition, there is another situation. Although it is platform tea, the tea products processed in decades-old tea gardens also have the style of old tree tea.
4. Process: The first step to distinguish the process category is the difference between raw tea and cooked tea, which is easy to identify. The second step is to distinguish between spreading and making noodles. Sprinkle the noodles for the sake of beauty, and put the strips on the noodles with better colors, and there are some inferior tea leaves in them. It's best to be consistent inside and outside, and don't make noodles. Step 3: Whether it matches. That is, tea cyanines of different origins, the same quality or the same origin and different grades are mixed and processed. Okay, we can't generalize. For example, in some places, the taste of tea is very good, but not enough. If Lincang tea is blended, it can achieve the effect of pure taste and rich tea fragrance. This blending is actually a good creation. In recent years, some tea products that won prizes in various exhibitions, especially cooked tea, mostly achieved excellent quality through clever blending. But the other is that unscrupulous merchants mix low-quality and low-priced raw materials with some high-quality and high-priced raw materials, and finally sell them at the market price produced by good raw materials. There are many teas produced in large quantities on the market now, and there are also many such combinations.
5. Storage: Storage does not belong to the category of "quality", but due to the special circulation history of Pu 'er tea, it can be divided into dry storage and wet storage. However, the quality of wet Tibetan tea has greatly changed the authenticity of Pu 'er tea. In a word, wet Tibetan tea tastes good and lacks vitality. It is also a good wet Tibetan tea, so it should be returned to the warehouse. Therefore, considering comprehensively, dry warehouse is the best, and wet warehouse can be used as an example, which cannot become the mainstream trend of Pu 'er tea. It can be predicted from the future that wet-stored Pu 'er tea will be withdrawn from the historical stage, and the word dry-stored wet-stored Pu 'er tea will become a thing of the past-because there is an unnatural "wet storage", a truly natural "dry storage", which needs no emphasis.
Besides, where is the best place to keep Pu 'er tea? This is also an open question. According to the author's experience, in order to pursue the rapid change of taste and color of soup, higher temperature and humidity are better; But relatively speaking, the aroma lasting appeal that changes too fast is slightly inferior; Four distinct seasons, slow change, but full of charm; Basic conditions, as long as there is no odor, natural humidity will not make tea moldy and deteriorated; Breathe a little, not too much, too much ventilation is harmful to tea; Just meet these basic conditions. But in the end, it is difficult to completely unify whether to pursue the rapid change of taste and color of soup or to sacrifice a little speed to pursue charm. You can't have your cake and eat it. See what you think is bear's paw and what is fish.
Raw Pu 'er and cooked Pu 'er should also be kept separately, otherwise cooked Pu 'er will get the sour taste of raw Pu 'er. Tea cakes must be broken 1 month before they can be tasted, which will evaporate the smell of the warehouse. Broken Pu 'er tea is suitable for preservation in porcelain bottles, and the bottle mouth can be sealed with a layer of water-absorbing and breathable paper.
The second of seven indicators for judging Pu 'er tea: appearance
The shape is the strip of tea, whether the strip is complete, tight and clear. The leaves are old or tender, the old leaves are larger and the young leaves are thinner; Look at the color and purity of dry tea, and it is no different from the miscellaneous taste. The color is brown or reddish brown (pig liver color), with oily luster, reddish brown (commonly known as red cooked), fat strips and less broken tea; The inferior ones are slightly stale or just stale, even with sour taste or other miscellaneous taste. The rope is thin and incomplete, dark brown in color and dry and dull. Shengpu is symmetrical in appearance, tight in rope, blue-brown or brown in color, shiny and moist. Tap the tea cake with your hand, and the sound is crisp and neat. Cooked pu has a symmetrical appearance, compact and clear lines, reddish brown color and moist luster.
The above is only a general situation, but there is another aesthetic habit in identifying the shape of Pu 'er tea, and it takes a long time to contact Pu 'er tea. For other teas, the newer and more tender, the finer the pursuit, the better; Such as Longjing and Mao Feng melon slices. However, in front of Pu 'er tea, it seems that it should be "more important than form", because Pu 'er tea is dominated by Yunnan big leaves, with new, tender and fine leaves, and the tea taste is not enough, especially the old tree tea, which is not in contradiction with coarse, old, thick, dark, simple and beautiful, that is, Ms. Luo said: Pu 'er tea is blindly pursuing the tender and fine bad tendency of China tea in order to reverse the fashion. In fact, in the practice of drinking, the exquisite palace level is good, but the fourth, fifth and sixth grades, even mixed with tea stalks, have a different flavor; In addition, especially some manual workshops, because each process is completed by hand, it is different from industrial standardization. These tea cakes pressed by stone mill may not be round enough, the thickness is not even enough, or even a little askew, but there is a humanistic beauty of traditional craftsmanship in them, which is very collectible.
