New Year's Tea Resolutions

I bet this list will keep growing but I’ll start here:

1. Make new blends that make me go “wow”. Maybe something chocolatey without the cloying sweetness?
2. Clean out my cupboard. By that I mean moving my collection to a bigger cabinet! They just won’t fit anymore.
3. Take a ceramics class and make my own tea set.

I am getting into puerh. I will be sampling as wide variety as I can afford or wish to. I can be over eager when shopping online and then realize I have jumped in over my head so I am trying to take it slow.

I also want to try to drink tea everyday, if possible, and build up my Steepster account. (I just joined a couple days ago so my data is very sparse still).

Not tea related but I am trying to lose weight. Hoping to accomplish as much as possible in 2016.

Basically more of this year. I’m new to tea and there are many types that I still haven’t tried, so I just want to keep trying new teas. I’ve got a sizable order from W2T on the way now to enhance my puer knowledge.

-Try more Dancongs
-create a pumidor
-better organize my stash

so nothing too impossible

1. Buy more puerh.
2. Try not to outgrow my pumidors.

My tea purchases in 2015 were the equivalent of spraying buckshot all over the place; my plan for 2016 is to (metaphorically speaking) be a bit more of a sharpshooter with my purchases, especially now that I can rule out a whole lot of tea I do not like and rule in a Iot I do like. Having said that:

1. MOAR PUERH – GRRRR!
2. Put a shelf in my pumidor. Because #1
3. Get some good liubao
4. Focus on the oolongs I like (dark and roasty)
5. Discover more Japanese greens in the summer
6. Tea-related: work on my pottery and get competent enough to make my own cups

and last, but not least:

7. Save the major purchases for November and December, because that’s when all the great sales happen!

1. Clean out and organize my tea stash again.
2. Blog more.
3. Try more puerh.

1. Sip down more teas (29 sipdowns from over 300 teas in 2015 was awful)
2. Buy to replace rather than to grow my stash.
3. Write more reviews
4. Buy for quality rather than quantity/value. Tea is cheap enough compared to most other beverages that there is no need to buy lower quality.

5. (added later): Drink every tea I own at least once in 2016

1. Keep tea/teaware spending under $2000
2. Finish my Sommelier training
3. Begin a more in depth exploration of Pu’erh
4. Continue exploring straight oolongs (particularly more oxidized ones)

1. Clean out and give away/swap all the flavored teas (that I generally don’t like) — as well as white and most green teas (which make me feel sick).

2. Establish a reasonably priced everyday breakfast tea from a shop that hasn’t gone out of business. I’ve just run out of all my Glenwood Reserve SFTGFOP1 from The Finest Brew, but it’s not always available, or discounted enough to work as an “everyday” sort of tea.

3. Learn enough about pu’erh to figure out whether or not I like it. I’m still not sure. I’ve only tried pu’erhs that taste to me like dirt and leather, and I don’t love that flavor profile at all. But apparently some are sweet and taste like molasses? I’d like to try out some of those.

4. Find good jin jun mei for a reasonable price.

5. Find a new Oriental Beauty to replace the one from Tea Setter since they were closing shop last time I checked. And at the time, I bought the only half pound they had left.

6. Establish some brand loyalty with companies that aren’t going out of business and that don’t close erratically for half the year with no announcement or explanation.