The Jargon List about Chinese Tea
You feel like a water drinker when fellow Chinese tea drinkers talk in Chinese tea jargon that you dont understand. Its not trying to be cool; you simply have to learn the language. Here is a list of Chinese tea jargon and commonly mentioned words you will come across in a Chinese tea drinkers party.
(Cha) tea *you can skip Math, but not this one if you want to be a tea drinker (Pao) noun amount of tea leaves enough for one brew, verb brew (Yat Pau Cha) A complete cycle of brewing. A Pau starts when new tea leaves is added, ends when its entire flavor is being extracted and brewing stops, regardless of the number of infusions in between. (Yat Chung cha) An infusion of tea. An infusion into the brewing container. (Gong fu cha) a well-know brewing method. Full pictured illustration here. (GalWan) Lidded bowl. A 3-piece porcelain cup with lid, cup and plate used for tea brewing. Large (6oz) and small (4oz) GalWans can be used for different tea brewing methods.
(Cha Tang) Tea Soup by direct translation. Means the tea come out of a brewing process. A fancy name for tea. Cha Hai Tea Sea. Fancy name for a tea tray. (Ku) plain bitterness one type of bitterness. Plain and flat. Its the kind of bitter most of us understand.
(Se) Rough bitterness-one type of bitterness. Rough as oppo9sed to smooth. Acute bitterness at the meddle to the back of the tongue accompanied by a not-at-all-smooth feeling when rubbing the tongue against the food of the month. This is the worst you can get from a brewing process. (Gan) Minty bitterness C one type of bitterness. Its a 2 dimensional taste. Slightly bitter first, then comes the slightly sweet taste (not exactly sweat but forgive me, I cant tell exactly in English). When breathing, the tongue & month gets a cool feeling. If its strong enough, it keeps coming back for a long while and its called Hui Gan (see below). (Hui Gan) Recurring Gan. See above for explanation of Gan. (Sang Jin) Stimulates Saliva. Saliva cells activated and working. To feel saliva flowing into the mouth is a wonderful feeling. Also, it is the best way to quench your thirst.