liu an/ luk on/ lok on

Puerh and other heicha
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wave_code
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Tue Jul 21, 2020 10:20 am

Seems worth having a dedicated thread here for such a unique fermented tea. If I thought it was hard to find information about Liu Bao methods and factories compared to Pu-erh in English, Liu An seems even harder. There is an older Global Tea Hut issue which luckily sheds some light for us English readers.

I've been slowly trying out liu an and am looking to learn a bit more and go deeper. I've tried only couple so far. I found the slightly older Sun Yi Shun offered by theTea.pl to be really tasty and was what got me interested at first. I've had some samples of some younger ones too that were less earthy and a bit more green, I think one from Chawang, another Sun Yi Shun that is more recent, and the other week had a sample of a basket somewhat surprisingly produced for sale under the Sea Dyke name that Lao Shop has right now, and a little while back I got a sample from TeaLife with aglaia odorata. Despite having some distinct common characteristics I can say all have also been pretty substantially different. I get the impression that there are various factories or producers who make different grades for "Sun Yishun" as a marker/brand rather than it all being made by any specific factory? Are there actually any other larger makers at this point, or is it either that or farmer tea?

I have a bag sitting here that just arrived I picked up on a whim while having to replace my broken glass pot, this one being packaged/marketed in a 100g foil bag by Ying Kee tea house in Hong Kong. I don't know the place so maybe someone else can say, but I have the feeling after a quick search its a place selling mostly to tourists or gift pack style tea? Hard to tell from where I sit. They seem to be selling to a some Czech tea houses/suppliers in Europe with a few different offerings, including the HK style stem-only tea which was unfortunately sold out and the HK style with added aglaia odorata. I have no idea if this is a lower-end liu an where the processing method is substantially different altogether, or if they just skip the later more labor intense parts like the basket packing/cooking, or if they are buying up cheap baskets and emptying them out to be able to mark them up in smaller quantity (this hardly seems worth the effort for the price so I doubt it), or if they still follow a more modern version of processing and are done in larger volume, say in Liu Bao size baskets, or more like a shu style process? The fermentation character is certainly there. Unfortunately one doesn't get any of the bamboo wrapper to add in then.

I have seen pictures of sea dyke style CNNP green boxes of 'lok on' that I think is mainly or at least a lot of stems, but I haven't actually been able to find any for sale anywhere to try it, if its still being produced.

For those who drink a lot of liu an, what pots/clay types do you find suit it best?
Last edited by Victoria on Tue Jul 21, 2020 12:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Mod edit: added link to referenced publication
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mbanu
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Tue Jul 21, 2020 11:12 am

Part of the confusion is that it markets itself as an old tea, but it is a new tea. More accurately it is a "revival" tea, a style of tea that went extinct and was then recreated from scratch.

It is also a great example of the confusion caused by counterfeit culture; after the tea went extinct, counterfeit versions were produced in Macao for many years after the original was gone. Only after the counterfeits went extinct was an effort made to recreate the original. So you have strata of liu an, based on when and where it was produced and who it was produced for.

In the early years, liu an had a niche for itself as an ingredient in Chinese medicine in some areas, while in the later years it was catering to the Taiwanese romantics who resurrected Yiwu pu'er. Pu'er production processes have influenced how modern liu an is made.

The old "Art of Tea" magazine sometimes had articles on liu an in English. I believe the magazine is out-of-print, but I've found pirated copies online being used as advertising on some tea websites, sort of mirroring the relationship between the original liu an and the counterfeit. :)

Ying Kee is an established Hong Kong teahouse that focuses on pu'er. I think it falls into the same category as the other older Hong Kong teahouses (higher prices due to being well-known). If you are looking for a Macao shop, you might try Va Lun/Va Luen.

Good luck in your efforts!

*Edit:
wave_code wrote:
Tue Jul 21, 2020 10:20 am
I have seen pictures of sea dyke style CNNP green boxes of 'lok on' that I think is mainly or at least a lot of stems, but I haven't actually been able to find any for sale anywhere to try it, if its still being produced.
During the nationalized era a lot of bad practices were eliminated, but a problem they struggled with was "grade inflation" in regards to the leaves. So you had more guarantee that the tea was indeed where it said it was from, but it might say it was highest grade Long Jing or whatever when it was a lesser grade.

Going back to those pirated articles, one of them explained these boxes as being a response to this problem:
Liu-an Stems (六安骨)

This is a mysterious tea because it is the only tea which has stems but not leaf. Strictly speaking, it is a “tea of stems”. It releases some roasting smell from the dry tea stems because the tea has been undergone roasting procedure before sale. The tea is smooth and comfortable. Hong Kong old people loved this tea. However, this tea faded out from the market gradually in the 1990’s. After research, I figured out the reasons.

