A November Walk

No tea today. No unnecessary words. Just some impressions of today's walk in the woods surrounding the village I live in. Impressions of this Autumn.

Whole Spring, One Tall Glass

2012 Yunnan Gao Shan Cui Ming.

Only now I realize how much I missed watching the young leaves; how I missed their dancing in the glass.

Happy Easter and beautiful spring to everyone!

New Sun for the Leaves

Early Sunset, Happy New Year

This Autumn

As you may have noticed, this blog hasn't been very active since the second half of September - I am very busy at the moment. Please accept this humble apology and stay patient - I will resume posting as soon as possible, hopefully by the end of this month or the beginning of November. Many blog-related things await me in the near future - another trip to Brno and its charming tearooms, possible visit to Vienna (any suggestions for interesting tea places worth paying a visit there?) as well as many new exceptional teas to try.

Until then, I hope you all have the most wonderful and colorful autumn.

Within Today's Leaves

As I have already mentioned a couple of time on this blog, I am not much of an avid Puerh drinker, consuming it only occasionally. However and considering this fact, I seem to have an unusual luck to find unintentional things while disassembling the cakes - (maybe) surprisingly, especially the "high-end" ones.

This definitely is neither the first nor the last bug for me to find in a good Sheng Puerh. The initial, maybe a second-long reaction of my brain is usually obnoxiousness (I've never really been on the best terms with bugs); just then, however, I realize the exact opposite, the positive side of such find. Can tea get any closer to nature and can it be any purer from any kinds of chemicals and pesticides than this, attracting (and, unfortunately, taking) so much life even during its processing stages?

From this point of view, finding bugs within pressed cakes is a good sign and, at least for me, possibly better than any shiny "Organic" sticker on the packaging.

By the creek and by the forest

Just a nice weekend, spent away from civilization, surrounded by deep forest.

Accompanied only by the sound of the creek's pure water's flow, tea means so much more.

Tea in the Park, Year Two

Accompanied by gentle breeze and mild sunshine, I met with old friends today and headed towards the oldest public park in Bratislava, Sad Janka Krala. We decided to repeat the event from last year, when we met at the exact same place with one purpose in minds - to enjoy a bit of silence in nature and drink fresh spring green teas right under the sky.

This Saturday seemed to be an ideal day for such a meeting, being delightfully warm and sunny – similarly to last year, we enjoyed two 2011 teas today, both green and Chinese. The first was Hai Nan Bai Sha Lu about which I wrote last month; the second, picked about a month later, was Wu Yuan Ming Mei, originating in Jiangxi province.

Drinking tea outside is a completely different experience from drinking it at home – there is something very pleasant in the sight of fresh leaves, slowly unfolding in water, just as if they were dancing for the singing birds.

This impression is even strengthened by the trees above our heads, reflected in cups filled with mild tea.

Escaping the city rush at least for a moment often seems priceless - and so does the opportunity to spend at least a bit of our rare time with long unseen friends and welcome spring by drinking its first harvest.

Tranquil Afternoon

January days

I've been terribly busy since the New Year's Eve and will probably stay busy at least until the end of January. As if it weren't enough, the weather here in Bratislava decided to contribute to my bad mood and tense even more, staying rainy, cloudy and cold all the time – it even went so far as to breaking the rainfall record with the biggest amount of downpours in history of many years. That basically means the sky is dark all the time, whether it's day or night and, in it's worst stage, we were continuously unable to see the sun at all for more than a week.

As weather generally tends to affect my mood a lot and I am a big fan of spring, you can imagine the impact it has on me.

What saves my sanity at such times is, without a big surprise, tea. Lately, I've been enjoying almost exclusively darker oolongs, namely various kinds of Yancha, Taiwanese Bai Hao and even one interesting Japanese oolong from Saitama (about which I'm going to write, hopefully in the near future). My consumption of Japanese greens decreased rapidly, as I need at least a bit of natural light to truly enjoy them.

Right now, I'm drinking a simple, solid basic grade of 2010 Shui Xian, that kind of tea which by all means doesn't surprise, yet definitely doesn't disappoint at the same time. Right now, it seems better than anything, warming up my body as well as mind.

Today's weather is weird. Even so, it brightens my mood more than anything – in one minute, the sky is dark and strong wind is blowing, in another, the sun begins shining and it seems like if there have never been any clouds... And it goes on, changing all the time like this, as if these two opposites were fighting in war of conquering the day.

These sunny moments are precious to me; they may be short, but even the simple fact that they showed up is really joyful.

It has just started to rain again as I'm writing this.

And yes, as most of you probably figured out, the point of this post is that I am neither dead nor did I gave up blogging. May your days be sunnier than mine, friends!

Christmas & 2010 Sencha Fukamushi Yabukita 3rd Prize Winner

There is something about spending Christmas in the countryside; something one can hardly achieve in the city. This year, we decided to move for the holidays to our house located in a lovely little village to the north of Bratislava, near the town of Myjava. This house is located close to the forest in a quiet mountainous area (the upper picture is taken right in front of its door); together with a bit of snow, this resulted in really magical Christmas.

I've returned to Bratislava three days ago and decided to write one more post this year today.

Just like the competition grade Gyokuro Saemidori I wrote about in previous post, a sample of this tea was kindly sent to me by Martin Spimr of Teamountain. Originating in Shizuoka and picked in May from Yabukita cultivar, it competed in National Tea Competition of Japan, where, with an amount of f 186 points out of 200, it received the third prize in Fukamushicha category.

