Drinking Tea Is a Journey of Aesthetic Refinement

For some reasons, I've been quite anxious these past few years, but I've come to understand tea better and make it better. Do you know why?

Because of aesthetics—I found the ultimate solution in tea. Aesthetics applies not only to tea but also to wine, aged tangerine peel, and all things that please the palate.

Before 2015, I rarely drank alcohol, thinking it was the most unnecessary thing in the world—irritating in taste, stimulating to the body, and emboldening cowards, making people impulsive and irrational. Later, when I started making tea myself, I needed to taste many new teas, which left my body damp and cold. Following Teacher Liang's advice, I took up drinking liquor, preferably aged liquor, to dispel dampness and cold. My tolerance is low; two liang is my limit. I've been learning to appreciate liquor. On Zhihu, there is a liquor reviewer named Awu. I bought almost all the liquors he reviewed, trying to experience them according to his tasting notes. I spent a lot of time and over a hundred thousand yuan on liquor, yet still didn't get it. By 2016, I gave up benchmarking against liquor and started using my tea-drinking sensation to understand liquor, attempting to taste it through bodily sensation. In one evening, I understood it—tasting liquor turned out to be that simple. Then I applied this sensation to aged tangerine peel, to rock tea I rarely touched, red wine, whiskey, and various dishes—and immediately became proficient, establishing my own standards. At least within my tasting scope, I have built my own standard system and understanding for these things.

Today, I want to share my years of experience with you, which is:

Aesthetic appreciation of taste!

To truly understand tea and improve your aesthetic appreciation of taste, you no longer need to memorize various complicated parameters—bitterness, astringency, salivation, returning sweetness, fullness, sweetness, thickness, smoothness, balance, calmness, ecology, strong intensity. You don't need to care about these. Just feel the aesthetic of the tea's taste.

Before discussing aesthetics, let's talk about the wisdom of the ancients.

As mentioned above, I've been anxious these past few years. I've read many books and watched many videos, many of which are classics of Chinese studies. But due to anxiety, my memory often gets confused, and I often mix up authors, dynasties, characters, and events. However, that doesn't stop me from continuing. The ten-thousand-hour theory still works. I've realized many things, and one of the most useful is returning to respect and identification with traditional culture.

Since childhood, we've been taught to understand science and to live and learn with a scientific mindset. Is that wrong? Maybe not, but it's not the only way. There are countless paths to understand the world; science is just one of the main roads. There's a saying: "The end of science is metaphysics." I didn't understand it before, but now I deeply agree. One piece of evidence is that more and more doctors and patients agree that "the end of medicine is traditional Chinese medicine."

Look at the wisdom of our ancients. Some books and phrases that have been passed down for a long time often consist of just a few lines or even one sentence, yet they explain many truths. For example, "One yin and one yang are called the Dao," and "The Dao that can be told is not the eternal Dao; the name that can be named is not the eternal name." Just one sentence, widely circulated, and many people deeply believe it. If we follow what we learned in school—that there must be arguments, evidence, and proof—isn't it nonsense? How can one sentence have evidence and proof? But this one sentence might be the insight of a person's decades or even lifetime, the summary of these wise men's lives. Isn't a lifetime of proof enough? Westerners tease us for not being rigorous, and we tease them for not understanding romance. In fact, we are equally rigorous—so rigorous that we prove it with a lifetime. It's just that after saying this sentence, we disdain to elaborate further. If you understand, you understand; if not, you figure it out yourself. The saying "Art comes from life" is also this principle.

What is "realized" is both experience and science. At this point, the nitpickers and scientific data enthusiasts can leave.

Today, I will share the aesthetic appreciation of taste that I have realized, in one sentence:

Tea: Plainness is true!

The ancients said this sentence and left. I'm still here, so let me elaborate.

1. Economics of taste.

In more economically developed regions, tastes tend to be lighter. Guangdong, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shanghai—these economically developed areas have light tastes, often eating the natural flavors of ingredients.

Families with better conditions also tend to have lighter tastes. Even if they previously preferred heavy spice, as their economic status rises, their tastes gradually become lighter. Even if the first generation of wealthy families has heavy tastes, the second generation tends to be lighter.

The better the ingredient, the simpler the way it's eaten. For example, deep-sea fish is eaten as sashimi, and termite mushrooms are eaten raw. Moreover, these foods are naturally sweet and have a wild charm. Just as free-range chicken can be used for soup, while supermarket chicken needs to be braised or made into spicy chicken.

2. Good ingredients are naturally sweet.

Examples include deep-sea sashimi, mountain delicacies like termite mushrooms, and tea from deep in the dense forest.

In my previous article "What is High-End Tea," I spent a lot of space discussing the calmness of tea. Let me extend that here.

"Bitterness causes salivation, astringency causes returning sweetness" is a common belief. It doesn't mean these teas are not good, but they are definitely not top-tier.

Top-tier tea is consistently sweet, sweet from beginning to end, without needing bitterness or astringency. Those who say "no bitterness, no astringency, no tea" are selling and drinking mid-to-low-end tea. This is also why I don't particularly like Mannuo tea or ordinary Laobanzhang tea, and why I prefer Yiwu tea and teas from the deep forests of Dehong.

3. Good ingredients are full of wild charm.

"Charm" is something I always emphasize, and it's the core element when I experience other palate-pleasing ingredients.

Just like free-range chickens and Donggua pigs, they naturally have a wild charm when eaten, which everyone can feel. Cold dressed pork belly—if you have the chance, come to the tea area and try it. It's simply boiled pork belly, sliced and eaten cold, with a unique flavor.

Good tea and good ingredients all come with their own wild charm.

4. Tea: Plainness is true.

Forget those technical terms. Don't attend various tea training sessions. Don't listen to the various remarks of masters. Don't try to understand tea through analysis. Use your body and taste buds to directly feel the tea, just like you would with food. Don't treat tea as tea; treat it as a soup made from vegetables. If it's fresh and you can drink a lot of it, it's good tea.

Tea: Plainness is true!

This is the thirty-sixth article in my "Tea on Paper" series. Click to read more "Tea on Paper" articles.