How to Explore a Tea: Thinking Through Experimentation and Adaptation

Tea Squirrels gather 'round! Today, So-Han skitters into the tea forests to find some new teas and explore them as if for the first time. This episode is all about how to go about learning a new tea, how to have a conversation with the tea through your practice, how to build a relationship with that tea over time, and how to adapt and adjust your Gong Fu technique throughout the many steepings to help the tea express its full potential.

To do this, So-Han explores one of each of the 6 types of tea*
*We didn't have any Yellow Tea in stock at the time of filming, so we just used another green tea as a placeholder.
As he approaches each tea, he open-sources his thought process so that viewers can get an idea of what kinds of thinking and experimenting can help pourers at home broaden and deepen their Gong Fu.

Mainly, this episode looks at how to adjust steeping time and water temperature as the main adjustable parameters (though we take brief looks at how pouring technique can also affect each steeping).

Teas featured in this episode:
-Green - Su Mao Feng (素毛峰, Sù Máo Fēng, “Plain Hairy Peak”)
-Red - Nannuo Sun-Dried Red (曬乾紅茶, Shài Gān Hóng Chá, "Sun-Dried Red Tea")
-Oolong - Yellow Twig (黃枝香, Huáng Zhī Xiāng, "Yellow Twig Fragrance")
-Yellow* (Not really a yellow tea!) - Snow Buds (雪芽, Xǔe Yá, "Snow Buds")
-White - 2020 Hindsight White Peony Bing (事后白牡丹餅, Shì Hòu Bái Mǔdān Bǐng, "Afterwards White Peony White Tea Cake")
-Black - 2016 Pomelo-Aged 8 Immortals (柚子裝陳八仙, Yòu Zi Zhuāng Chén Bā Xiān, "Pomelo-Packed Old 8 Immortals")

Music by: B. Glenn Copeland (www.SongCycles.com)

Production Credits:
Produced/Directed by: Echo Duemig
Edited by: Henry Arrambide
Cha Xi ("tea stage" - the tea "set up" for this episode) by: Echo Duemig and So-Han Fan