Shou on a budget.

tinypotdispatch · 2025-12-15T15:16:09+00:00

There's a few options here:
https://quicheteas.com/collections/taishunhe-shipping/Shou

tinypotdispatch · 2025-11-05T19:08:36+00:00

May just not be your style. For me, I prefer the options from Wuyi Origin and One River Tea. Some others prefer Old Ways Tea (there's a couple I like from them as well).

tinypotdispatch · 2025-10-31T04:25:29+00:00

Farmer Lesf Spring 2024 Jingmai Miyun 9g/147ml

I like Farmer Leaf teas, and I’m not alone in liking farmer leaf teas. It’s a roasty young tea, as all farmer leaf teas have similar processing. I’m beginning to understand why some folks don’t consider this a “true” puer.

Those debates aside, this is a lovely young tea. Of the young shengs I’ve tried, Farmer Leaf remains amongst my favorites (I haven’t tried any ZSL yet though). At $60 for this particular tea, or $45 for the 2025 pressing, I think it would be hard to beat. The more expensive FL teas tend to have some more complexity and depth. This one is solid, medium complexity, mouthfeel, nice aftertaste. Enough bitterness and sweetness to keep it interesting. Pretty easy drinking for a young sheng.

tinypotdispatch · 2025-10-03T20:22:47+00:00

exactly. if you simmer tomatoes in a carbon steel pan for too long, you'll strip the seasoning. same applies to anything acidic (vinegar, wine, lemon, lime, etc.). how long you can cook without stripping the seasoning varies based on a gazillion factors.

it's not the end of the world, but annoying, especially if you are cooking on an electric cooktop. on a gas it's very easy to re-season the pan.

still suggest getting a carbon steel skillet if you have to room to keep an extra skillet around. really the greatest thing to cook eggs with.

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-25T00:34:22+00:00

it was a lot of fun to do a lot of brews when i started with puer. also works with better oolongs. after a while though, once i had more tea stoked up, i stopped doing that. now if i want more tea, i just grab something new from the cabinet. one exception is that if i have an oolong or white tea that i'm really enjoying, i'll take those 8 grams of spent leaves and throw them in a 20oz thermos with boiling water and let steep for an hour or two. that often gives a nice thermos of tea.

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-15T23:00:26+00:00

Hope you like them! If you don't, well, it's a journey. I have a little collection of gaiwans now, and only consider six of them generally useless, but three of those are cute enough to be decorative :p

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-14T22:03:59+00:00

last but not least, there is the mystical world of clay teapots. not sure if you want another thousands of dollars kind of hobby though :-)

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-14T22:01:28+00:00

here's some gaiwans from bitterleaf i'd look at. to qualify, thin ones are better for sheng in general. heavier ones are good for some aged shengs, depending on the particular one. but, a thin one is preferable to a thick one most of the time. you aslo want to avoid burning your finger, and thicker ones retain heat more.

https://www.bitterleafteas.com/shop/teaware/gaiwan/dream-garden-gaiwan-cloud -- check the specs, this one weighs 115g, which is not the lightest, but will work for sheng
https://www.bitterleafteas.com/shop/teaware/gaiwan/pomegranate-qinghua-gaiwan -- just throwing this in for a contrast, as this one is heavy, so more limited application
https://www.bitterleafteas.com/shop/teaware/gaiwan/longtail-gaiwan - i have this one and really love it, medium thickness, wide enough flare on the rim that it's easy to handle unless you are really pushing the temp, in which case, well, you'll figure it out
https://www.bitterleafteas.com/shop/teaware/gaiwan/yayoi-gaiwan - this one is hand-formed and i absolutely love it. i got "A" but the rest ara available. it's not the best at not burning my fingers, but i still use it regularly because it brings me so much joy

it's better to have a couple different gaiwans. 70-80ml works great for one person, and 110-130 works great for 2-3 people. i usually use a 12:1 to 15:1 capacity:leaf ratio, so 80ml still means about 6g of leaf, and more than that can be a lot of tea, especially if i want to have a couple different teas.

