I watched Olivier Assayas' film "HHH - A Portrait of Hou Hsiao-Hsien"
yesterday. The film crew visit a cafe in a town where HHH had
previously shot "A City of Sadness", somewhere in the south of Taiwan.
They have a pot of oolong re-roasted or smoked in a charcoal oven. Not
sure that I really like the sound of this, but it sparked my interest.
There was no mention of the style of oolong used. The cafe owner
herself said that it was a "rare & old fashioned" method of
preparation. It was then made in a 2 cup Yixing pot, tray and all.
Anyone come across this method of oolong prep, either in Taiwan or
elsewhere?

(The Immoral Mr Teas) writes:

> I watched Olivier Assayas' film "HHH - A Portrait of Hou Hsiao-Hsien"
> yesterday. The film crew visit a cafe in a town where HHH had
> previously shot "A City of Sadness", somewhere in the south of Taiwan.
> They have a pot of oolong re-roasted or smoked in a charcoal oven. Not
> sure that I really like the sound of this, but it sparked my interest.
> There was no mention of the style of oolong used. The cafe owner
> herself said that it was a "rare & old fashioned" method of
> preparation. It was then made in a 2 cup Yixing pot, tray and all.
> Anyone come across this method of oolong prep, either in Taiwan or
> elsewhere?

I've heard of it but not tasted it. I believe the charcoal roasting
method is called "tampei" in Taiwan.

/Lew
---
Lew Perin /
http://www.panix.com/~perin/babelcarp.html

On 17 Oct 2003 09:41:35 -0700, (The Immoral Mr
Teas) wrote:


>Anyone come across this method of oolong prep, either in Taiwan or
>elsewhere?


Message-ID: >

Can it be the 'roasted' taste is what the above thread is about? The
inexpensive oolong teas you can buy at asian shops (in nice blue,
green and red tin cans) have this 'burnt' taste that you might as well
refer to as 'roasted'... maybe...

Cheers,
Ralf


--

mail2me? add a box to the mail - anything else is dumped!

"The Immoral Mr Teas" > ha scritto nel messaggio
om...
> I watched Olivier Assayas' film "HHH - A Portrait of Hou Hsiao-Hsien"
> yesterday. The film crew visit a cafe in a town where HHH had
> previously shot "A City of Sadness", somewhere in the south of Taiwan.
> They have a pot of oolong re-roasted or smoked in a charcoal oven. Not
> sure that I really like the sound of this, but it sparked my interest.
> There was no mention of the style of oolong used. The cafe owner
> herself said that it was a "rare & old fashioned" method of
> preparation. It was then made in a 2 cup Yixing pot, tray and all.
> Anyone come across this method of oolong prep, either in Taiwan or
> elsewhere?

I have not seen "City of Sadness" nor the film on HHH, but, if what you saw
was a cilindrical basket, a little narrower at its belly, with a metal net
dividing it in two halves, which was filled with tea leaves in the uppuer
part and placed on a charcoal pit-oven, then you saw a "bei long", a
roasting basket, used for drying tea, as well for the finishing or
"re-fining" of many oolong tea.
Let me know if the description correspond
L

(The Immoral Mr Teas) wrote in message . com>...
> I watched Olivier Assayas' film "HHH - A Portrait of Hou Hsiao-Hsien"
> yesterday. The film crew visit a cafe in a town where HHH had
> previously shot "A City of Sadness", somewhere in the south of Taiwan.
> They have a pot of oolong re-roasted or smoked in a charcoal oven. Not
> sure that I really like the sound of this, but it sparked my interest.
> There was no mention of the style of oolong used. The cafe owner
> herself said that it was a "rare & old fashioned" method of
> preparation. It was then made in a 2 cup Yixing pot, tray and all.
> Anyone come across this method of oolong prep, either in Taiwan or
> elsewhere?

About a week ago I tried a new method of nurturing a yixing pot which
involved a process similar to the one above. I've noticed that tea
placed into a hot teapot releases a strong burst of fragrance.
Thinking that this might be related to aromatic waxes or oils that
could nurture my teapot, I baked the pot with tea at around 220F for 3
hours sealed within aluminum foil. The pot appears to have acquired
some fragrance and the brew from the baked leaves was extraordinary!
It was by far the best brew I've had from that tea. Both flavour and
aroma were stronger and more clearly articulated.

The tea was FunAlliance's Snowflake dan cong, the teapot was a gongfu
sized zhuni clay pot.