The raw materials manufacturing Liu-an Stems (六安骨) were the stems of oolong tea. In the past under the planned economy of China, the exported oolong usually contained many stems so that tea vendors in Hong Kong had to remove these stems from oolong tea first before sale.

In order not to waste these stems, tea vendors would roast these stems until they released attractive aroma. They gave an attractive name to this tea, Liu-an Stems (六安骨). However, there was nothing to do with the genuine Liu-an (六安) basket tea.

There was an interesting story in relation to Liu-an Stems (六安骨). Hong Kong tea vendors requested for removing these stems before export. Although the request was accepted, the stems were still export to them and still charged the same price as the normal oolong tea. Subsequently, in the late 1980’s, when oolong tea leaves could be exported by tea farmers on their own, private tea wholesalers removed these stems without any additional charges so as to attract more sales. Therefore, without these oolong stems, the Liu-an Stems (六安骨) gradually disappeared from the market.
.m.
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Tue Jul 21, 2020 12:23 pm

wave_code wrote:
Tue Jul 21, 2020 10:20 am
I have seen pictures of sea dyke style CNNP green boxes of 'lok on' that I think is mainly or at least a lot of stems, but I haven't actually been able to find any for sale anywhere to try it, if its still being produced.
I think the green box "Lok On" tea you're referring to is a Golden Sail Brand production (which is Guangdong based, whereas Sea Dyke Brand is Fujian based). Anyway, i've got a box out of curiosity maybe 2 years ago: it's barely drinkable, i really don't see a reason to drink it. It doesn't have that many stems, mainly small bits, lot of dust, heavy wet storage, likely quite similar to their generic shou, sort of a stale "old books" taste. To me, it neither has any of the lui an taste, nor is the wet storage done well.
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wave_code
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Wed Jul 22, 2020 11:29 am

interesting- I knew that the production had been stopped so you have your old/original liu an from say the 50s, and the new style, and I recall seeing things saying if someone claims a production year in the period between when production first ended and when it was "re-created" not to trust the dating, but I had no idea the bootlegging was on such a large scale that I guess there is probably a supply of tea produced somewhere in that period, just it wasn't made in Anhui. Also it seems that at least now you can find both raw and cooked liu an just like puerh.

I found the thing about the tie guan yin stems really interesting - it also makes me wonder then what the Ying Kee stem tea is. I doubt its 90s age, so I wonder if they are also using oolong stems and roasting them or something else to try and recreate that tea for locals who miss it (I guess now creating/re-creating ANOTHER tea born out of an already re-created tea, which is kinda fascinating). I'm hoping to get my hands on some because I actually really like the mix of sweet and woody you get from tea with lots of stems like banchas, very twiggy liu baos, kukicha, so on. I remember Tealife was offering this a little while back and its sold out now, but maybe I can talk him into finding some more- https://www.tealifehk.com/products/hong ... stems-150g

I didn't know about the regional differences between sea dyke and golden sail- thanks for clearing that up. while I certainly wouldn't want to pay more than a few bucks for a box I'd still be curious just to try it. both sea dyke and golden sail I find really interesting- here, sometimes either one can be nearly impossible to find except at laughable mark up, and then one city over or 4 months later there is tons of it around at the correct price of about 4 euros a box. while it isn't anything fantastic I have to admit I do drink the big orange box puerh pretty often when I have it- cheap as chips and perfect for making one big strong cup in the morning when drinking anything nicer would just be a waste. Also I'll drink the teabag puerh when I travel too because well... its in a tea bag. I don't know about pesticides though, maybe it is not the healthiest tea to drink? Though believe it or not I have had far worse shu.

I gave the Ying Kee tea a try today and was pleasantly surprised. Again, like every other liu an I have had it was different from all the others, but also the same. This one brewed up much darker, darker than I remember the 2002 tea being, looking like an early round of shu in my cup for around the first 3 brews and the earthy fermentation flavor was there. A little less sweet than the others I have tried, and more earthy, closer to a mid to heavy fermented liu bao in some ways- if the tea has been stored all this time in HK I suppose that could explain things. I started with longer steeps so I'll try flash steeping next go around. I'm not really confident to be able to compare the leaf grade, but it was quite small and quite dark looking. Makes me think the other recipes they have on offer might be worth trying out, as well as trying to get a bit more info about the processing they are using.
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mbanu
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Mon Apr 05, 2021 8:40 pm

mbanu wrote:
Tue Jul 21, 2020 11:12 am
wave_code wrote:
Tue Jul 21, 2020 10:20 am
I have seen pictures of sea dyke style CNNP green boxes of 'lok on' that I think is mainly or at least a lot of stems, but I haven't actually been able to find any for sale anywhere to try it, if its still being produced.
During the nationalized era a lot of bad practices were eliminated, but a problem they struggled with was "grade inflation" in regards to the leaves. So you had more guarantee that the tea was indeed where it said it was from, but it might say it was highest grade Long Jing or whatever when it was a lesser grade.

