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Using a Glass Tumbler to Inspect Tea

From The Modern Art of Tea
by Cai Rongzhang
Translated and abridged by Luo Zhaohua

You can begin to tell if a tea is good or spoiled by looking at how well it was dried, its form, and the color and aroma of the liquor, but at most you will be able to tell about thirty percent of what you need to know. The remaining information must be discovered in other ways.

After inspecting the tea, put some leaf into a glass cup and pour in some hot water. At first, the leaf will float on the surface, and then begin to slowly sink as it absorbs water. It will then begin to open up and show the beauty of the leaf's original appearance, and in addition, each kind of leaf will now begin to give off its distinctive color— Qing Cha, golden yellow; Dong Ding, faint brown; Hong Cha ["Red Tea"; black tea], reddish; Lu Cha, jade green. If you use a glass tumbler or some other transparent infuser, the stages of infusion can be a splendid sight.

It is possible to get a reasonable idea of how good the tea is by looking at the stages of its infusion. You can infuse two different cups of the same kind of tea [but different grades or brands]—one cup may unfurl smoothly and secrete its color vigorously, while the second cup, even though it is the same kind of tea, may have a similarly clear liquor but with a harsher appearance. This would indicate that the second tea is not as good as the first one.

If you use a different kind of leaf, the leaf may soften gracefully after the initial infusion; this signifies that the leaf was picked when young and was lightly fired. If the appearance is "like one who is honest but dull," then the leaf is certainly older or was fired more heavily. An emerald leaf color that leans toward a greenish tinge means it was lightly fermented, while leaning toward a more reddish tinge means that it was more heavily fermented. A brighter leaf was fired lightly, while a darker leaf was more heavily fired.

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