Pu-erh Cakes
I’ve tried Pu-erh Teas before and am still quite new. In an effort to learn more, I am going to purchase my first cake. I’m pretty excited about prying it apart, it looks like fun! I am always envious of cakes I see and how great they must be, since everyone gets so excited!
Having never purchased a whole cake (I’ve only gotten loose samples), what should I look for? I always see beautiful names and four digit numbers (I always imagine it’s a secret code I haven’t learned)… I’m sure the age is a good indicator, too. I would love any guidance you can offer!! :)
Sample before buying. Buy from sellers with good storage. Buy from the sellers tat visit this site as they always have excellent customer service.
Good sellers that I know, in no particular order.
Yunnan Sourcing
TeaVivre
Mandala Tea
Crimson Lotus
White2tea
Whispering Pines
Misty Peak Teas
Verdant
Berylleb King Tea (eBay)
King Tea (Aliexpress)
These are just a couple off the top of my head. Others can add in as well.
You are correct on the numbers for factory cakes. An example would be a Nenghai tea factory ‘7542’ for example.
(75)- the year the blend originated in
(4)- leaf grade used
(2)- factory number, in this case it signifies the Menghai Factory.
I also have a question. If I were to buy a cake, how would I best store it? I don’t mean for aging it further, but while I’m actually using it. Obviously I can’t just tin it, but is it alright to let it stay in the wrapper in an aroma-neutral (and cat-free) place, even if it can’t be sealed up properly in between using it?
@Amgrboda, I think that would be fine. I think it needs to breathe to age. If you are going to drink it fast maybe ziploc it to keep all the nuances it has. One recommendation I follow is when you get a new cake open it up to breathe before drinking it. Most likely it was stored in a non breathable shipping unit and maybe exposed to cold that robs humidity. I would open it a week before you get into it.
Are you looking for a ripe or raw cake?
I haven’t any preference, I suppose. I think I’m leaning towards raw. I haven’t developed a taste for any one more than the other…I’m wondering if Pu just doesn’t call to me the way some others do or I just haven’t had the right ones.
Raw is the most complex in taste :)
Some raw cakes have a smokiness to them; some like it, others don’t.
Between that and bitterness, that’s probably the two things you want to determine if you want present in the tea or not.
What ends up making it a red or green light is the price.
If you are looking for Young raw cakes you can’t go wrong with Yunnan Sourcing. They sell most of their cakes in 25g sample portions so you can try them before you buy them.
@mrmopar … why? Out of everything I bought from YS (ripe wise) the 2015 Green Miracle has been my favorite
@liquid Proust, Scott is good at letting his cakes settle before rushing them to market. The aroma from a freshly fermented cake doesn’t smell like anything you would want to drink. The amount of fermentation time will affect how much of this aroma that it will have. Menghai holds their products for almost 6 months to let this dissapate.
To quote the site.
“from Spring 2014 and pressed into this lovely 250 gram cake.
Tea leaves from 50 to 70 years old tea trees were harvested in April 2014, then fermented through the summer. The tea was then aged in loose form for a few months before pressing this year.”
So this is actually a 2014 fermentation product so it has settled quite a bit. Letting it air before pressing that is the key.
Which cake are you going to buy? If you haven’t decided on one, get more samples until you find one that you really like and get a cake of that. If you want raw, AllanK had a good suggestion that yunnan sourcing has a good variety. If you want ripe, start with Menghai brand like 7572, 7262, or 7452 (my personal favorite) as Menghai has good quality ripe pu erh.
Puerh is a funny thing. I tried probably about ten different raws, and thought that pu just wasn’t for me. It was like everyone else was in on this awesome joke and I didn’t get it. Ripe was the gateway for me though – I really liked them all (Mandala and Yunnan Sourcing have some great ones), and for whatever reason I just didn’t want to give up on raw so I kept trying more and more of them. They are all so vastly different, the young and the aged, some smokey and some sweet, some bitter and some light. Eventually for me something clicked, I don’t know, I guess White2Tea’s Poundcake was like taking the blue pill, and I’ve been sliding down the rabbit hole ever since. That was my first whole cake I ever purchased, and it came months later. I still haven’t really developed a taste for aged sheng, but it wouldn’t surprise me if I did at some point. Drinking puerh changes your palate in ways you just cannot predict.
I have not really developed a taste for aged sheng either, but I keep on trying. Had the White Whale today which was interesting and a lot of people absolutely love it. I was not converted by it.
Yeah, I keep going back and forth about getting in on the December YQH group buy. I feel like I should, but even though those cakes may be a fantastic value, they certainly aren’t cheap, not for me anyway. But I’m afraid if I pass it up, months later I’ll develop a taste for aged sheng and it’ll be too late. Sometimes I think tea is turning me into a mental case, lol.
Sample first. Do swaps. Make friends with the PuRus. Hang out on the puerh of the day thread. You will learn SO much. I lucked out on the first cakes I bought – they were the 2012 Wild Monk and a Phatty Cake. That was sheer beginner’s luck, a total guess and they are superb. But try a lot of stuff and see what you like before you buy a cake and then – for your first cake? Buy an awesome one. Awesome ones don’t have to be peeyourpants expensive. But I think buying your first cake is milestone so it should be something you really like instead of an educated guess. Pu-erh is awesome.
Being a Pu-noob I spent quite a bit of time reading and trying to understand the fascination of this tea before making my first whole purchase. There is something (at least in my mind and at first) weird/different about buying leaves that are as some call it; composted and then pressed into a “cake” drinking the water from such.
My first whole cake was the Menghai 7572. I bought it from Dragon Tea House via Ebay. I too felt that the whole Pu-erh was an inside joke that I just couldn’t grasp. But then one day, I read some quote in regards to describing it to non-drinkers as being the most delicious earth. Then something kind of clicked in me as well, and I started to really enjoy drinking it. No I believe like so many others I am addicted to the stuff! I guess it’s far better than many of the other addictions one could have.
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