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Pu-erh · Yunnan
Shou Pu-erh
shóu pǔ'ěr · 熟普洱
Ripe pu-erh — Yunnan broad-leaf tea fermented in warm, damp piles to taste decades old within weeks. Dark, smooth and earthy, with notes of wet wood, dates and a deep, comforting sweetness.
- Region
- Yunnan — pressed and aged
- Harvest
- Leaf picked spring; ripened in piles after
- Oxidation
- Post-fermented (ripe, fast-piled)
- Cultivar
- Yunnan broad-leaf (assamica)
In the cup
Damp earth, wet wood, dates and dark caramel — thick, smooth and round, with no bitterness and a soft sweet finish.
What it gives
The classic "comfort" tea — warming, gentle on the stomach, traditionally drunk to settle digestion after a rich meal.
Shou pu-erh — ripe pu-erh — is the modern half of Yunnan’s great aging tea. Where raw shēng pu-erh ages slowly over years and decades, ripe pu-erh was invented in the early 1970s to reach that deep, mellow character fast. The leaf is heaped into warm, damp piles and turned for weeks in a controlled microbial fermentation, wòduī, that does in a month what time does in a lifetime.
What comes out is dark, glossy and forgiving. The bitterness and brightness of young raw tea are gone, replaced by a thick, smooth body and flavours of damp earth, wet wood, dried dates and dark caramel. It is the easiest pu-erh to love and the one most people meet first.
In the cup
Always rinse it first — a quick pour of boiling water, discarded, to wake the leaf and rinse away pile dust. Then brew boiling and short, gongfu style, and it will give a long run of deep, smooth, sweet steeps. It is the tea to reach for after a heavy meal, or on a cold evening when you want comfort more than excitement.
How to brew
Shou Pu-erh
Water
100 °C — full boil
Leaf
8 g per 120 ml
Steep
Rinse, then 10–30 s, many steeps
Vessel
Gaiwan or clay pot
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