Going back to those pirated articles, one of them explained these boxes as being a response to this problem:
Liu-an Stems (六安骨)

This is a mysterious tea because it is the only tea which has stems but not leaf. Strictly speaking, it is a “tea of stems”. It releases some roasting smell from the dry tea stems because the tea has been undergone roasting procedure before sale. The tea is smooth and comfortable. Hong Kong old people loved this tea. However, this tea faded out from the market gradually in the 1990’s. After research, I figured out the reasons.

The raw materials manufacturing Liu-an Stems (六安骨) were the stems of oolong tea. In the past under the planned economy of China, the exported oolong usually contained many stems so that tea vendors in Hong Kong had to remove these stems from oolong tea first before sale.

In order not to waste these stems, tea vendors would roast these stems until they released attractive aroma. They gave an attractive name to this tea, Liu-an Stems (六安骨). However, there was nothing to do with the genuine Liu-an (六安) basket tea.

There was an interesting story in relation to Liu-an Stems (六安骨). Hong Kong tea vendors requested for removing these stems before export. Although the request was accepted, the stems were still export to them and still charged the same price as the normal oolong tea. Subsequently, in the late 1980’s, when oolong tea leaves could be exported by tea farmers on their own, private tea wholesalers removed these stems without any additional charges so as to attract more sales. Therefore, without these oolong stems, the Liu-an Stems (六安骨) gradually disappeared from the market.
A correction! Either liu-an stems was originally a product really made with stems removed from true liu-an, or the practice of selling roasted oolong stems as liu-an predates the nationalized era. Here the tea is mentioned in a 1938 article in the Chinese Medical Journal documenting the caffeine content of various teas popular in Canton.

Also interesting to see that there was a tea even cheaper than Liu-an Stems, it looks like "Dajiang Tea"? (大江茶). I've never heard of it before, though... Not sure if it is related, but 大江 seems to be an old-fashioned name for part of the Yangtze River. Having more tannin but less caffeine than a tea made out of twigs is a puzzler... Maybe these were used leaves re-dried?
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Andrew S
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Mon Apr 05, 2021 10:57 pm

Old liu an is one of my favourite teas, so I'm very interested in seeing what I can learn about it. Thanks for starting this threat @wave_code.

It certainly is not cheap, but I guess that it is not quite as bad as old pu er...

MarshalN posted about opening an entire batch of liu an quite a while ago: http://www.marshaln.com/2007/12/thursda ... er-6-2007/

Varat has posted a little bit on his website as well: http://theguidetopuerhtea.blogspot.com/ ... ishun.html

@mbanu: I assume you meant the Chan Kam Pong article and Zhou Yu articles that seem to have been plagiarised by a tea vendor... I recall the original articles being available online legitimately somewhere a while ago, but perhaps it only survives in print these days.

One of the things I'm curious about is that, given that there are so many conflicting stories on the proverbial interregnum between the end of the old era and the start of the new era, is there a definitive account of what happened in between that someone can point to or set out here?

I've seen people call liu an as being 50s, 70s, 80s, cultural revolution, and various other things. Some people seem to think that it jumped from ROC liu an to 80s zhong cha liu an, while others insist that the old methods were kept alive with the old sun yi shun tickets in some form or another in the period in between.

I'd be grateful for any wisdom that anyone can offer....

Andrew
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wave_code
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Tue Apr 06, 2021 4:00 am

cheers, nice to see more people interested in Liu an as both tea and a bit of a historical puzzle. Maybe part of it is slowly figuring out where to look for liu an over time combined with maybe a bit more of it being around at western accessible vendors I feel like finding it to even try different batches is getting a bit easier. And while it seems like there are probably a lot of inflated or lower quality disguised/mis-market baskets floating around at least in terms of price to pu-erh the incline isn't quite so steep, but once you cross a certain threshold it jumps up to unobtainable for me pretty quickly. but despite still not getting to try and extremely old ones yet if I've figured out one thing so far its that I think liu an needs a VERY long time to get where it can go, even compared to pu. Or at least that it needs a real kick start with more humid storage before being moved to something more moderate if it is going to be drunk sooner rather than later. That said I feel like I'm still really messing around a lot and figuring out my best brewing practice for the style in general trying different pots/ratios.

