A Blog About Puer, Teaware, and Gongfu Tea| BITTERLEAF TEAS

Yixing vs Jianshui Teapots & Teaware: Differences & Similarities

When getting into gongfu brewing, Chinese tea, teapots and the like, there are 2 clays you’re most likely to hear about. Yixing zisha and...

March 9, 2020

Inside a Jingdezhen Teaware Studio

Behind the scenes in the studio where our 1001 series teaware is made. There are several steps producing any piece of teaware, but teapots...

January 27, 2020

How to Store White Tea (or Just About Any Other Type of Tea)

As the popularity of white tea increases, so do the number of questions about proper storage for this minimally processed tea. Well, we’re going...

January 19, 2020

How Its Made: Firing Tea Jars in Jianshui

While in Jianshui this past summer, we decided to shoot some footage of a custom batch of tea (and water) jars we ordered being...

September 10, 2019

The Tea Market Experience – April 2019

The Tea Market Experience is a non-subscription tea club that offers unique, interesting and possibly dubiously labelled teas, bringing you as close as possible...

April 19, 2019

The Tea Market Experience – March 2019

The Tea Market Experience is a non-subscription tea club that offers unique, interesting and possibly dubiously labelled teas, bringing you as close as possible...

March 7, 2019

The Tea Market Experience – January 2019

The Tea Market Experience is a non-subscription tea club that offers unique, interesting and possibly dubiously labelled teas, bringing you as close as possible...

January 18, 2019

The Tea Market Experience – November 2018

The Tea Market Experience is a non-subscription tea club that offers unique, interesting and possibly dubiously labelled teas, bringing you as close as possible...

November 15, 2018

The Tea Market Experience – October 2018

The Tea Market Experience is a non-subscription tea club that offers unique, interesting and possibly dubiously labelled teas, bringing you as close as possible...

October 11, 2018

Digging in Yixing Part III

We were quite fortunate during our visit to have several contacts ahead of time in Yixing, all who serve different markets – low, mid...

January 31, 2018

Digging in Yixing Part II

After much discussion, research and digging during a week spent in Yixing, it’s not difficult to see that the price of an Yixing teapot...

January 18, 2018

Digging in Yixing Part I

For many, gongfu tea can be an overwhelming hobby to get into at first. There are so many different types of tea from different...

January 18, 2018

How to Choose a Puer Tea

This is one of the most common questions we field, especially from those who are new to puer. It can be a fairly packed...

January 5, 2018

Jingdezhen Ghost Market

In late May we decided to sacrifice some sleep and wake up at 4am in order to check out the Ghost Market in Jingdezhen,...

September 6, 2017

Jingdezhen – Junction of China’s Past and Future

We wasted very little time between sourcing our 2017 teas and venturing on our first teaware sourcing trip to Jingdezhen this year. Perhaps labelling...

June 7, 2017

Month in Pictures (January ’17)

The year is off to a good start after receiving these 3 #tea jars. They're made extra special due to...

February 2, 2017

Month in Pictures (December ’16)

Decided to try something a bit different for our first #tea of the day after receiving some matcha as a...

January 1, 2017

Month in Pictures (November ’16)

Taking a break between touring #tea gardens in Feng Huang to drink some song zhong dancong oolong. Now that our...

December 2, 2016

Weeks In Pictures (October 10 – 31)

We've restocked our Ink teacups. They're a little smaller this time around and a perfect size for gongfu #tea. A...

November 2, 2016

The Differences Between Spring and Fall Puer

Obligatory apology - We know that this blog has not been updated with insightful content in quite a while, and apologize. Vendor blogs tend...

October 16, 2016