Yixing

[26uk]

What's the water check for yixing pots?
On some posts someone mentioned some water check. Can someone elaborate? Something about brewing water in the pot and tasting?

[steanze]

T_D

Key question.... does it brew a decent cup of tea??

^^ this is the most important question. The clay looks pretty decent to my eyes, I would expect it to do quite well.

[T_D]

T_D

Key question.... does it brew a decent cup of tea??

It does! It's my go-to pot for roasted oolongs. I just couldn't help but be interested in the minutiae that I don't have the knowledge to answer.

Thanks again for everyone's responses. Very much appreciated!

[.m.]

What's the water check for yixing pots?
On some posts someone mentioned some water check. Can someone elaborate? Something about brewing water in the pot and tasting?

Sounds like some test to determine how well the pot brews hot water. If one intended to brew tea in it then one might as well test with tea.

[26uk]

Sounds like some test to determine how well the pot brews hot water. If one intended to brew tea in it then one might as well test with tea.

Get out of here with your common sense

[Bok]

Sounds like some test to determine how well the pot brews hot water. If one intended to brew tea in it then one might as well test with tea.

Get out of here with your common sense

Guess it’s more of a “let water sit in it and drink” test. Some clays render water notably sweeter, thus vastly improving some teas.

Same logic applies for clay kettles.

[Kolleh]

Hi, all! I started collecting zisha pots this year off of Taobao and sort of jumped into it without reading up on it enough. Now have a ton of pots and a sinking suspicion at least some of them are fake. Is this the right place to ask for help?

[DailyTX]

Hi, all! I started collecting zisha pots this year off of Taobao and sort of jumped into it without reading up on it enough. Now have a ton of pots and a sinking suspicion at least some of them are fake. Is this the right place to ask for help?

@Kolleh
Here would be a good place to get input. Many experienced folks have provided guidance on yixing collection. Welcome to the forum

[Bok]

Hi, all! I started collecting zisha pots this year off of Taobao and sort of jumped into it without reading up on it enough. Now have a ton of pots and a sinking suspicion at least some of them are fake. Is this the right place to ask for help?

Welcome! Well, fake is relative. Pots might be really from Yixing, but still be crap and vice versa. Question will more be what kind of clay has been used and how good the craft is. Other than that everyone is on Taobao, the good and the bad ones - and then some... it’s just the larger version Amazon for China

[BriarOcelot]

Hi, all! I started collecting zisha pots this year off of Taobao and sort of jumped into it without reading up on it enough. Now have a ton of pots and a sinking suspicion at least some of them are fake. Is this the right place to ask for help?

I may be guilty of uttering heresy... but they are also just teapots. Do they function well? If so, they are good teapots. As long as they don't smell bad they are most likely okay. Do the usual hot water / hot tea rinses etc.

Yixing is largely a huge marketing fad. They do very little to affect anything to do with your tea that is much different from other vessels made from Nixing or Jianshui or any number of other clays. I'm not sure I buy all that 'matching tea to a pot' nonsense either. It was never a thing in the past.

This is, of course, just my opinion. I detect heavy dosages of bull-faeces whenever I see someone suggesting that you need to match a particular tea to a particular pot. I suspect they just want to sell more pots.

They are pretty though and have an interesting value as much as any other antique. But don't stress about it being fake. I have a few 'factory 1' pots that are perfectly fine pots, but I'm pretty sure aren't real.

[Bok]

They do very little to affect anything to do with your tea that is much different from other vessels made from Nixing or Jianshui or any number of other clays. I'm not sure I buy all that 'matching tea to a pot' nonsense either.

Clearly you have not compared enough pots to come to such a conclusion. It is quite easy to see the results of different clays in side by side comparisons, as some here have conducted.

But – I agree in a way, that most of what is on the market, be it Yixing or otherwise, does indeed have little effect on the tea, often detrimental. So the smaller the sample size, the easier it is to come to above conclusions. I myself was a not convinced of Yixing for the longest time and used other teaware, simply due to the teawares available to me at the time. Luckily, curiosity got the better of me and I challenged my own assumptions...

It was never a thing in the past.

It was never a thing in the past, as people did not own that many things and Yixing was a luxury item. Like you owned one suit and died in it, you probably only ever bought one teapot – and very likely also drank the same kind of tea your whole life – just as my father in law still does by the way. Once you make the same kind of tea long enough with any given vessel it won't really matter anyways.

They are pretty though and have an interesting value as much as any other antique.

There is a crucial difference here – actual antiques are at least 100y old, so F1 is not quite there yet... if you have tried any antiques you might find that some(not all of course) can indeed have rather dramatic effects on the tea brewing.

[BriarOcelot]

Ah! my heresy is exposed. I am new here (very) so I don't wish any offence (or to come across as a knowlessman).

I'm glad we agree on something though. I will experiment more Bok, and who knows, maybe I'll see the light someday. I'm not completely closed-minded, I promise (haha). Perhaps I was a little too strong.