The package is opened and reveals leaves, which are typically short as a result of deeper steaming; what is unusual on these, however, is their color – light green, almost yellow, yet still shiny and overally very attractive. Their smell is very humble, fresh, predominantly fruity and has tones of apricots, peaches and blackberries.

Because of the higher fragmentation of its leaves, this Sencha is prepared in a small kyusu with mesh filter instead of my favorite shiboriashi. The first infusion is very opaque and has color similar to that of dry leaf – yellowish green. Its taste is very fruity, complex, with vivid hint of umami and freshness, which somehow reminded me of Nunosawa Shincha I'd been enjoying at the beginning of this summer.

The second infusion is brewed only for a short while, resulting in even more opaque, almost non-transparent yellow color and very smooth, harmonic and complex taste with tones of young fruit, milk and umami. The overall feeling of this infusion is a bit warmer, less fresh and lacks the similarities to Shincha. The aftertaste is very humble and mild, quite sweet and once again predominantly fruity.

The third infusion is similar to the second in color and its vivid opaqueness. While still maintaining the fruity sweetness and umami of previous infusions, this brew is now a bit sharper, mouthfilling and somehow heavy.

One more infusion is made of these leaves, resulting in a bit woodsy, warm brew and fruity, full aftertaste, already a bit flat.

I have to admit that I'm not a big fan of Fukamushi teas – I tend to avoid them because of their almost aggressive sharpness and something I would call “fake deepness”. Purity and complexity of Asamushi somehow seems to fit me better. This tea, however, is an exception to some extent, being unusually humble and harmonic, even in further infusions.

May the new year be really successful and filled with good tea and happiness for all of you.

Prague and its tea

Even though this weekend was mostly a rainy one for central Europe and not at all pleasant for any kind of outdoor activities, I decided to use the opportunity to, after very long time, once again visit probably one of most famous cities in the world - Prague.

Apart from being one of the most densely visited places in Europe...

...and, therefore a growing tourist paradise overfull of hotels, souvenir shops and restaurants of all kinds, Prague is also known for its large variety of teahouses, teashops and, together with smaller and less famous Brno, a center of Czech tea culture.

At this point, it's a pity that I don't know the city itself that much - the main difference from Brno, where I always know what teahouse I'm heading to, is that I've personally experienced only one teahouse in Prague so far.

Still, this place definitely is worth mentioning.

Cha Dao is located right next to the main railway station (and I was able to locate it only thanks to this) and is ran by the same people as online shop Teanet. As they are of Chinese origin, the whole teahouse is decorated in quite a traditional style, giving it unique atmosphere and the advantage of being quite different from all teahouses in my hometown Bratislava, which are generally a mixture of Chinese, Japanese, Indian and Arabic inspirations with European influence and can often seem quite disparate.

Menu of Cha Dao also comprises mostly traditional Chinese and Taiwanese teas, available in wide range of grades, from average to the top. There are, however, some Japanese teas in their offering as well, though I decided to order this 2010 Huang Jin Gui oolong from Anxi. Expect a post on this tea in the near future.

In the end, here is a question for those of you who know Prague better than I do or have visited in in the past and had some interesting tea-related experience - where to go and what to visit? I want to focus more on Prague's teahouses the next time I visit it, which, I hope, will be soon.

Tea in Liptov

As I have already said in my previous post, I spent five days out of the city, in a beautiful region of Liptov in northern Slovakia, just close to High Tatras mountains - surrounded only by nature and good friends.

This is going to be a picture post rather than informative, as I have this strong need to share at least a bit of atmosphere of this wonderful place.

photo by Martin Hatala, a friend of mine

First day, I found my favorite spot for tea drinking - quite a big grass-field, located on small hill. This is the look-out from this grass-field, draped in morning mist.

There is nothing better than good Japanese tea, consumed in a place like this.

Lying in the grass, just with tea, sun, breeze and silence.

...I drank this Tokunaga Seicha Tamaryokucha from Ureshino.

Just a few minutes of walk from the place when we resided, you would find Kvačianska valley. There were few traditional Slovak wooden houses in this place, including historical water-mill.

Summer, cubes of ice and...

Shinobi-cha, traditional Japanese way of ice-brewing, is a real test of patience. It can take hours for all the ice to melt - but it definitely is worth it, as the best qualities of tea are even improved and sharpened.

Most suitable for this kind of brewing are high-quality Japanese green teas - it's originally supposed to be used for Gyokuro, but Sencha and Kabuse are great as well.

Still, you can experiment - it's interesting to try also Chinese steamed green teas, for example.

Meng Ding Cui Yu 2010.

All you need is good tea, ice and... patience, a lot of patience.

I'm going to shut myself out of civilization for next five days - with no internet, television or even a proper radio signal.

Sometimes it's nice, just to read and relax all day like this.

Until then, enjoy the summer!

Tea in the park

Just a while after lunch today, I met with friends and we went to the park to celebrate the return of nice weather and spring. We drunk two 2010 Chinese green teas.

In the heart of Slovakia's biggest city, bustling with hundreds of thousands people, right next to the business borough...

Is the oldest public park in central Europe, Sad Janka Krala.

We had some Pre Ming Yunnan Mao Feng and Meng Ding Cui Yu, both wonderfully fresh and delightful.

And for me, tea always tastes best when shared with friends, especially in nature.

It also was a nice turnover from the hectic atmosphere of city; spending whole afternoon just like this - watching the sky, sipping the tea, listening to the trees and having some calm conversation with people I like.

Have a nice day, too.