The third pressing of 'P'u Ming' - our handcrafted, single-origin shoucha. The base material was pile-fermented in 2022 from material gathered in the preceding years, It underwent a period of loose storage before pressing. Our first version of this cake sold out shortly after release. We acquired the remainder of the original material for this third and final release.
When Yimu's father, indigenous herbalist and 'barefoot doctor' Su Wenxin, decided that for health reasons he should begin drinking more shoucha, it was natural he should craft it himself. Doctor Su understood that to impart complexity to a single-village tea he would have to source tea from different gardens and adapt his pan-frying technique to account for subsequent pile-fermentation. His effort was informed by a long time friendship with Lancang Ancient Tea Factory's former fermentation master Li Meiying. It's not a coincidence that she is also responsible for overseeing the fermentation of our Xiangtu material, as she is respected throughout the region for her knowledge of Jingmai Mountain tea.
Theasophie is a family-based tea agroforestry project, and we could not be more pleased to offer this latest shoucha production. During our travels and talks on tea, we often allude to the fact that, historically, upland tea cultivators never consumed Pu'er tea. So, for an upland herbalist from one of the oldest tea producing villages in the world to take it upon himself to produce shoucha, a recent style of accelerated fermentation developed in the early-1970's, is a truly remarkable achievement.
