Teaclasses! -02

Hi there, I promised it would be soon right? 

So, it still took me longer to upload then I hoped haha. This entry will be about my second tea class. This time, it did not rain and the bus actually showed up, yay!

Note: When I talk about degrees, I think in Celsius, because that's what we use in the Netherlands.
Note 2: Please do not mind the possible grammar or spelling mistakes I made.

-02
My second class started with an written test about the previous lesson. Thankfully I already knew a lot because I had researched tea for my Thesis, so learning for the test this time was easy. I believe I’ll have a good result, but I will know for sure at the next lesson. Fingers crossed!

After the exam we went ahead with the lesson. This day we learned a lot about the production process of the different kinds of tea. Withering, drying, steaming, rolling, shaking, frying and well, that. For every tea a different process exists and I will have to learn all of them! White tea is the easiest to learn because the production process is very short. Oolong tea on the other hand has a pretty long production process. I will have to start learning soon, or else I might fail the next test.

This lesson we also tasted a lot of tea! Firstly, we tried out the most favorite ways of making the Pai Mu Tan we had to do our homework with. It was quite fun to see how most of us liked the same way of making it. I was the only one who went to the extreme with the steeping time and temperature of the water haha! As said in my previous blog, it really was way to bitter! But I reaaally had to taste it.. Anyway, the most favorite way of making the Pai Mu Tan was with a temperature of 75 degrees and a steeping time of 2 minutes. You could really taste the tea well, without it turning to bitter.

Some of the other teas we tasted were:
Zuxiang Mao Feng
Lost Malawi tea
Sencha
China Zhejiang Curled Dragon Silver Tips
Hōjicha
Huo Shan Yellowtips
Golden Yunnan
Silver Needle (Kenia white)
Oriental Beauty

We tasted some of them together, so we could taste the difference. For example:
Silver Needle (Kenia white) and Oriental Beauty.
Huo Shan Yellowtips and Golden Yunnan.

I personally loved the Sencha, China Zhejiang Curled Dragon Silver Tips and the Hōjicha the most. The Sencha reminded me of grass and cabbage but with a sweet note to it. I really liked it because it had no bitter taste to it at all. The China Zhejiang Curled Dragon Silver Tips was a bit bitter, but still very nice to drink. It felt a bit drier in the mouth but I did not mind. The Hōjicha had a nutty, smokey taste and was a bit sourish. These three definitely are my favorites from this lesson.

-02 homework!

As for the tea we took home to experiment with, it’s the Korea Jade Dragon. I never knew Korea produced tea.. A friend of mine, Maria, who studies about Korea explained they mostly drink coffee. So I thought they wouldn’t produce tea either.. But well, it turns out they do haha! Since both of us were surprised by this discovery, we tasted the tea together. I tried a lot of different ways of preparing the tea and varied with steeping time and temperature. This time I did not vary with the amount of tea to use. Instead of using the two kettle method -You put the tea in one kettle and pour water on it, let it steep and then you pour the tea over into another kettle through a filter- I used a Gong Fu Cha. The Gaiwan is only 120 milliliters so it’s pretty small. Therefore I used 2 grams of tea on 120 milliliter water.

I started with a temperature of 75 degrees and used two different steeping times; 1 minute and 2 minutes. The next step was 70 degrees and a steeping time of 3 minutes and 1 minute. Then I went up in temperature and used 85 degrees water and used a steeping time of 1 minute and 2 minutes. Next up was 80 degrees and 3 minutes steeping time. And then, for the extreme; 95 degrees and a steeping time of 1 minute and 2 minutes. I used osmoses water the first time, and the second time I did this process, I used tap water.

I varied quite a bit and it was fun to see how steeping time could make the tea bitter, even on low temperature. I really loved the tea on 75 degrees, and steeped for 1 minute. It was not bitter at all and tasted like fish and seaweed, but not too much. When I steeped the second time it became somewhat bitterer, but the taste of the tea became stronger too. The third infusion however, was steeped for 3 minutes at 70 degrees. It became way to bitter, despite the lower temperature of the water and the tea being used for the third time.

What surprised me was that one of the third infusions, at 85 degrees and a steeping time of 1 minute, was less bitter than the third infusion at 70 degrees and a steeping time of 3 minutes. And, surprisingly the first infusion at 95 degrees and a steeping time of 1 minute wasn’t as bitter as I thought it would be. It did leave a dry feeling in my mouth, but it wasn’t as bad as the second infusion, which I steeped for 2 minutes. Man, that was bitter! My favorites are both first infusions, with a steeping time of 1 minute. The only difference is that I used 70 degrees water and 75 degrees water. They both are my favorite because there was hardly any difference between them haha!

As for the tap water, I didn’t really like any of the infusions I used tap water for. Somehow the tea became bitterer even on low temperatures and it left a sourish taste in my mouth. But it was not the nice kind of sourish.

Welp, this actually became quite a long post.. I hope it’s understandable what I write hehe. It is kinda hard to explain a certain taste when the one who reads it can’t taste it. So, if you wanna come over and drink some tea with me, feel free to contact me! If you have any questions or comments, please use the comment section below. I won’t bite, so be my guest!

Cheers! ~ Liset.