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dahongpao

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Mr. Zhang decided to make the ultimate Dahongpao, the Dahongpao…

Tea Adventures

Mr. Zhang decided to make the ultimate Dahongpao, the Dahongpao Blend with the ingredients of Shuixian, Rougui, and Golden Mudan (a new Wuyi varietal), to make a superb confluence of fragrance, body, and intensity. Body and intensity are both characteristics of Wuyi teas that imitations can not approach. He would make the ulimate Dahongpao. But there you have noticed- there is no Dahongpao in it! Purposefully of course. Mr. Zhang laments the lack of knowledge of his region, the Bordeaux of tea. Everything is called Dahongpao by the outsiders, so unscrupulous merchants would blend stuff together or outrightly use raw material from other regions. Hardly anyone knows what Dahongpao tastes like anyway- and no wonder. The 2nd generation single varietal Dahongpao amount is so little to be had, no one would actually blend it with other teas. Or sell it to a nobody. And we are all nobodies when compared to the leaders of the Communist government. Dahongpao is inherently Leader Grade tea. So folks, whatever else is just stages of blends. As for Mr. Zhang’s version- it is superb. He could call it Dahongpao or Cow Dung tea. Using the best varietals he grows, this was an unforgettable tea. We will get to taste this side by side with a 2nd Generation Single Varietal Dahongpao. As well as his competition entrant Shuixian, which will quadruple the price if he wins…..

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Still seething from the plagiarism of my story on the Phoenix Ya…

Tea Adventures

Still seething from the plagiarism of my story on the Phoenix Ya Sai on this blog, I asked Mr. Zhang about the massive amounts of fake Dahongpao out there. Why, there is cheating at every level! Sometimes the tea pluckers will harvest your top mountain raw leaves but will turn in low mountain stuff. They look the same as raw leaves but once they are roasted, huge differences are obvious but too late. Outside producers will come in and open a production factory, registering with local authorities and even pass inspection. But the tea they make as Dahongpao? Not even close to being from this region. And what about the real tea from this region generically called Dahongpao? Blends of generic Wuyi low mountain stuff. No clear discernible taste of a single varietal. Blending is a cuss word here in Wuyishan, conjuring up wicked mercenary merchants. Telling a real story and selling fake tea is what the Chinese called ‘hang a sheep’s head but selling dog meat’, referring to bait and switching. That is clearly the folks mentioned in the Forbes article. I forget the name of that tea company. Real story, fake stuff. Happens everywhere, starting from the source! Mr. Zhang and I, zealous tea people, won’t let that stop us. What are you doing with those Tea University interns? Still turning them down for internship there? ‘Of course, ’ he said. ‘’Wage war on paper’, is another favorite Chinese saying. They are not fit to make tea, but they sure can talk about it with all that academic book learning. They can go sell tea in one of those chain tea companies’ -said Mr. Zhang, eccentric, long visioned, superb tea artisan.

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Use 7 gms of leaves, said Mr. Zhang. Or you’ll never learn to…

Tea Adventures

Use 7 gms of leaves, said Mr. Zhang. Or you’ll never learn to appreciate the heaviness that is Wuyi tea. There are 3 main varietals, which are Shuixian, Dahongpao (Big Red Robe), and Rougui (loosely translated as Cinnamon). Of these three main groupings, there are 10 or so major sub varietals, like my favorites Water Golden Turtle, etc. Though Dahongpao is the famous fabled varietal of the region and the most imitated by exterior forgeries, in reality, the other two varietals are much more revered by the local connoisseurs. A side by side comparison of these three revealed the differences, using the mountain top spring water. After a long discussion over which water is the best ( mountain top, river, well, or bottled spring water), of which of course mountain stream water being the clear winner, and why well water is the worse ( no movement), and which water is in advisable when it rains, and much other in depth tea-geek discussions, I get to taste the three varietals side by side. These are the best of the best. The Rougui is from the Main Cliff area, the competition Shuixian is from 70 year old trees at the mountain peak, and the Dahongpao is the 2nd generation version. Never mind pedigree though. Some surprising results ensued.

I won’t reveal what the results were. We will all taste them together at the Harvest Party!

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80% of the population depends on tea for a livelihood in one way…

Tea Adventures

80% of the population depends on tea for a livelihood in one way or another here in Anxi, the birthplace of Tieguanyin, world renown oolong. To be sure fads come and go every year and a Tieguanyin is not always the most fashionable tea every year. Since the mountain range is so huge, all this raw material has to go someplace. They can get sold to Wuyi to be made into Dahongpao, or Phoenix Mountain to make ‘Phoenix tea’, or even green teas. For most people, they are not going to taste the terroir difference. For Americans, forget terroir- there’s just green tea or black tea in a teabag. Actually, the best example ever- once I was in a restaurant in SOHO, NYC, billing itself as a tea house restaurant. On the menu was: Hot Tea. That’s it. The wine list was a book and coffees were a dozen choices, but this ‘tea house’ had only one option for tea. Phew, glad it was hot. Now, why did I just spend my whole life getting terroir specific tea from the indigenous varietals picked on the perfect day made by the best artisans in the villages, again?

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江山 Jiangshan, or River and Mountain, translates in Chinese to…

Tea Adventures

江山 Jiangshan, or River and Mountain, translates in Chinese to ‘one’s country’. It is a term used possessively by a ruler. When Zhou En Lai responded to Nixon’s puzzlement on why he received such a small amount of Dahongpao as the official State gift in 1972, Zhou said to him ‘we gave away the equivalent of half the Jiangshan’.
So what constitutes the country of China to a ruler, includes the Jiang (Yangtze River), and Shan- all the spectacular mountains in between. And preferably all the areas that have both river and mountain together, the ultimate spectacular scene like Wuyi.

The Jiangshan of China has both become more orderly and prosperous, and more restrictive and repressive. I noticed that on this trip, the Great Firewall of China has tighten its grip even more. I could not access many smaller sites, nor could I access even the Teance site. Forget YouTube or Facebook. Many selective content on sites like CNN were also eliminated but one is under the illusion that such news sites were permitted.
But who needs freedom of speech when you have Dahongpao to drink and a relaxing raft down the River, right?

Philosophically, is it ok to live in repression in exchange for peace and prosperity? Or is the seemingly available freedom of expression really freedom of thought? Is there really freedom of thought, aside from the practice of the sages? Isn’t our US media brainwash just as insidious as Communist government mind control? We, the people of Hong Kong, tend to think these were very taxing discussions, and go get ourselves some egg tarts and afternoon tea instead. Yet when such freedoms were taken away from the people of Hong Kong, they rose to defend it- at last, something was more important than food and the many luxuries and comforts in life.

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