I do hope to get to try Varat's offerings at some point. Its a rare treat to get to try any tea of that age.

as for production totally stopping or at least changing substantially it seems to still be a debate/interesting question. for example SampleTea claims on their listing for a 70s basket-
"Some say Anhui has stop Liu An basket tea production during 50's to 80's. To be exact, Anhui Liu An tea mill has stop the Liu An basket tea production. The master from the mill ran out of job and start a home based mill producing it and sell to local herbal shop to support the family. After all, this is the only job they are good at.
Because of the medicinal effect of the tea, the demand for Liu An basket tea is high during 70's in Hong Kong and Macau. This is when most of the Liu An basket tea has been shipped to Hong Kong and Macau."
To complicate the whole thing further they also have an 80s brick, but of Liu An Gua Pian Zhuan, which I have no idea if this is green tea that was compressed and aged having nothing to do with actual Liu An. The compressed leaves look more like I'd expect to see of Gua Pian tea, but who knows to what degree oxidation vs fermentation and what the initial processing was, or if it was an attempt at imitating traditional tea but with different material. I've also seen a modern brick in that style but with a supposed Sun Yi Shun mark. I don't know enough about the production and export/politics of anything in China in that period to say, but if the main use of Liu An for many people was as medicine I can see how people would want/try to continue its production, even if maybe under less ideal or altered circumstances.

How this affected the quality and whether time could or couldn't compensate for that is another question too. I was reading a bit about and based on a couple of experiences can agree with with the idea that just because a Liu Bao for example is old doesn't mean it will be good or better than a high standard modern production with a bit of good aging. There were periods where production quality would have been very poor because the price of the tea was so low anything not made for personal consumption wouldn't have been given much care or attention, and such a tea probably also wouldn't have seen very good storage either up until the point it was old enough to be covetable. Junk can be produced at any period of time, and aging can help to make some of it into something special, but it isn't always the case and we shouldn't get too wide-eyed over a particular tea just because of the date.

While some of the younger baskets I've tried are perfectly pleasant and I'd actually maybe choose over shengs of the same age for my taste, it does seem that around 20 years is really the sweet spot of where the tea starts to get more interesting and really transform. One of my favorites still has to be the 2002 baskets that theTea has been selling. I recently decided it was time to get a whole basket and a bit extra. I think he has since gotten more or swapped some out, but the most recent batch was quite different and had clearly seen more humid 'traditional' storage- the spent leaves have the expected darker/greyer tinge, much more earthy humid flavor, some white frost. I was told more moderate dry storage baskets are coming and if I didn't like the sample I could return/swap it out which was very nice. For me to get to have a basket with that kind of storage character was tempting enough for me to keep it though, and while it is quite different I do really like it. Its been a perfect tea for this strange non-Spring we are having this year (snow again today...).
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mbanu
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Tue Apr 06, 2021 4:34 am

wave_code wrote:
Tue Apr 06, 2021 4:00 am
cheers, nice to see more people interested in Liu an as both tea and a bit of a historical puzzle. Maybe part of it is slowly figuring out where to look for liu an over time combined with maybe a bit more of it being around at western accessible vendors I feel like finding it to even try different batches is getting a bit easier.
Lots of historical surprises. For instance, some liu an was being exported to America in the early 1900s, as seen in this example menu from a 1904 issue of Hotel Monthly. It looks like it was being sold for Starbucks prices, as the standard price for tea at the restaurant menu listed above it was 5 cents a pot, while this tea was 25 cents a cup (although it did include cake). :)
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polezaivsani
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Thu Nov 10, 2022 12:30 pm

A quick heads-up, Jing Tea Shop has some Sun Yi Shun liu an ca. 2003 and 2004, though listed in a green tea section. No idea how good it is.
polezaivsani
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Sun Feb 26, 2023 7:17 pm

Another tip, Jade Leaf has some baskets seemingly hailing from YCH's reserves, https://thejadeleaf.com/collections/tea ... liu-an-tea. Again, no idea how good it is.
DailyTX
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Wed Feb 28, 2024 4:44 pm

Drinking an early 2000 Liu An tea today. It's quite an interesting tea. It has the taste of an aged/old green tea. The tea broth scent reminded me of dried seaweed. It's a very forgiving tea to brew like most hei cha. It's a matter of time, this tea will stain my duanni pot :lol:
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