Regards,

Cameron Lewis

Cheers, Ralf, Lew & Livio,

Unfortunately, the documentary didn't actually show any of the
preparation of the tea - they just talked briefly about it, and there
was a brief shot at the close of the segment of pouring hot water into
the 2 cup pot, which itself was pretty much stuffed with leaves. (As
y' know, I'm a committed jar drinker, my knowledge of Gong Fu limited
to jumping on my opponent's leg and clobbering 'em on the head).

I kind of assume they smoke a lower grade woody oolong - I can't
imagine anyone smoking the delicate floral Taiwan oolongs ... but I
might be wrong.
And Lew and Livio, could either of you guide me to the written form of
the words "Tampei" and "beilong" (tones or radical or meaning)? I
assume the latter is pinyin, tampei could be mandarin or colloquial?

And finally Livio, "used for drying tea, as well for the finishing or
"re-fining" of many oolong tea."
Such as which ones? Might it have been fairly common years ago to buy
"fresher/unfinished" leaves and finishing the preparation of oolong
teas oneself?

I'll try to get to watch the doc again (the film, A CITY OF SADNESS,
meanwhile has no tea scenes in it as far as I recall, but it's very
good if you get the chance to see it as are most of his films - the
non-costume epics in my opinion) ... if it says the name of the town,
or the cafe owner, etc, I'll let folks know.

Thanks all, J

(Cameron Lewis) wrote in message om>...
> (The Immoral Mr Teas) wrote in message . com>...
> > I watched Olivier Assayas' film "HHH - A Portrait of Hou Hsiao-Hsien"
> > yesterday. The film crew visit a cafe in a town where HHH had
> > previously shot "A City of Sadness", somewhere in the south of Taiwan.
> > They have a pot of oolong re-roasted or smoked in a charcoal oven. Not
> > sure that I really like the sound of this, but it sparked my interest.
> > There was no mention of the style of oolong used. The cafe owner
> > herself said that it was a "rare & old fashioned" method of
> > preparation. It was then made in a 2 cup Yixing pot, tray and all.
> > Anyone come across this method of oolong prep, either in Taiwan or
> > elsewhere?
>
> About a week ago I tried a new method of nurturing a yixing pot which
> involved a process similar to the one above. I've noticed that tea
> placed into a hot teapot releases a strong burst of fragrance.
> Thinking that this might be related to aromatic waxes or oils that
> could nurture my teapot, I baked the pot with tea at around 220F for 3
> hours sealed within aluminum foil. The pot appears to have acquired
> some fragrance and the brew from the baked leaves was extraordinary!
> It was by far the best brew I've had from that tea. Both flavour and
> aroma were stronger and more clearly articulated.
>
> The tea was FunAlliance's Snowflake dan cong, the teapot was a gongfu
> sized zhuni clay pot.
>
> Regards,
>
> Cameron Lewis

Dear Cameron,
Reading over my original posting I realise my rambling grammar has led
to a minor confusion. I didn't actually mean that a "pot of tea" was
roasted, just that the tea leaves were, ie "a pot of oolong WHICH HAD
BEEN re-roasted or smoked in a charcoal oven". Reminds me of the final
instruction on a box of cheap chinese tea I sometimes buy ... "Never
Boil Tea!"

I'm not a Yixing user (or any other teapot; I even retired the big jar
nearly ten years ago) - others on the group most definitely are, so I
leave it up to them to comment on pot preparation.

"The Immoral Mr Teas" > ha scritto nel messaggio
m...
> Cheers, Ralf, Lew & Livio,
>
> Unfortunately, the documentary didn't actually show any of the
> preparation of the tea - they just talked briefly about it, and there
> was a brief shot at the close of the segment of pouring hot water into
> the 2 cup pot, which itself was pretty much stuffed with leaves. (As
> y' know, I'm a committed jar drinker, my knowledge of Gong Fu limited
> to jumping on my opponent's leg and clobbering 'em on the head).
>
> I kind of assume they smoke a lower grade woody oolong - I can't
> imagine anyone smoking the delicate floral Taiwan oolongs ... but I
> might be wrong.
> And Lew and Livio, could either of you guide me to the written form of
> the words "Tampei" and "beilong" (tones or radical or meaning)? I
> assume the latter is pinyin, tampei could be mandarin or colloquial?
>
> And finally Livio, "used for drying tea, as well for the finishing or
> "re-fining" of many oolong tea."
> Such as which ones? Might it have been fairly common years ago to buy
> "fresher/unfinished" leaves and finishing the preparation of oolong
> teas oneself?
>
> I'll try to get to watch the doc again (the film, A CITY OF SADNESS,
> meanwhile has no tea scenes in it as far as I recall, but it's very
> good if you get the chance to see it as are most of his films - the
> non-costume epics in my opinion) ... if it says the name of the town,
> or the cafe owner, etc, I'll let folks know.
>
> Thanks all, J


