Cleaning: Awakening & Resetting Unglazed Ceramics / Yixing

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Baisao
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Mon Nov 14, 2022 11:57 pm

Not descaling until it is a problem probably avoids the discomfort of adjusting to water that will taste different. Someone becomes habituated to the tastes of their water from a scaled-up kettle, removes the scale, and now the water doesn’t have the same characteristics and seems unpleasant. They will likely grow accustomed to the flavor produced by their cleaned kettle after a half dozen sessions. And the process repeats.
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pedant
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Tue Nov 15, 2022 2:26 am

botlofchaz wrote:
Mon Nov 14, 2022 11:29 pm
Did you descale your kettle because it wasnt functioning properly? I've read in a couple of places now that descaling can affect the characteristics of tea and therefore should not be done. The last place I read that was on Hojo's website... whether there is any validity to it, I'm not sure. But curious to hear if there are pros/cons to descaling.
i just did it because i was bored.
Baisao wrote:
Mon Nov 14, 2022 11:57 pm
They will likely grow accustomed to the flavor produced by their cleaned kettle after a half dozen sessions.
i agree. mine's already improving after several refills. i would say that not all of it is habituation to the new state of the kettle, though. the first few sessions were objectively bad, and i think that's just how it goes when you descale a stainless kettle.
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debunix
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Tue Nov 15, 2022 8:31 am

I descale my kettle when it can’t since temperature properly because the scale is too thick over the temperature sensor.
botlofchaz
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Tue Nov 15, 2022 11:25 pm

Thanks for all of the responses!
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Baiyun
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Thu Jan 19, 2023 1:10 am

I just did a reset on a heavily tea stained pot yesterday:

- Overnight soak in sodium bicarbonate and water to lift stains
- Scrub with a toothbrush and a thick paste made from sodium bicarbonate and a little water
- Neutralise it with a quick white vinegar bath
- A few boiling water rinses and sun drying

Came out looking brand new with no smells at all, but I should add that it was not very porous clay either.

The overnight soak really loosened everything up and the abrasive paste treatment took care of the rest.

If there are non-tea stains or ancient sludge present, it may not do the trick.

However, I feel comfortable recommending this approach because the chemicals are mild and directly food safe.
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Victoria
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Thu Jan 19, 2023 2:35 pm

@Baiyun thanks for sharing your process. I do the same with mild staining and build up on porcelain, unglazed as well as glazed teapots with success as well.
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Baiyun
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Mon Oct 09, 2023 8:43 pm

After taking a handful of new pots into service and resetting a couple, I wonder what people here found to be a sort of peak pot performance (PPP!) sweet spot. It seems to me like a new or freshly reset pot is generally dry and hungry, and performs suboptimally for a while until it had its share of tea to glow up a bit, but conversely, I suspect that a pot can deteriorate in performance, or at least noticeably change characteristics, if it has been clogged with tea oils to the point where the clay, for which it may be prized, does no longer interact as well with the presently brewed liquor. Goes against that whole ancient seasoning lore, which does not make a lot of sense to me to begin with.

If that is in fact so, I wonder whether people do reset their pots at some stage, without any major contamination forcing it. I assume this may be such a gradual process that it is hard to pinpoint when to do this, perhaps just a sense that creeps in after several hundreds or thousands of sessions in a pot?
.m.
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Mon Oct 09, 2023 10:03 pm

I reset them when they start to feel a bit dirty, like when the interior is to a substantial degree covered with residues, or when putting a nice tea in them doesn't feel right anymore. The first one or two sessions after it might be a bit awkward, but afterwards the pot starts to feel right again.
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Baiyun
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Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:12 pm

.m. wrote:
Mon Oct 09, 2023 10:03 pm
I reset them when they start to feel a bit dirty, like when the interior is to a substantial degree covered with residues, or when putting a nice tea in them doesn't feel right anymore. The first one or two sessions after it might be a bit awkward, but afterwards the pot starts to feel right again.
Any indication how long it takes until you get to that point? I appreciate it will depend on the clay and tea types brewed in it.
And if you do, do you just do a bicarb/vinegar/soak/toothbrush/rinse treatment?
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Baisao
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Tue Oct 10, 2023 2:45 am

