My Recent Batch

This is a raw puerh from the Crimson Lotus company. For travel, I wanted a way to enjoy gongfu brewing no matter where. I did the googling and some discussion with /r/tea members and here we are, Gongfu2Go. I've been brewing quite a bit in this and with daily maintenance it's keeping it's seal perfectly. Anticipate more photos with this set up.

Since I'm new to puerhs and the price is right enough to allow for experimentation, I started this tea with a flash brew. I cranked the burner there to 5 (max) and since it keeps it's heat for a good bit this allowed the water to reach a good boil, but not a rapid boil.

I washed the leaves for about 10seconds before pouring the brew (or soup as I've seen the experts call it). Once poured, I closed off the valve in my glass thermos so the steam might open the leaves a bit more. I'm not sure if this will have any impacts but we're gonna try.

Well, it had impacts. The tea came out slightly more astringent than I want, but I'm questioning too if maybe I shuld back off the leaves some. The brew is coming out kinda dense for my tastes but we'll halve the leaves next time and see.