First of all: forgive me, but it was too late when I realised that I wrote
re-fining instead of re-firing. Actually all non-industrial oolong teas use
this kind of final drying. Some have a very light one (such as Baozhong and
most of China Tieguanyin), some have a middle one (such as TW high mountain
oolong- gaoshan wulong), some have a quite heavy one (yancha of Wuyishan and
TW Tieguanyin). It belongs to the operations necessary for the finishing of
"maocha", semi-processed tea. In some cases you can see tea shop keepers
doing this operation in the premises of the shop in order to keep the tea
leaves dry or to get a more "baked" tea.
It doens't involve smoking, but just drying and baking.
I suppose that "tampei" is the Taiwanese pronuonciation of mandarin (in
Pinyin written) "tanbei", charcoal firing.
Do you know Kangxi 214 radicals? If so...
TAN4: charcoal. A "mountain" at top with "ash, grey" under it
BEI4: bake over fire. Radical 86 (fire) and the left part of character "bu"
of "bufen" (part)
LONG2: basket. A bambu at top (radical 118) with a dragon under it
L

> > About a week ago I tried a new method of nurturing a yixing pot which
> > involved a process similar to the one above. I've noticed that tea
> > placed into a hot teapot releases a strong burst of fragrance.
> > Thinking that this might be related to aromatic waxes or oils that
> > could nurture my teapot, I baked the pot with tea at around 220F for 3
> > hours sealed within aluminum foil. The pot appears to have acquired
> > some fragrance and the brew from the baked leaves was extraordinary!
> > It was by far the best brew I've had from that tea. Both flavour and
> > aroma were stronger and more clearly articulated.
> >
> > The tea was FunAlliance's Snowflake dan cong, the teapot was a gongfu
> > sized zhuni clay pot.
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Cameron Lewis
>
> Dear Cameron,
> Reading over my original posting I realise my rambling grammar has led
> to a minor confusion. I didn't actually mean that a "pot of tea" was
> roasted, just that the tea leaves were, ie "a pot of oolong WHICH HAD
> BEEN re-roasted or smoked in a charcoal oven". Reminds me of the final
> instruction on a box of cheap chinese tea I sometimes buy ... "Never
> Boil Tea!"
>
> I'm not a Yixing user (or any other teapot; I even retired the big jar
> nearly ten years ago) - others on the group most definitely are, so I
> leave it up to them to comment on pot preparation.

I was aware that you meant only the tea, though as the effect of
roasting pot and tea together produces roasted tea the results are the
same. I didn't notice any roasty off-taste, just a very refined
flavour and aroma with an incredible first infusion and somewhat less
good second through fifth.

I have found a reference to a somewhat similar re-drying method on one
of Billy Mood's yixing pages. http://terebess.hu/english/yixing1.html
under "Steps of Chao Zhou Kungfu tea".

The effects on the pot after two attempts now have been quite good.
The pot has darkened very slightly, the patina seems deeper somehow,
and there is a subtle lingering fragrance. I should note that this is
not an attempt to break in the pot (which I do by simmering in tea,
not boiling!), but rather to age the pot more rapidly and encourage an
affinity with a particular tea.

Regards,

Cameron Lewis

Hi again Livio,

> ... Actually all non-industrial oolong teas use
> this kind of final drying. Some have a very light one (such as Baozhong and
> most of China Tieguanyin), some have a middle one (such as TW high mountain
> oolong- gaoshan wulong), some have a quite heavy one (yancha of Wuyishan and
> TW Tieguanyin). It belongs to the operations necessary for the finishing of
> "maocha", semi-processed tea. In some cases you can see tea shop keepers
> doing this operation in the premises of the shop in order to keep the tea
> leaves dry or to get a more "baked" tea.

Yep, this is what I was getting at. It makes sense to me but I've
never seen it in action (in fact in recent years I've not been to such
a "rustic local" tea shop that might do it - Beijing and Shanghai
shops are more commercial and normal these days).

> It doesn't involve smoking, but just drying and baking.

And maybe that was all that was being done in this cafe - the mention
of charcoal kind of put me along the smoking train of thought.

> I suppose that "tampei" is the Taiwanese pronuonciation of mandarin (in
> Pinyin written) "tanbei", charcoal firing.

That makes complete sense.

> TAN4: charcoal. A "mountain" at top with "ash, grey" under it
> BEI4: bake over fire. Radical 86 (fire) and the left part of character "bu"
> of "bufen" (part)
> LONG2: basket. A bambu at top (radical 118) with a dragon under it

All perfect sense, thanks.

J