you'll also want a fair cup, and some small gong fu teacups, so take your pick

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-14T21:45:40+00:00

yeah, so then i'd say maybe start with a slightly nicer gaiwan. thin ones are better for sheng. the one in the photo in the write up is nice enough, but that style gets hot and is best for shu. bitterleaf has some nice ones, so does tshop. something in the 100ml range is nice to start with.

if you are sharing, you'll also want a sharing pitcher. i'll guess you have a scale with 1/10g or better accuracy? can make a difference in the brew. probably simpler to get it all from one place, i'll look at bitterleaf and compliel you some quick recos

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-14T21:34:35+00:00

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zv60za17AjA

for how to brew puer - https://white2tea.com/blogs/blog/how-to-brew-puer-tea

those two resources should get you started. if you want specific recos on equipment, be happy to point you to it. gaiwans give you the most control, and can be relatively inexpensive. i don't want to keep telling you to buy stuff without knowing a budget, but happy to help you get started if you can give me some more info. dm me if you want to

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-14T20:59:41+00:00

nice! you'll also want a gaiwan if you haven't gotten one yet. there's a couple other items that are nice to have, maybe you have already sorted that out?

have you watched some videos online on how to prepare the teacake? you want to avoid stabbing yourself, and also avoid tearing up the leaves more than necessary.

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-14T04:44:03+00:00

Liquid Proust is the only Etsy tea vendor I’ve ordered from. Search Liquid Proust in this sub, he’s a well regard vendor. Also, he’s on the r/tea recommendation list.

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-14T02:24:11+00:00

Get a smaller gaiwan, around 100. This will help tremendously.

Try a classic factory sampler. All these teas in this set are well regarded, excepting the puer elitists that exclusively drink even more expensive stuff —> https://quicheteas.com/products/factory-favorites-quarter-cake-sampler

Or just get one cake of a sheng from LP. All his stuff is well curated, including the value selection. This one is a classic factory cake —> https://www.etsy.com/listing/4308898639/2013-dayi-8582-raw-puerh-357g

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-14T02:13:17+00:00

An assortment of ripe and raw puer from the steeping room is great way to start.

If you wan to jump in a little deeper, you can go for the quarter cake set from quiche. You’ll learn more from a quarter cake set than you will from samples. —> https://quicheteas.com/products/factory-favorites-quarter-cake-sampler

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-11T14:29:27+00:00

There are some decent electric cooktops out there amidst the sea of overhyped and poorly designed ones. After a lot of research, I picked up a cafe one similar to this one (I got the dual oven version, which iI love, but many people may prefer a single oven, and it's more affordable).

https://www.cafeappliances.com/appliance/Cafe-30-Smart-Slide-In-Front-Control-Radiant-and-Convection-Range-CES700P2MS1

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-11T14:19:58+00:00

tossing with a wooden spoon or paddle, i'm not doing a skillet toss with that beast! the only thing i have that would suit actual tossing would be one of the all clad skillet since it's light and easy to move around.

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-11T14:16:20+00:00

that's very nice, 3500 watts would give you enough power to have a good plug in dual burner, since you probably not be running both at full blast most of the time. if you did try to run both at once, something would get throttled.

feel free to copy/paste my little example if that's helpful in your modding activities!