The third of seven indicators for judging Pu 'er tea: color.
The color mainly depends on the depth and brightness of the soup. High-quality Pu 'er cooked tea has a bright red color and a "golden circle". There seems to be a film of oil beads on the soup, and the bottom of high-quality Pu 'er cooked tea is brownish red. Poor quality tea soup, red but not thick, thick but opaque, not bright, often with dust suspended in it, and some even black, commonly known as "sauce soup." High-quality raw materials, orange color, clear and transparent, as if wrapped in an oil film, unchanged for a long time.
The charm of Pu 'er tea lies largely in the pleasing color of the soup. Mr. Simao Zhu used "fused agate" to describe Pu 'er tea soup, and used ruby red, agate red and amber as simple methods to distinguish the quality of Pu 'er tea by the color of the soup, which was poetic and practical.
In short, tea should be judged by color, dry tea should be lubricated with natural oil, and the color of soup should be transparent and bright.
The fourth of seven indicators for judging Pu 'er tea: fragrance
The aroma of Pu 'er tea is one of the important factors that determine the quality of tea. The so-called tea fragrance is actually the unique fragrance type of tea formed by the combination of different aromatic substances with different concentrations and the comprehensive action on the olfactory nerve. Tea-scented substances are a mixture of various volatile substances with different properties, little content and great differences. Up to now, about 700 kinds of tea aroma substances have been isolated and identified, some of which are unique, some are synthesized during the growth of fresh leaves, and some are formed during the processing of tea. The specific aroma components of Pu 'er tea have not been completely detected. Hot sniffing and cold sniffing are mainly used to identify the aroma of Pu 'er tea. The dry tea of high-quality Yunnan Pu 'er loose tea is old and fragrant, the high-quality hot taste is obviously rich and pure, the cold taste is long, and it has a very sweet and refreshing taste. The inferior aroma is low, some are mixed with sour rot, rancid, rusty water or other miscellaneous smells, and some are "smelly and moldy" and "rotten". The aroma of Pu 'er tea can be identified at any time during the whole brewing process, but the aroma of Pu 'er tea is complex and it is difficult to express it accurately in easy-to-understand language. Of course, different methods of smelling incense have different effects, such as smelling incense in an empty cup, smelling incense in the knife mark of the cake opening, smelling incense in the lid of the cup, smelling incense at the bottom of the cup and so on. Leng Xiang, Wenxiang, Hot Xiang, Qianxiang, Houxiang, Dimfragrance, Aquilaria Resinatum and Mingxiang are also different. In any case, the aroma of Pu 'er tea is natural, strong but not greasy, clear and indecent, heavy but not boring. Tea people use the metaphors of rice fragrance, flower fragrance, fruit fragrance, honey fragrance, grass fragrance, jujube fragrance, orchid fragrance, camphor fragrance and lotus fragrance to accommodate the different aroma of Pu 'er tea, which shows that the aroma of Pu 'er tea is complex and rich, and these changeable aromas come from the changes of internal elements such as different time, temperature and humidity of Pu 'er tea raw materials in the later period. However, it is worth noting that there is an article saying that the reason why Pu 'er tea has camphor tree fragrance is because the tea tree is planted with camphor tree, which is subjective speculation. From this perspective, is the lotus fragrance of Pu 'er tea the result of interplanting tea trees and lotus flowers?
The fifth of the seven indexes to judge Pu 'er tea: taste.
Taste is the most important first step to perceive and understand Pu 'er tea, and it is the "first title" of Pu 'er tea tasting. The characteristic of "taste" is also the characteristic that Pu 'er tea is obviously different from other teas in tasting. In the practice of drinking, the "taste" of Pu 'er tea has two meanings: one is the physiological activity and experience of the tongue and mouth, and the other is based on it and contains a great degree of aesthetic interest, which makes people feel different tastes and corresponding different tastes of Pu 'er tea, and at the same time makes people feel spiritual pleasure. We often say that "returning to sweetness" and "returning to sweetness" are the mixture of these two feelings; However, Pu 'er tea gives priority to returning sweetness, and those who return sweetness will definitely return sweetness, but those who return sweetness may not have a sense of returning sweetness. In other words, the sweet Pu 'er tea contains some other ingredients that are beneficial to people's taste, which is what the ancients meant by tasting delicious food. The more tasteful experience mainly comes from the smoothness, sweetness and throat moistening of the taste. High-quality taste is mellow, smooth, throat-moistening, sweet, and tongue root produces fluid. Refreshing, smooth, mellow, sweet and fluid-producing. In short, as far as cooked tea is concerned, good Pu 'er tea tastes almost the same and is sweet. On the other hand, poor quality Pu 'er tea also has its own shortcomings, such as bitterness, rancidity, acidity, astringency, numbness and hang-up, which is a bit like Tolstoy's saying: all happy families are similar, and each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.
