我的易武茶 My Yiwu Tea

[chin]

易武茶 I - 同一小號的07秋茶。
G, H, I是一起買的。未試。

[chin]

易武茶 A - 99易昌號宋體
買後第一次喝時，可能落茶葉太多和泡得耐，頭3泡苦過弟弟，第4泡神奇地甜苦交集，跟著苦味沒了。
想重錘出擊時，茶鋪話沒貨了。

My own comment on 13-Sep-08

—— 99易昌號宋體 ——
以前在“我的易武茶”一貼，我說過“買後第一次喝時，可能落茶葉太多和泡得耐，頭3泡苦過弟弟，第4泡神奇地甜苦交集，跟著苦味沒了。”

後來泡過幾次都沒有太覺有苦。但今天泡時這苦又來了。那種苦味有點是涼茶的苦，強度是涼茶一半吧。第四，五泡左右開始變得很甜。

雖然開始有些苦，後面的味道還是不錯。比起同期99年左右的茶，我喜歡喝開的那餅綠大樹多一點點。但我的小女，卻很喜歡這苦茶。頭兩泡的喝了起碼一半。她說雖然苦，但很香，喝了後覺得“yum...”，然後想再喝多點。

其它有這茶的師兄妹，有沒有這樣的先苦後甜的經驗？

有可能只是這餅？因為餅上的雞毛？頭發？黃片？

[chin]

再喝昌泰的易武

上星期茶聚喝過佳哥的99易昌號宋體（易武茶 A），居然是和我的壹樣，就是苦頭幾泡，後面有點香甜，茶質薄，跟同期的綠大樹（易武茶 B）沒得比。好彩上年沒有機會高追。這樣的茶香港竟然賣千幾/餅，大陸過二千！

上星期也再試了昌泰04易武正品，小藍字（易武茶 C），也是香甜薄，沒有苦，酒紅色。有壹餅做版已夠。

上星期也終於試了上月買的昌泰03千家峰，三泡就開始沒有茶味只有甜味。也是有餅做版已夠。

昌泰03/04的易武茶唯壹稍有吸引的只是價錢便宜 - ￥160/餅。看來昌泰的易武不是我的那杯茶。

[chin]

My Custom Order of 2009 Spring Yiwu Tea

Tea H was from a guy, Mr Zheng, whose family has been owning and working on the same patch of land of tea trees for generations, except during the Cultural Revolution period.

Zheng visited Hong Kong jn Jul 08 and had spent a few hours with us drinking his new tea and our aged tea. The newest in our tea was Tea B (99 Green Big Tree), and Mr Zheng really liked it and confirmed that it was Yiwu. However he did not really appreciate the older aged fine Puer, like our Simplied Zhong Cha or my Small Yellow Mark.

This was no surprise to us, since collecting and drinking aged Puer has long been a Cantonese or Hong Kong "thing". Traditionally Yunnan people drink only fresh tea like other green tea. There is no tradition of appreciating old tea or the knowhow to age them properly. By now, many fine aged Puer tea are totally out of reach for almost all tea producers - not only the good one are hard to find, the price has gone up to much that I doubt many of them would pay >$20000 for a Small Yellow Mark, or $10000 for a Simplied Zhong Cha, or even the Green Big Tree at RMB1400 a piece.

I wrote a long discussion in a public tea forum after having tea with Mr Zheng. My point was that now tea producers who has no idea how Puer age are producing "new Puer" to a mass market of consumers who also has no idea how an aged Puer taste like. Can we still expect the newly produced tea would be able to age to the taste we like now?

Anyway, there is not much we can do.

I have been trying Zheng's 07 Spring tea a few times, and find it quite good and may age to a fine tea in perhaps 10 years (relatively short in Puer terms.) I also thought that 09 may be a good year to stock up some new tea, since the market was not as crazy as few years back, and the tea trees may have enough time to grow and nurture.

I decided to buy 2 stacks (total 14 tea cakes of 357g each cake), and posted the following in tea fourm on 8-Apr-09 and asked if anyone would like to tag along.

The result was a huge surprise.

