Tea Highlights: Pu-erh

I tend to remember my first encounters with new teas. Lapsang souchong at that ice cream cafe in my college town. Hojicha at a tea garden in San Francisco (visited in honor of the October Daye series). And a strange, rich tea labeled pu-erh at a coffee shop two doors down from my old apartment. The last was particularly surprising because all the coffee shops in my area serve the same brand of local teas, so you rarely see anything different or new. But there one morning, next to all the familiar labels, was a hand-written scrawl that didn't look like any tea I'd ever heard of. So I ordered it, and within minutes lapsang had its first true contest for my affections.

Pu-erh is a fermented and aged tea from the Yunnan province. It's usually sold in pressed bricks or cakes, and labeled with a year, though what with increased popularity, there are a variety of ways and processes different groups use to hasten the aging process, including leaving it loose. I'm still new enough that I can't talk in depth about most of this, but I will say that the bricked and labeled pu-erh I've had is far richer and more worthwhile than the loose. That said, it's also more expensive. Trade offs. If you'd like to know more about the process and history and variants (and really, who wouldn't?) the Wikipedia article is surprisingly in depth.

After that initial taste at the coffee shop, I went to my old pal Upton Teas and bought a box of pu-erh bricks that I hoarded and carefully doled out over the course of a year. I've also bought bricks from Peet's, which I used in my initial attempts at blending. But the former is no longer available and the latter has undergone some changes, so I can't speak to its current state. Instead, I'll talk to you about the three types I have in my house at the moment:

From the top left clockwise around, that's MEM Tea's loose pu-erh, pu-erh tuo cha (compressed cakes) from Upton, and "sticky rice" tuo cha also from Upton. The MEM tea is currently sold out, and I no longer remember how much it cost per ounce, but both of the Upton cakes were about $10 for 125g, which works out to something around 4.4 ounces or ~35 cakes. (So 70ish cups of tea, since a cake is good for two cups.)

The characteristic taste of pu-erh is "earthy," and that's about all you'll get from the MEM tea blend. If you've had pu-erh before, it clearly tastes like the bare minimum of what a pu-erh should be, and if you haven't, you'll taste soft, sweet, smoothness, which you may be tempted to compare to chocolate, and which never oversteeps or acquires the acerbic bitterness of most teas.

The Upton tea (not the sticky rice, we'll get to that) in comparison tastes of rich forest loam in late summer, filled with life and decay. And I know that doesn't sound like a selling point, but give it a taste some time if you can and see what I mean. This one is everything I love and want from a pu-erh, and the reason I can't give you an exact count on how many cakes came with it is because I'm not certain how many I've already had.

The sticky rice one I bought out of curiosity, and it is fascinating. Apparently there's an herb that's occasionally blended into pu-erh that smells of sticky rice, and, well, that's definitely the flavor that got added. On top of the rich earthy pu-erh, these cakes have a savory rice flavor. A lot like genmaicha, but without some of the roasty popcorn flavor that I often encounter in the green tea. It's...good? It's fascinating, for sure, and I find I'm most inclined to drink it with hearty, savory meals, but I probably won't get it again.

For blending, I've seen pu-erh paired with chocolate to great effect, but there's almost too much overlap there if that's all you're adding. I prefer to mix in sharper flavors. The mint from my Death blend and the basil from Witch's Brew, for example. Witch's Brew was particularly fun because it played up the vegetal flavors I love so much. And of course I add cinnamon to everything, but in the case of pu-erh I find it enhances the warm late season coziness that makes pu-erh a go-to comfort tea for me.

In the end, pu-erh and lapsang souchong are such inherently different teas that I see no reason to compare them, and they share the title of my favorite tea, as well as, unsurprisingly enough, the teas I most often foist on and recommend to others.