Before your first steep.
You're holding seven whole tangerines packed with ripe pu-erh. Three minutes of reading, then water.
- 01
Drop one whole piece into your vessel. Don't break it apart — the peel is part of the recipe.
- 02
Rinse: cover with 100 °C / 212 °F water, pour off after a breath.
- 03
Steep 10–15 seconds. Pour. Taste.
- 04
Add a little time each round. Stop counting after ten.
First rounds lean citrus — the peel speaks first. From the third steep the pu-erh takes over: dark honey, walnut, aged wood, a thick, calm texture. If a round tastes muddy, shorten the steep.
Southern China has aged citrus peel for centuries; kept long enough, it earns its own name — chenpi — and its own price. Tea makers eventually did the obvious thing and sealed leaf inside a hollowed fruit, leaving the two to trade oils until they steep as one voice.
The small green version — xiao qing gan, “little green tangerine” — is the tradition’s portable form. One fruit, one pot, one afternoon.