Qi: the sixth of the seven evaluation indexes of Pu 'er tea
Qi is a core concept in evaluating and tasting Pu 'er tea, and it is also the basis for people to linger and rely on Pu 'er tea. The depth of Pu 'er tea depends largely on the word "qi".
Qi element is a philosophical concept, which refers to the most basic substance that constitutes the beginning and beginning of all things in the world. The theory of Qi runs through China's traditional art and folk literature. The abstract category of Pu 'er tea drinking is also an important indicator to distinguish the top and bottom quality of Pu 'er tea. We often say that Pu 'er tea is alive, and drinking Pu 'er tea is an art, which is aimed at the "qi" of Pu 'er tea to a great extent. Between heaven and earth, all life must have "qi"; All the traditional arts in China, such as painting, calligraphy, music, architecture and even poetry, pay attention to the word "Qi". Mencius, an Asian sage, said that "I am good at nurturing my noble spirit", referring to the realm of human cultivation; Cao Pi, the Wei Emperor of the Three Kingdoms, said that "literary spirit is the mainstay" refers to art; And the title of Fu Baoshi's "Exhausted Vitality, Real Appeal" refers to things. For example, in our life, calligraphy works can be seen everywhere, and we always feel that there is abundant vitality behind the paintings of masters, which makes them look dull and dull. For example, in our daily life, some people can feel each other's deep, frank, generous, or profound cultivation in their brow, although their appearance is not amazing, that is, their inner vitality is expressed through the surface form. It's just that this expression is not straightforward and simple enough. The spirit of Pu 'er tea is based on high-quality raw materials, so-called "the essence of heaven and earth, the beauty of the sun and the moon", "the head of a hundred plants, the flower of a thousand trees", and then the spirit of heaven and earth is obtained through human mind processing. Pu 'er tea is thick, straight and full of spirit.
Of course, Pu 'er tea is magical but not mysterious. The so-called tea fragrance is the comprehensive experience of human senses and spirit when tea is the material basis of tea. When we describe the taste of tea, we often use words such as "tea taste is not enough", "tea taste is right or wrong" and "tea taste is not strong". From the material basis, the main reason is that the content of tea polyphenols and caffeine is insufficient; Tea polyphenols are the material basis of tea, and the raw material of Pu 'er tea must be Yunnan big leaf species, because the content of tea polyphenols is higher than any tea species at home and abroad, and with the aging of long years, the content of tea polyphenols in raw tea will gradually decrease, and the content of tea polyphenols will also be greatly reduced. If the content of tea polyphenols in sun-cured raw tea as raw material is low, it will form the congenital deficiency of tea products. Over time, we will say that a certain tea is "tasteless". Lincang tea, one of the main producing areas of Pu 'er tea, has the highest content of tea polyphenols, that is to say, Pu 'er tea made of raw materials in this tea area has good innate conditions, which is the guarantee that Pu 'er tea will taste full of flavor and charm, and it is also the guarantee that the collected Pu 'er tea will be more fragrant in the future, but the soup will never be diluted. The simplest example is the green cake pressed with yellow tablets (also known as yellow leaves) in the newly made new tea, which tastes very sweet, but even if it is stored in Kunming for three or four years, the tea fragrance is weak, so the collection value is not high. Yellow film is the part of tea that is not picked in time after it is released, and it is also what the person named Jin Yutian (some versions are "Jin Tianyue") said in Pu 'er Tea that "the internal strength will be pre-selected when rolling. The content of tea polyphenols in yellow tablets is very low, so tea farmers usually pick them out when processing, which is similar to the old rotten leaves we lost when washing vegetables-that is, the kind of tea that Shi Kunmu said on page 45 of Classic Pu 'er that "it is obviously the thick branches and old leaves of tea gardens, but unscrupulous manufacturers pretend to be big leaves to deceive consumers." Only yellow cake is not only tea garden tea, but also old tree tea; Moreover, there are not many manufacturers and many businesses that cheat consumers.
