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I doubt this Imperial Topaz follows traditional oolong processing. Also Darjeeling teas are not oolongs at all. They are just lightly oxidized black tea. Detail explanation of the difference already covered in Leo’s writing in this site.
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That is interesting. For me, I never make Longjing tea with water “a little bit lower temperature than 100°C”. Between 80 to 90 is good. I think when a tea is not good enough, whatever you do to it may make it only a little better.
A tasteless tea, a bad taste tea, a horrible tea etc can happen because of quality, regardless of your brewing technique!
When it is hot like that, I much prefer Huangshan Maofeng, or Gyokuro, or Nepalese half-fermented black tea in the morning. When not so hot, I always have a few cups of good Longjing.
People use pins and knives that are produced especially for plying tea bricks or tea cakes. You just pierce the tool on a looser and thin side of the compressed tea and ply it. Just be careful not to hurt yourself.
I myself use a nice letter opener to do it. Same thing.
Tea Guardian has been my tea bible since I discovered it in its previous generation. Tea Hong has been my primary source of tea also since its previous version. I have not seen any more reliable tea education or teashop like Leo Kwan’s. I live in Hong Kong therefore I can go to many real shops or shops in China to buy tea but I prefer to buy online from Tea Hong. Although I have not tried all the teas Leo provide, but I have tried many good ones. I have bought many kinds many times so I can learn many ways of steeping them for better taste. I think although the infusion tips in the website has not mentioned using short time, but it has not mentioned using only long time either for many teas. Because I have found many teas very enjoyable using gongfu style in the gaiwan and better than long time infusing. For example, many oolong teas, puer teas, and black teas are like that. I use more time than 20 seconds, as Leo teaches in the websites, and experiment with different weight of tealeaves.
I think a good gaiwan is also cheaper than a good teapot. In my opinion, a teapot is better when brewing using long time or for a lot of tea, and a gaiwan is better when brewing for shorter time and not a lot of tea. I most of the time use gaiwan when only myself or myself and a friend drink tea.
The famous mountains has very many old trees for high class material for making into puer tea cakes. Taste is much deeper than ordinary tea leaves. When you brew raw puer, always use high class quality and do not brew so long in the beginning for better taste. Also when good old tea tree tea leaves are made into shu puer, the taste is more different and deeper. There is high mountain music 山韻 in taste. Ordinary tea leaves not in comparison