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09易武春茶

舊年7月有位雲南做茶的鄭先生來了香港旅遊。我和幾位師兄跟他喝過他自己做的茶和我們的綠大樹，中茶間，和小黃印認真配方。後來我在香討上寫了篇“和雲南茶農的對話”。這裏有幾位師兄可能還記得那次茶聚。

鄭的正職是政府質檢部門人員。他的父母在鄭家梁子打理茶園。鄭在一些大陸的茶網上的名字是“古茶園”。

我買過幾餅他的純料茶，那時問過他為什麼會有自己的茶園。他說因為“1730年我祖先來到鄭家梁子開辟了現今這片古茶園，新中國成立後入為合作社，1981年實行農村土地承包責任制後，又按原祖輩開墾的歸還給其後代承包。”

他的茶的味道跟黃雲，廣雲福的麻黑茶味道都差不多，比較柔柔甜甜的。是不是這就是正宗易武味就不知道。他喝我們的紅票綠大樹時，鄭說那是正宗的易武味，他希望自己的茶他日也是那種味。

幾天前我問他今年什麼時候出春茶？大概什麼價錢？他的回應是“5月初就可以銷售了，價格800元/筒（7片）。代我向其他幾位茶又問好啊！”

我會同他定兩筒。有興趣搭單或試他的茶的出聲，我還有1餅他的07春茶和秋茶。

[chin]

My Custom Order of 2009 Spring Yiwu Tea

Within 3 days, my friends "subscribed" almost 100 tea cakes.

With order this size, I proposed to make our own Nei Fei (the little piece of paper inside the tea cake) and proposed the following design.

The background picture was taken in an orchid show, the poem was written on-the-fly by two of my friends.

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谢谢locke兄提点。各位定茶的要留意下。

1。 我刚刚电话联络了郑。他现在还在茶山采茶。他说是有下雨，但只是阵雨，不会影响质量，云云。

2。 07春茶已经没有了，我买了的两饼是最后的。

3。 因为我们定超过10筒09春茶，所以都是以4千/小件计算，约￥95/饼。

4。 最后是内飞。他的茶本来是没有内飞的，我们可以加自己的内飞。但因为我们每人都是1到2筒，寄10种不同的内飞给他制作茶饼可能不大实际。或许可以制作一种内飞（如刻个“茶痴壼狂”的印），或照他原包装没有内飞。

因做茶饼是月中开始，我们因该这几天决定有没有内飞，有的话做约100张20号左右寄给郑。
茶饼总数25号晚截至，让他有时间计算运费。月底下单。

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Before our golf trip to Kunming, I ordered the following seal to be used in our Nei Fei. The seal says "茶痴壼狂" which means roughly "Tea Craze & Teapot Nuts". 

[chin]

My Custom Order of 2009 Spring Yiwu Tea

One thing I did not realize fast enough was that with the inclusion of the custom design Nei Fei, this order of tea is no longer just a regular purchase. The tea has became sort of a souvenir.

There are now more emotions attached, in additional to hope (that the tea will age well.)

At the end, our order had grown to about 250 tea cakes, or about 100kg. At a normal serving of 10g for 2 or 3 people, this order is good enough for 10,000 servings.

Now the Nei Fei are ready, we should be getting the tea in about 3 weeks. I have put my personal chop in some of the Nei Fei. (The tea is the same, other than the additional marking at the back of the Nei Fei.)

Let's hope Zheng's tea turn out to be good. I will be very happy if it turns out close to the 98 Green Big Tree.

[chin]

Upping the order...

[chin]

My Custom Order of 2009 Spring Yiwu Tea

Progress update. I sent Zheng about 20 extra Nei Fei to put on the bamboo package as a label. But somehow he did not understand the instruction or missed the instruction or purposely ignored the instruction, all the Nei Fei was used in pressing the tea cake. 

In stead of sticking to the original order, I will just purchase the extras. The extra money is not much, but it's annoying when people cannot following instructions. And this raise the question of his quality control.

[chin]

My Custom Order of 2009 Spring Yiwu Tea

The extras were gone in a day. 

[chin]

My Custom Order of 2009 Spring Yiwu Tea

In the afternoon of 21-May, while taking pictures of my friends Shi Xiao Ma teapots, the first shipment arrived. Somehow only 1 out of the 7 boxes arrived, and it happened to be the tea cakes with my own seal at the back of the Nei Fei. I opened one and took at few pic.