revisions

Boseong Tea Garden, on a misty summer's morn

At the risk of tarnishing my credibility, I would like to point out a couple of mistakes I've made in past posts. In both cases, it was a result of my lack of good Korean skills that lead to my misinterpretation of what I was told. Through further questions and conversations, I've cleared things up.

The first was with "Date Aroma Puer Tea". The taste was so convincing that I actually thought that it had been infused with dates. Actually, it's the recipe, special technique and skills of the workers that give it its special taste. Technically, it's a shu-puer, but the leaves are only left to ferment for two weeks, not the usual three months. Usually, a brick puer uses leaves 7-10, the largest leaves, but this puer uses a combination of all the leaves, 1-10. Though the only thing that changed was my understanding (it's still the same tea), knowing this made me appreciate it even more.

The second was in my description of "A Traditional Way to Brew Da Hong Pao". This was one of the first things Mrs Kim ever showed me, back in '07, and I never actually tried it at home until I wrote the post, so it's likely that my memory didn't serve me well. But trying it out for myself proved to be troublesome, and for a reason. The crushed leaves are meant to me mixed with whole leave at a 3-7 ratio. Using just the crushed leaves (and apparently I crushed them too small) ended up clogging the spout and took far too long to pour. Showing my post to Mrs Kim, she also mentioned that the pot I used wasn't appropriate for cliff tea. The next time I watched her make Da Hong Pao, after adding the leaves to the pot, she simply took the butt end of the wooden tea scoop and crushed the leaves a little before rinsing. It made a terrible crunching noise in the pot, but returns an extra strong flavour for the sacrifice of the beautiful, whole leaves.

So, that should clear things up... Apologies for the misinformation, and I'll do my best for it not to happen again, though I can't guarantee anything!