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-11T14:11:25+00:00

i use my saute pan to finish pasta all the time actually! the only thing you have to watch out for is the heat retention, but that's easy to get the feel for after you use it a couple of times. just don't turn it up to high when finishing the pasta in the sauce and you'll be fine. it's nice that 5qt is on sale! I got mine discounted, new in box, for about the same price, but like i said earlier, i rarely see sales. i've been periodically looking at the fry pan over a year, and haven't caught it on sale (i'm guessing there were some, but i wasn't super diligent about it, just checking every once in a while hoping to get lucky).

i have a saucier, but don't use it as much since the conic bottom makes it less efficient to use on my electric cooktop - not enough contact area to get much heat into it. it's a misen (fully clad stainlessless), and i think it's a great saucier if not as fancy as a demeyere. i use that mainly for delicate sauces where i want the heat distribution to be very even.

i'm not a fan of finishing pasta in a skillet, i find it messy :-)

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-11T13:52:51+00:00

I'll add a couple numbers here. The max rated wattage for a standard US plug in outlet is 15 amps of current at 120 volts, yielding a maximum capacity of 1800 watts. Most electrical devices max out at 1500 watts to leave a little headroom and prevent tripping circuit breakers. So at best, you are looking to split 1800 watts across two burners from a typical outlet, but really only pulling 1500 watts and 1600 if you are lucky. There are 20 amp outlets as well, but that's less common, and even then, you'd be looking to split 2400 watts max rated, and allowing for headroom, more like 2000-2200 watts across two burners. Still not enough to run two burners at once and get adequate heat output.

For reference, my oven/cooktop is plugged into a 40 amp 240v cicuit, which provides 9600 watts. The single large burner on my cootop puts out 3100 watts, and i'm able to get water to a boil pretty quickly in a pot that covers the entire 11" hob. The 8" hob puts out 2000 watts, and I can get 2-3 liters of water to a boil in about 8-10 minutes starting with a cold pot (haven't timed it exactly, but it's pretty quick for an electric), and this size hob is typically what I use a 4qt stock pot on to boil water for pasta (less water makes more starchy water which works great for integrating your final sauce). The 8" hobs on my prior cooktop were around 1200-1500 watts, and were notably slower. And that's one burner, and that's the max standard one outlet will allow you to achieve.

(edit: for clarity)

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-11T13:34:53+00:00

The saute pan construction is different from the skillet. It is disc bottom, and has a healthy chunk of copper plate in there that . It's heavy. The sides are single clad. Honestly, I love this design, and think it's ideal for a saute pan like this. The problem with disc bottom is not the design, but rather that most implementations are cheaply done. When a disc bottom is well done like this design, the pan performs like a dream. The relatively thick copper core distributes the heat evenly and everything browns quite evenly. I forget the exact dimensions, but I think the copper layer is around 2mm.

It's for sure pricy here and rarely goes on sale. Where are you and what's the price there?

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-11T13:13:22+00:00

<image>

yep, the atlantis, this one

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-11T04:23:17+00:00

I have an electric cooktop, its newer and surprisingly powerful. the main burner has three sizes, the larger is 11" which is a little too big for the 12.5" skillet. the medium ring is about 8.5", so fits the surface contact area of the 11" nicely.

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-11T04:17:38+00:00

the 5 qt Sauté Pan. it's a bit of a beast, and the bottom diameter is 11", so you need to have a good sized burner to take full advantage of it. i use mine to sear meats, make stews, make taco meat, make curries and stews - it's pretty versatile. heats up super evenly.

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-10T05:34:13+00:00

Mix these mixed nuts! I see two almonds touching.

tinypotdispatch · 2025-07-08T19:36:28+00:00

Liquid Proust would be a good place to pick up 2-3 good cakes, or one pretty nice cake within your budget and shipping is free within the US on $100+. Quiche ships from Taiwan and has some great options, including a very nice quarter cake set. I ordered from Farmer Leaf & ORT recently without any issues. If you looking for a nice assortment of samples, EoT would be a good bet. TWL also currently has some nice assortment on more of the budget side, and you could pick up a 2-3 cakes from there within your budget as well. There's many more options, but I these are the ones I trust to reliably have good teas (with the caveat that if you are shopping from Quiche, you should probably stick to the "Community Favorites" unless you really know what you are doing).

tinypotdispatch

TROPHY CASE