I just see a lot of companies selling a lot of (pingni) pots and a lot of new drinkers buying them. I'm not sure if they really need them half the time. Or indeed if they will 'perform' like the real deal. OR if that performance is even really necessarily that big of a deal (especially to those 'new to tea', will they even notice?). Is it worth an extra $300? That buys a lot of good tea, maybe a beginner would be better just drinking a lot more tea? I dunno. Do we all need a Rolls Royce?

I sit here in my armchair wearing a fine chronograph though, which I have failed to ever use for its intended purpose. So who feels like a phoney.

I do use a selection (10 or 12 or so) of various sized and shaped silver, Duan'ni, Luni, Jianshui, Tokoname and Nixing pots (I'm fairly sure mine aren't all 'real' either). I don't own any Zhuni or Hongi pots to be fair (yet).

Now, I concede that there are differences in performance or function, but I attribute that to their shape, thickness or the pour speed primarily. Far 'less so' the clay (so far at least). I definitely do prefer certain pots for certain things. We are all guilty of developing favourites.

I've heard of the 'dulling' effect' or clays that 'remove the high notes' or 'remove bitterness' etc. etc. I'll try it out with some side by sides when I get some more decent pots.

See the abstract for this study:

Background: The flavor and quality of tea is widely believed to be associated with the pot the tea is made in. However, this claim is mostly by experience and lack solid support from scientific evidences. The current study investigated and compared the chemical compositions of oolong tea made from 6 teapot materials-Zisha, Zhuni, stainless steel, ceramic, glass, and plastic. Results: For each tea sample, polyphenols and caffeine were examined by HPLC/UV, volatile compounds by GC/MS, amino acids by LC/MS, and minerals content by ICP/MS. The results suggested that the tea infusion from Zisha and Zhuni pots contain higher levels of EGC, EGCG, total catechins, and lower amount of caffeine than the ceramic, glass, and plastic pots; and tend to have the lowest total mineral contents, potassium and volatile compounds in tea soup. The statistical difference were not all significant among Zisha, Zhuni and stainless steel pots. Conclusion: Based on the overall chemical composition in the tea infusion, Yixing clay pots (Zisha and Zhuni) produce tea infusions presumably less bitter, more fragrant and tend to contain more healthy compounds than the other pots. The results could partially explain why Yixing clay pots haves been regarded as one of the most popular teapots. The beneficial effects of long-tern repeated use of these teapots warrants further study.

I say this as an interested ceramicist (well I don't do it anymore, maybe I'll get back to that someday). I know full well what the clay composition of the pots is, and the work that goes into it, I've made clay and I've fired pots. I have a healthy respect for potters from anywhere who are so involved in the production of the clay as well as the skills it takes to produce decent pottery. May they, indeed, keep making good pots.

I will await my Eureka moment though. At that time Bok, I will think of you (and all of those slighted potters) and offer a silent prayer of forgiveness for my heresy against Yixing.

However; in brewing tea... water and tea are the base units yes? The vessel doesn't even come close to the importance of the leaf and the water in the brewing of tea. It's a distant third (at best).

But I'm getting off point (and this is more than I intended to ever write). Don't be anxious about your pots. Just use them to make good tea. If they hinder that process, throw them away. Never pass on a bad tool.

[Bok]

@BriarOcelot nice follow up writing.

I think we mostly agree, especially in that for most it won’t make any difference, as they either won’t notice, or that it won’t matter much for the kind of tea brewed.

Even if paid attention and with good teas, the differences can be minute. Only few clays(or pots better said) do leave a marked impression...

[steanze]

I will await my Eureka moment though. At that time Bok, I will think of you (and all of those slighted potters) and offer a silent prayer of forgiveness for my heresy against Yixing.

However; in brewing tea... water and tea are the base units yes? The vessel doesn't even come close to the importance of the leaf and the water in the brewing of tea. It's a distant third (at best).

I suggest to try a side by side comparison with teapots of same size and shape but different clays (I'd recommend testing duanni vs zini vs hongni), it will be an interesting experience.

Personally, I don't like ranking by importance the different elements in tea making. How bad should we take the worst water to be? And the worst vessel? There is no way to establish an equivalence between a certain amount of change in water, a certain amount of change in tea, and a certain amount of change in vessel. As a consequence, it makes little sense to compare them...

[Kolleh]

Thanks for the warm welcome! To be clear, I probably don't have a refined enough palate to notice significant differences by the type of clay, although I did roughly start to follow this guide while picking clay types, for fun and just in case: https://www.teavivre.com/info/choose-pr ... r-tea.html.

I was mostly drawn to Yixing teapots because A) they're cute, and B) I liked the idea of personalizing a pot by how it changes over time with use and through absorbing the tea you drink. That a pot becomes more special the more it's used and carries its history with it is a nice concept.

So I'm mainly interested in confirming that the pots have decent clay, or at least aren't poisoning me. I'm curious about the quality of the craftsmanship, but I'm not too fussed about it.

I suppose I'll post these one at a time, since I have way too many pots at this point and don't want to spam too many photos at once.

Here's the second one I bought, and the one I'm most worried about since I found out shortly afterward that affordable azure zisha practically doesn't exist.

It has some vertical marks around the inside of the pot that, to my understanding, mean it was probably made by hand with slabs, unless they've been faked. But other than that, I'm not sure.