But we usually drink tea, so there is no need to distinguish between tea polyphenols and caffeine. There is a simple sensory evaluation-the eight-character mantra: "Bite hard, don't bite, don't hang your tongue." It was a bit bitter when I first entered the customs, so I have to go back to Gansu immediately; It's a little astringent, but it melts quickly, resulting in fluid and charm-the taste is fresh but distinct, varied but natural and smooth as running water. This may be why the dancer Yang li Ping said: Pu 'er tea is the music of taste.
Tasting tea mainly comes from three aspects: foot, thickness and integrity. Raw materials such as Lincang tea are natural and full of gas; The processing technology is precise, so that the benefits of tea polyphenols can be brought into play harmoniously with other elements such as amino acids. For example, tea polyphenols and coffee, because of the chorus of the lead singer, naturally have a strong tea fragrance. When tea leaves are picked, they are not randomly mixed. If someone with tasting experience drinks a cup, Lincang tea is Lincang tea, Simao tea is Simao tea, and Banna tea is Banna tea. The style is obvious and the personality is outstanding. This is the so-called tea spirit
What I said above is only the "external gas" of tea gas, and what is more fascinating is the "internal gas". People with internal qi do not feel it with their mouths and noses, but feel it with their bodies. This is most easily felt by qigong practitioners, Chinese medicine practitioners, monks and people who are not addicted to meat or fish. Pu 'er tea belongs to lung meridian and spleen meridian. When drinking it, Dantian's hands and feet are slightly hot and sweaty, and even feel angry when practicing Qigong; To some extent, the real charm of Pu 'er tea lies in its internal qi; However, because everyone's physical condition is different, the degree of feeling is not the same, but the in-depth discussion of internal qi seems to be more clearly explained from the theory of traditional Chinese medicine.
At the same time, if tea is lifeless, rhyme will become a castle in the air.
Those who know the fragrance of tea can be said to have entered the room of Pu 'er tea.
Seven indicators for judging Pu 'er tea: rhyme.
Rhyme is a subjective feeling that is more difficult to describe vividly than "qi" in Pu 'er tea tasting. For example, although the melody, pitch and rhythm are accurate when singing, there is no aesthetic feeling, which is called "no rhyme"; When evaluating characters, beautiful women have good height, measurements and facial features, but they are rigid, inflexible, uneducated and lack of "rhyme", which makes it difficult to give people a sense of beauty. This even embarrassed Li Daiweng, in "Secretary Li Daiweng? Volume department? Choose a posture first? In terms of attitude, he said that it is not the figure, skin and facial features that fascinate beautiful women, but "coquetry", which is an intangible thing that can "make beautiful people more beautiful and gorgeous people more gorgeous".
According to his aesthetic standards, posture comes first. "Choosing appearance and posture is not as important as choosing posture first." But after talking for a long time, he could only make an analogy: "coquetry is like people, like fire, like lights, like pearls, like gold and silver." It is difficult to define the rhyme of Pu 'er tea, but the most intuitive experience in the practice of drinking is "producing saliva". Different kinds of tea produce saliva on the tip of the tongue, some on the surface of the tongue, and the best even produce saliva in the throat. The so-called throat rhyme refers to this. Drinking tea to promote fluid production is like listening to the lingering sound of music, enjoying the scenery and getting along with respected and knowledgeable old people. Of course, the "rhyme" feeling of Pu 'er tea can't be completely summarized by promoting fluid production and quenching thirst. The rhyme of old tea is different from that of new tea. The rhyme of new tea is more direct, while the rhyme of old Chaze is implicit-of course, some drinkers regard "wet warehouse flavor" as the rhyme of Pu 'er tea, but in fact they regard shortcomings as characteristics and even advantages.
The ancients said, "If a fish drinks water, it will know whether it is warm or cold." Chairman Mao said, "If you want to know the taste of pears, you have to taste them yourself." Drinking Pu 'er tea is not mysterious and does not need to be endowed with any innate ghosts and gods. As long as you keep practicing and comparing, especially communicating with tea friends, you will gradually realize the benefits of Pu 'er tea. It is important not to choose the wrong tea at the beginning, and take the low-quality and inferior tea as the standard for future tasting, just like wearing colored glasses. It is a detour to understand the world and richness of Pu 'er tea. This is why some tea lovers now regard old tea in wet storage as the standard for storing old tea in the future, which is self-folding.
Tasting Pu 'er Tea: To make Pu 'er tea healthy, it is most appropriate to drink it slowly. If you drink too fast or in a hurry, your nervous mood will not make tea gas work safely in your body. Just as the most exquisite qigong skill is a hasty act of "intentionally moving qi", it must be unstable in mind, unable to concentrate and unable to intentionally move qi. Even if tea gas plays a role in the meridians, it is impossible to bring tea gas into the meridians and run with lax consciousness.