New Clay

 
We test new clays regularly and there is nothing so special about that. But clay I used for this teapot can be labeled as fully natural. It was picked by our friend near her house, when some workers were making trench for water pipe. Yes, she is potter and living in village which is known for traditional ceramic, she is always looking around for local clays.

 Few months back, she give me backet of rough material to try. After soaking in water, sieving, drying and a lot of kneading I got few kilos of a bit too sandy, yet nice clay. Few tests later I created several teapots and some cups to see how they will stand the fire. On pictures here you can see first of those teapots. It was fired by one of our students in our small wood kiln last weekend. I am happy about the final result. And I was even more happy that Michal Zajacek of Harmony of Tea was present during unloading of that kiln. As photographer he is professional and his passion for tea is very live. What a combination! Thank you Michal.

This unglazed teapot can hold 120ml. I put some dry horsetail weed on the top before firing- it created the green-yellow ring on the lid. The clay reminds me some shigaraki pieces I saw. I hope to get more of it soon. I am quite curious how it will work with tea and how it is going to age.

Thank you for reading!

Yiwu MaoCha to drink in 2023

After testing the MaoCha from TeaUrchin, I coudl not help myself, but there was idea hovering at the back of my mind. How woudl such fine, clean and yet powerfull tea age? What difference will make if it will be maocha and not a cake? I do not belive in my storage condition to that point that I would invest in few tongs of  tea which is not, let say, from one of the cheapest. Anyway, I have know that I would go back to this question again and again with another fresh leaves so I was thinking about going from ideas to actions. When Eugene of TeaUrchin offered me the Maocha for friendly price (in order to make me happy and also to make space for fresh, 2013, tea leaves) I asked him to send me all what they have left. They have prepared several hundred grams of Luo Shui Dong and Manz Huan in small sample bags. Those will serve us my thank-you-for-your-support gifts for my customers.

And then there was also 500g of Gao Shan Zhai, which was, based on my testing notes, the winner of my testing. I am going to keep those leaves for myself. The idea is to let it sealed (waxed) in ceramic jar for 30  20 10years. You may say that using the wax is not nessesery. Thruth is, that it have to be there. Other wise it would be too tempting to not open it several times a year (at least), that I know. I used clean natural beeswax and label it with some basic informations.

 I was more then supriced how bulky can 500g of maocha be. I have used Mirka's ceramic jar which was made for 200-250g cakes and it was close shave. You can fit there nine 250g cakes, which makes 2.25kg of tea. Or, after light shaking, you can put there 500g of this Gao Shan Zhai. Some sources say that pressing tea was invented for better transportation and storage, and here we can see the point.

Call for expressions of interest: During April of 2023 I will open this jar and I will be happy to share with anyone around. If you are interested, please write that event in to your calendar. Just let me know that you are interested in advance (during March 2023 will be best). Cup of eleven years old Maocha from Gao Shan Zhai will be ready for you.

note: In Czech, we had this proverb (or rather pearl of wisdom): Plant a three, Build a house, and Father a son. I have to say I miss there "Stash a tea" When the three will be tall and bear a fruits, your son will be looking for his own house, you can sit quiet in your chair and break the seal on one of yours tea jars...

Thank you for reading!

Gem number fourteen- The End of the Winter

This new Gem is already with us for a while now. I was still waiting for a sun to make pictures, which will make a justice to that piece. But the winter did not want to give up, sky was keeping to be steely grey and some flake of snow have been landing on my hairs even yesterday, seventh of April. But today, the brake is here. Morning was freezy, yet sunny blue. And I know, we will sit on the fresh green grass, sipping brew of fresh tea leaves from 2013 harvest pretty soon. Really looking forward to it!
Till that, enjoy those "End of the Winter" pictures. I can imagine that for some pre-QingMing Dragon Well it would do a great job.

And one more thing...before looking at new pot, please say goodbye to the Gem number four "A Stone behind grass". My friend, who have reserved this piece, is now on his trip around tea gardens of Yunnan. But I  believe that he will steep some 2013 maocha in it soon.






For more pictures of the new piece please visit this page. If the Ten Gems of The Ten Kilns project is new for you, then please read this post first.

Thank you for reading. 

And of course, enjoy some fresh spring teas! As every spring, it is once-in-a-lifetime...

Heating water on charcoal- part two: Stoves and Kettles

Promised for ages, here it is: The post about stoves and kettles for boiling water for our tea. Since The Part one I was using and testing different stoves with different kettles. We were trying new clays, shapes and glazes and we had some succesful combinations as well as failures. The first part of this story was focused on charcoal itself and on how to use it. But as I have few new findnings about things which I have already spoken of there, I will start with those.

So some quick notes first:

- Even if you are not washing your charcoal, make sure it is dry enough. I find out that even opened bag of charcoal may absorb some air moisture. The charcoal will work but with much more smoke and smell, especially during lighting. So, if you would like to have smokeless time - dry your charcoal and keep it closed in dry place.

- If you are making tea outside, the heating water will, most likely, take more time. Especially cold, windy day (which can call for nice outdoor tea session) can be tricky. Moving air is cooling the stove, kettle and moves the heat all directions. It may seems to be marginal but lets try it and you will see. The putting the stove on sheltered place and using more of well lighted coal can fix that.

