Steaming hard pressed puerh

Puerh and other heicha
Post Reply
.m.
Posts: 877
Joined: Wed Oct 11, 2017 3:26 pm
Location: Prague

Sun Dec 20, 2020 7:37 am

The method of steaming hard pressed tuochas, jinchas, bricks, cakes etc. to break them apart has been circulating around for a long time and has been a bit of a controversial topic. For example, TeaDB writes "... I would caution most inexperienced people to avoid this. Just live with some leaf breakage like the rest of us." While i agree with this advice, sometimes i don't follow even my own advice. So i thought i might share a bit of my experience.

First some remarks:
- Steaming pressed puerh to break it apart is not a reversal of the original steaming to press the leaves together, it's nothing like that: unless the pressing is light, in which case there is no reason to do this, it is very hard for the steam to penetrate inside.
- The goal is not to try to separate the leaves using steam. This could take several hours at the end of which the tea would likely be completely ruined.
- The goal is to moisturize the leaves a little bit to make them less brittle, perhaps even slightly pliable, so that less leaf breakage occurs when one tries to break the mass with a pick.

The tea: 2007 YQH Jincha - well known for its hardness, it would probably cost more if it were more lightly pressed in a cake.

Method:
- First i use a pick to carefully separate as much material as i can without too much breakage. The leaves near the surface run in layers parallel to the surface, and with some patience quite a lot of the material can be separated in nice chunks. I manage to get about half of the material this way. I stop when all i'm getting is just small broken bits.
- Now comes the steaming of the core. I bring some water in a pot to boil, turn off the heat and wait until the boiling stops. I don't want to scorch the leaves with boiling steam, nor do i want the tea to become dripping wet with condensation. I want a very slow gentle steam, more like what one would use to steam one's head to open sinuses. I leave the core in a strainer inside the covered pot for about 15-20mins. Then i proceed with the pick as before. The leaves are moisturized to maybe about 1cm deep an i manage to take of most of the material in nice layers (what looked like a complete mess reveals to still have a bit of layered structure). The dry bit that is left could be resteamed, but it is too small to bother so this time i just break it in half with a brute force.
- The dry chunk are placed in a mylar bag with a small boveda pack, and the steamed ones are dried overnight (the appartment is dry so it dries fast) and placed in another mylar bag with a small boveda.

Test:
Two months later i compare the dry and the steamed material. It's not a fair test since the outer layers and the core had different levels of compression and likely aged a bit differently. Also the teapots i use are not identical. Anyway, I'm not detecting any obvious difference (i have a slight impression the steamed material is a bit smoother, but not to the point to be meaningful). I will likely proceed to mix the two parts together.

How is the tea: It has a good thickness and leaves a strong lasting aftertaste at the back of the throat. The energy is pleasantly invigorating and feels very nice. It's not a high end stuff, but at $95 for 300g the Jincha beats easily most of its mid-grade competitors (such as 2013 XG Love Forever, or the 2001 Zhongcha Huangyin from TWL,... ), but this is of course a completely subjective valuation.

In the picture: the jincha, and the steamed chunks of tea from the core.
Attachments
DSCF5766.JPG
DSCF5766.JPG (197.92 KiB) Viewed 2322 times
DSCF5761.JPG
DSCF5761.JPG (179.94 KiB) Viewed 2322 times
User avatar
BriarOcelot
Posts: 43
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2020 1:42 pm
Location: Montreal

Sun Dec 20, 2020 9:45 am

Interesting. I've been curious about trying this with some notoriously rock hard Xiaguan tuo. The pic looks pretty nicely broken apart, though I find the XG mushrooms a bit looser than some of their other tuo (Jia Ji, Te Ji, gong-tuo etc).

I'd seen quite a few discussions about steaming as a way to loosen these up, but I've always been too wierded out by the thought of intentionally dampening the cake or exposing it to that kind of heat and humidity. I guess trying it on a $9 tuo is no great loss.

My thinking in the past was, 'XG tuo already seems composed mostly of broken leaves anyway.' So picking away at them I figured it wouldn't be much different...

However, after having laboured hard with picks for a while, I'm more inclined to try softening them up a bit (age does seemingly little, I have XG tuo from the 90's that aren't that much looser).

Also, I have some Gu Shu tuo coming and I'd prefer not to hack all that nice leaf (or at least, I expect it to be nicer leaf) apart.

When I get around to it (I'm nearing the end of a jar, so soon) I'll try to take a compaison pic of dry broken and steamed.
User avatar
pedant
Admin
Posts: 1516
Joined: Fri Sep 29, 2017 4:35 am
Location: Chicago
Contact:

Sun Dec 20, 2020 2:02 pm

thanks. i have never read a better writeup of the process.
User avatar
mbanu
Posts: 962
Joined: Fri May 03, 2019 3:45 pm

Sun Dec 20, 2020 2:06 pm

Are people steaming using a steamer or steaming using a microwave? I don't have much experience here, but I've steamed a couple mini-tuos in a microwave and they fall apart immediately.
User avatar
BriarOcelot
Posts: 43
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2020 1:42 pm
Location: Montreal

Sun Dec 20, 2020 3:56 pm

mbanu wrote:
Sun Dec 20, 2020 2:06 pm
Are people steaming using a steamer or steaming using a microwave? I don't have much experience here, but I've steamed a couple mini-tuos in a microwave and they fall apart immediately.
The OP stated that they leave the broken pieces sitting in a strainer suspended over the steaming water (off the heat, after boiling). With the lid on. Also mentioned that he was trying to avoid 'actively steaming' the tea (which I've seen people do before and is what I suspected wasn't a good idea). I would guess microwaving might be a bit too aggressive (it's effectively cooking it right?).

I asked a friend about this a long time ago (his dad actually, who drank Puerh).

His method was to steam a damp cloth in a steamer. Then he'd wrap the tuo in tissue (kitchen paper) and then wrap that tightly with the steaming hot damp cloth and leave it (switched off) pot with the lid on. He would then wait until it had cooled and would pick it apart. Only big diff is he hadn't picked it apart first.

I suppose that's a similar process.
.m.
Posts: 877
Joined: Wed Oct 11, 2017 3:26 pm
Location: Prague

Mon Dec 21, 2020 1:35 am

@BriarOcelot Using a cloth to wrap the tea is quite an interesting idea - i'm not sure whether good or bad, maybe depends on the fabric. 8-) In any case the principle should be to minimize the damage. If reasonably nice chunks can be separated dry then i think it's preferable, but if the level of breakage gets very high then a bit of steaming can be worth trying.
@mbanu :o :o :o :P
Post Reply