This tea I got from China, and it had a very bad paper taste at first. In several months it became tasty. It was changing all the time, depending on storage and weather conditions. First half a year in my room I had to make at least 5 steeps to get a decent taste, now it goes well after 2 rinses. Storage conditions is everything for aging puerh.
The small tuocha was a 100g bird’s nest. Very compressed, dark and dry. One teapot produce about 20 steeps of this tea.
Now the taste is great and deep. It mostly in apricot tone, but with many rich undertones of earth, peanuts and some moderate sweetness. Now when winter finally came to Israel, it tastes not so sweet as before, but more elegant and roasted. Interesting how it changes each couple of days.
Remember to give a pu-erh tea to breath after shipping arrives, this is just crucial to get a good taste of it. Several weeks in open package will do well, then store it in some ceramic jar, not tightly closed
Aged puerh is great, it lives a life of its own.
In the tea obsessed south, the ifranmol rule is to use more leaves, and steep for less time minimum time for maximum fullness’ of taste. Usually in China the rule of thumb is 6-8 grams of tea for a serving (which may well be infused a dozen or more times) gradually increasing the infusion time. One of the most understated but clear pieces of information on serving Puer/Pu’erh I’ve ever heard was start off with the basics of 6-8 grams, fully boiled water and then play around and let the tongue decide .
All teas that originate from the Camellia seninsis plant have the same health benefits because they come from the same plant. Therefore, the benefits of green tea are the same as the benefits of black tea and the same as the recently popularised Wu yi tea.Logically, if teas which originate from the same plant have the same health benefits, they would also have same side effects. All these teas have tannin, which works in the same way as caffeine. Teas I have mentioned so far come from leaves of the plant. If you choose to drink tea made from flowers (eg rose hip tea), then it will taste different. By the same token, tea from flowers will *not* have the same health benefits as teas which come from the leaves of the Camellia seninsis plant (ie green tea, black tea, oolong tea, Wu yi tea).One way you could get around the taste issue is to dilute down your tea. For example, in Wu yi tea, it is recommended you drink two cups of this tea for health. You could dilute this fluid with water so that there will be 4 cups of tea. This way, its taste will be less prominent.Have a look at tinyurl.com/clwcqh