- Another combination which can slow your heating down is too big kettle or with wide bottom on small stove. Some stoves work with wide range of kettles, from big tetsubins to small glass boilling teapots. But usually there is certain size of the kettle which works best. Shortly: If you close the top of the stove with the kettle, there will be no draft and the fire will be inefficiant.

Stoves
 
 There are many stoves or heaters around the world. I have experinces mainly with our own and I am going to talk about those. Our stoves are, basically, of two kinds. I call them "with the sieve grate" and the second one "with the flat grate" Those with sieves are Mirka's original invention and I am glad to admid that those works, in most cases, better. On other hand the stand or flat grate system allows shapes, which are not easy to make with sieve. To understand more, please take a look at picutres.

In first case there is kind of sieve, which works both as grate and as a place where the kettle sits. Great thing about this kind of stoves is that you can use charcoal of almost all sizes and shapes. You can put there big pieces (as far as they can fit there) as well as fragments from the bottom of your bag. Just if you are using your stove for more then one and half hour, still feeding it with new charcoal, you will need to clean holes in the sieve. I use old chopstick and it works just fine.

The flat grate is made as a stand and sit on the bottom of the stove. Or there is just grate which sit, thanks to shape of the stove, on walls of the stove. I like this style, but the burning of the charcoal is more tricky. You have to have rather bigger pieces of the charcoal and you need pay more attention how you set it up. Those simly needs more care.

To make sieves and grates more thermal shock resistant, Mirka mixes her own mixture of clay, silica, grog and sawdust. The main body of the stoves are usually made of clays manufactured for cooking. When you go through my pictures you can see several clays, with few glazes or slips which works for low temperature. We actually fire our stoves to two different temperatures. To thermal shock safe, but more fragile 850°C and to 1250°C in woodkiln. Those from 1250°C are much harder, but it is more risky for cracking with charcoal fire. So far, it did not happen with the clay we use now.

Kettles

With kettles, there are many choices out there. And thruth is that for quality of your tea water is the kettle even more important then the stove. Your kettle can be made from silver, stainless steel, iron testsubin, ceramic, glass. Every material will impact the water its own way. All can be in different qualities, sizes, designes and, of course, price ranges. My experiences are limited to few testsubins, glass and many (mostly my own) ceramic kettles.

Glass is hard, clear, cold - they say that it leaves water how it is. Glass boiling teapots are pretty cheap and practical. I like to watch boiling water in glass with live fire under it. I think, it is good starting point, when you learn how to work with charcoal and stove. When there is not much going on it terms of improoving water it does not make it poorer either (as some stainless electric kettles do).

Iron kettles - Tetsubins, are incredible things. I am not an expert on those so just few words here. Good tetsubin ad to water some iron and makes water more live. If you had a chance to drink tea made with water from good iron cast teapot you know. Unfortunately there are many inferior as well as really bad ones. Even good testubin can get rusty and you will get more iron then you may like. I have very nice testsubin (spoussedly fifty years old), which isquite rusty inside. I dont use it on daily basies, which could help to clean it. The water taste nice, but for most teas is too irony. People ask me just for the water and nobody wants to drink tea.

Especially if your water is poor for minerals then good tetsubin can make you happy. But as good tetsubin is real  investment, in both money and what we expect from it, dont buy it in rush. Make sure you know what are you looking for, make some research first. One of MarchalN's posts can be helpful too.

Ceramic kettles are, as you can expect, my love. Again, there are many kinds and origins out there. When we put aside the size and dezigne what counts is material and firing. If your kettle is glazed, then it is closer to glass teapot. Unglazed clay impact water and the lower firing tempretaure usually means more porous clay and the stronger impact. I saw Jappanese teapots (boffura), which were fired so low that that water leaks through and whole body was covered by small drops of water. The water taste from lime (calcite) and clay. If your tea water is too soft (poor in calcium, Ca(HCO3)2) then it can be what you need. You can find kettles, which go from this porouse, underfired clay to hard and waterproof stoneware. For now, I use manufactured clay, which is sold for cooking ware. It works when we fire it around 1230°C and most teapots do not leak. The clay makes water more rounded, with nice mouthfeel. It is clean and live.

With ceramic kettles or boiling teapots, there is always issue of cracking over the fire and thermal shocks. For our kettles we give some qurantie, all kettles are tested, but basic rules have to be kept.

-our quranties aplly, when our kettles are used on charcoal fire, not gas or electric. Some of them will works even on gas or electric burners and for very long time (I use mine) But, if I had some of them cracked then it was on electric and ges fire - never on charcoal. .

-don't put empty or almost empty kettle on the fire

-never pour cold water in to hot, empty kettle

-do not put hot kettle on very cold place (floor, stone table), fabric or wooden pad is good choice

-ceramic is generally fragile. So please, do use common sence when using them.

As I have already said, boiling water over the charcoal fire takes my tea experience on new level. And it is not "just" about taste of the water. It is about paying atention to what is going on your tea table. Live energy of fire. It is about being in The Rhythm during your tea time.

For those who are interested, here you can see our available stoves and kettles.

Thank you for the reading!