hi welcome back to tea with Phil and Zhen today I'm gonna talk to you about how to choose and
use your very first gaiwan this video is going to be especially interesting for those of you who
have always wanted to get into gongfu brewing but just didn't know quite how to choose a gaiwan
and if you have a giant gaiwan collection don't worry we've got lots of great info for you
as well alright let's dive straight into this because I want to get to the using part so I
can have some tea but first we got to talk about how to choose let's roll and choosing our first
gaiwan there are two main factors to consider size is one of them the size of your hand will
help you choose the size of your gaiwan but we also have to remember that it's our very first
gaiwan so versatility is important that means that it has to work for you when you're brewing
just by yourself just chilling out with your tea but it also should work when you have a friend or
friends over material is also a very important factor in choosing our first gaiwan porcelain
is best but any non-porous material will do the trick porous materials like unglazed earthenware
or pottery actually affect the aroma of the tea so we definitely want to go with porous because
it's our first gaiwan we're gonna literally be brewing all kinds of tea in this puppy also the
color matters ideally the inside of the gaiwan should be white or at the very least a light
color you can probably figure out why liqueur color liquor color is super important in tea
and especially when brewing tea intuitively so ideally the inside of our gaiwan will
be white you can see that this little guy here while exceedingly cute is not going to work very
well for large groups this is Zhen's personal tea time gaiwan and it's perfect for an individual
brewing session but at only 50 milliliters it's not a very good choice for your first gaiwan
here we have a gorgeous gaiwan that was gifted to us by the Toronto tea festival for a talk that
Zhen did on puerh at around 160 milliliters this one might be a little bit large if your
hands are towards a smaller side also consider that leaf amount is related to gaiwan size so
in a brewing session with only one or two people you're going to end up with an awful lot of tea
next we have this gorgeous gaiwan with a wonderful glaze but if you look at the inside
you'll notice that it's quite dark again not ideal for tea brewing especially when you're just
getting started also notice that the gaiwan is quite thick thickness is an interesting property
in a gaiwan and there's a tendency to think that a thicck gaiwan will help protect your
fingers from burning but actually the opposite is true after the first couple of infusions the
gaiwan will begin to retain heat and become very hot and take a long time to cool down now
let's get into how to use a gaiwan since this is your very first guy one I'm not going to get
into excessive detail and I'm definitely going to steer clear of ceremony and etiquette I just want
to give you enough information so that you can brew great tea for you and your friends with
minimal burns to your fingers the first use of the gaiwan perhaps obviously is for brewing tea each
tea has its slightly unique brewing method and we have plenty of videos on those which you can
check out in the links down in the description today I'm only going to cover the unique aspects
particular to gaiwan brewing which is basically pouring the water into the gaiwan to cover the
leaf and pouring the water out I think pouring the water into the gaiwan is quite obvious so
let's get on with pouring the water out Zhen and I use two different grips when emptying a
gaiwan Zhen's grip has the advantage of only needing one hand and it looks something like
this you can play around with the exact grip you use but the idea is that your thumb and middle
finger or maybe our middle and ring finger grasp the edges of the gaiwan be careful not to reach
down to the walls of the gaiwan because they will be piping hot keep your fingers on the edge
that's where the gaiwan will be coolest the exact position of your fingers isn't all that critical
some people like to put their index finger into the lid I myself prefer to lay my finger down
on the lid so you'll start by giving the little little tilt grasping it however it works
for you and pour out your tea if you're really concerned about burning yourself you can always
practice with cool water work your way up to boiling water without using tea the grip
I use was recommended to me by Zhen's mom I liked this grip because it's a little bit easier on my
fingers temperature-wise that is to say I seem to burn myself less with this grip the disadvantage
however is that you're going to need two hands to get your pour started let's take a look with this
grip I'll pick up the gaiwan with my left hand I'm right-handed so if you're a southpaw pourer
switch the hands around I'll grasp the bottom of the guy one with my middle and ring finger
on the base and place my thumb on the lid always be careful to make sure your fingers are clear of
the walls of the gaiwan and squarely on the base which like the edge is much cooler how much cooler
I don't know but my fingers know that it's a lot cooler and I trust them now here's something that
blew my mind it's a bit of a long story but I'm gonna bring this back to a gaiwan use I promise
you I was in sichuan last year sitting with the inventor of xu Gong cha also known as bi tan piao xue
with Zhen and Jianli of course he served us some tea and we each got a gaiwan with xu gong
cha in it one for each of us there were no tea cups no sharing pots I had no idea what to do
so I just sat and waited while mr. xu and Jianli are chit chatting away finally mr. xu picks
up his gaiwan and he takes a sip of his tea and it dawned on me I had read about the use
of a gaiwan to drink from as a drinking vessel but I had never actually done it so I didn't get
a good enough look at mr. xu so I still patiently wait for Jianli or Zhen to take a drink finally I see
them do it I want to make sure I get this right I don't want to look like a clumsy Westerner so
finally I take my sip mr. Tsui instantly notices my awkwardness and gives me a quick lesson on how
to drink from a gaiwan I'm here to save you from that predicament so let's let's have a look with
this method unlike our other methods we're going to pick up the whole guy Wan including the saucer
this gives our fingers a nice break from the heat as that we experienced in previous methods
once the lid is open you may notice that there's a bunch of leaf floating around on the surface
of the liquor if that's the case you can use the gaiwan lid to gently encourage them away from the
area where you're about to take your sip this also slightly cools the liqueur and prepares
your first set if the leaves are insistent on coming back to where you're sipping from you
can actually leave the lid in place while you take that first sip like so and once they've all sunk
to the bottom and your liqueur is sufficiently cool you also have the option of simply sipping
from the gaiwan like this so there you have it how to choose and use your very first gaiwan and
don't hesitate to use that last method either and brew up and drink some green tea straight
from the gaiwan that way you'll fit in like a pro if you ever find yourself in a part of
China where they drink tea like that if you liked this video please give it a thumbs up and don't
forget to subscribe to our channel where we cover all kinds of tea related information from travel
to brewing and more you can also follow us in all kinds of social media we're heading over to China
soon so if there's something in particularly you you'd like to learn from processing to locations
please leave us a comment down below we'd love to hear from you until next time keep steeping