Baiyun wrote:
Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:12 pm
.m. wrote:
Mon Oct 09, 2023 10:03 pm
I reset them when they start to feel a bit dirty, like when the interior is to a substantial degree covered with residues, or when putting a nice tea in them doesn't feel right anymore. The first one or two sessions after it might be a bit awkward, but afterwards the pot starts to feel right again.
Any indication how long it takes until you get to that point? I appreciate it will depend on the clay and tea types brewed in it.
And if you do, do you just do a bicarb/vinegar/soak/toothbrush/rinse treatment?
I just go on feel/memory for when it is past that sweet spot. And I use sodium bicarbonate. Most of my pots develop this very slowly since I rinse them with hot water after use.
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Baiyun
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Tue Oct 10, 2023 7:48 am

Baisao wrote:
Tue Oct 10, 2023 2:45 am
I just go on feel/memory for when it is past that sweet spot. And I use sodium bicarbonate. Most of my pots develop this very slowly since I rinse them with hot water after use.
Seems like a thing people do then, reset their pots based on build-up, not just those transformational first resets on old pots (which are definitely the most satisfying to look at here). I still thought most people try to get their pots as seasoned as possible, but I like them unclogged, and also rinse them with boiling water after each use to keep them clean and speed up drying. My modern Zhuni pots seem to take forever before any build up is visible, but my older Hongni builds up with dark deposits relatively fast, either due to the clay, the teas I brew in it, or likely both. I no longer have reservations about doing bicarb-vinegar resets after doing it once.
.m.
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Tue Oct 10, 2023 8:31 am

Baiyun wrote:
Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:12 pm
.m. wrote:
Mon Oct 09, 2023 10:03 pm
I reset them when they start to feel a bit dirty, like when the interior is to a substantial degree covered with residues, or when putting a nice tea in them doesn't feel right anymore. The first one or two sessions after it might be a bit awkward, but afterwards the pot starts to feel right again.
Any indication how long it takes until you get to that point? I appreciate it will depend on the clay and tea types brewed in it.
And if you do, do you just do a bicarb/vinegar/soak/toothbrush/rinse treatment?
I have quite a few pots that are in a rotation and not used equally, so each acquiring stains at a different rate. And I also often leave the leaves sit in them for several days. Maybe it takes 2 years to get to the point where I decide to reset it.
Usually I use sodium percarbonate, it is much more effective than baking soda. Put a teaspoon of it inside, submerge in hot water bath to soak for 1 hour, some toothbrush cleaning, good rinse under a tap, and one or two rinsing steeps with boiling water. Then I use spent leaves for the first brew, or brew a tea with a robust taste.
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Baiyun
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Tue Oct 10, 2023 8:57 am

.m. wrote:
Tue Oct 10, 2023 8:31 am
And I also often leave the leaves sit in them for several days.
:shock:

I haven't tried percarb yet, mostly because I tend to have bicarb on hand for porcelain. I usually do a warm bicarb soak, followed by light scrubbing with a chunk of loofah, warm white vinegar soak to neutralise, finishing with boiling water rinses. Never had to contend with any tough staining though.
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Victoria
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Tue Oct 10, 2023 2:03 pm

Baiyun wrote:
Tue Oct 10, 2023 8:57 am
I haven't tried percarb yet, mostly because I tend to have bicarb on hand for porcelain. I usually do a warm bicarb soak, followed by light scrubbing with a chunk of loofah, warm white vinegar soak to neutralise, finishing with boiling water rinses. Never had to contend with any tough staining though.
I also just use baking soda and vinegar for cleaning most teaware, only using sodium percarbonate as a last resort (heavily impacted/impossible to clean) because it seems to strip the clay too clean requiring the process of resetting.
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Baisao
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Tue Oct 10, 2023 2:09 pm

Victoria wrote:
Tue Oct 10, 2023 2:03 pm
Baiyun wrote:
Tue Oct 10, 2023 8:57 am
I haven't tried percarb yet, mostly because I tend to have bicarb on hand for porcelain. I usually do a warm bicarb soak, followed by light scrubbing with a chunk of loofah, warm white vinegar soak to neutralise, finishing with boiling water rinses. Never had to contend with any tough staining though.
I also just use baking soda and vinegar for cleaning most teaware, only using sodium percarbonate as a last resort (heavily impacted/impossible to clean) because it seems to strip the clay too clean requiring the process of resetting.
It really doesn’t.
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