When it comes to luxury goods, we must not be unfamiliar, such as watches, luxury cars, but today the author to say that this luxury, but can be tasted and drunk antique-level collection. First look at a set of data:

In 2004, the auction of 3 grams of Pu’er Tea Paste kept by Mr. Lu Xun was a sensation and was finally sold for 12,000 RMB.
In 2007, a piece of 82 grams of Qing Palace Pu’er Tea Paste was purchased at a high price of 850,000 dollars.
In 2010, a box of Qing Palace Pu’er Tea Paste was sold at the auction site at a sky-high price of 1.008 million dollars.
In 2019, 105 grams of Qing Dynasty Tribute Pu’er Tea Paste was sold for 900,000 yuan at the spring auction.

Tea paste is one of the five forms of Pu-erh tea: brick, cake, dough, tuo, paste, and is also the world’s first “instant tea”.

Pu-erh tea paste is the tea leaves after processing and fermentation, using a special way to separate the fiber material and tea juice of arbor tea leaves, and then the tea juice obtained by reprocessing and become.tea paste

Tea cream is a treasure passed down from our ancestors, a “drinkable antique”. Pu-erh tea paste is unique to China, which began in the Southern Tang Dynasty, became popular in the Song Dynasty, flourished in the Qing Dynasty, and flourished in the present day.

Lu Yu was the first discoverer of tea cream, and in his monograph “The Classic of Tea”, it is written: “The one who comes out of the cream is light, and the one who contains the cream is wrinkled”, and “the oil anoints its face”. In the “tea scripture” mentioned many times in the word “cream”.

During the Qing Dynasty, the Yunnan Tusi in the reference to the Tang and Song dynasties to make cake tea process, based on the creation of a cauldron boiling tea, the way of making cream, the “steam” upgraded to “cooking”. Cauldron boiling ointment belongs to the first stage of the development of Pu’er tea paste, can only be characterized as a native system (native methods), which is very different from the later Imperial Palace “imperial” tea paste.paste çaji

Evolution of tea cream production process: It is said that in the Qing Dynasty, during the Qianlong period, due to the pot boiling tea cream is difficult to produce “fine products”, so it was changed to the imperial teahouse in the palace “imperial”.paste çaji

As a result of drawing on the Song Dynasty “small press to water, large press out of the cream” method, the production process has been similar to what we usually use now low-temperature extraction, low-temperature drying. The tea paste made in this way will present the best quality.paste çaji

According to Wu Renchen’s “Ten Kingdoms Spring and Autumn Annals”, as early as the second year of Min Kangzong Tongwen of the Southern Tang Dynasty (937 AD), there was a tribute of tea cream offered. During the Yongzheng period, tea paste became the emperor’s tribute, and thus became a symbol of imperial power. Qing Yongzheng seven years (1729), Yunnan and Guizhou Governor Ertai requested the implementation of the policy of land reclassification, set up a total tea store in Simao, in order to centralize the Pu’er region of the tea trade. On the sixth day of August of the same year, Yunnan governor Shen Tingzheng to the court tribute tea, duke përfshirë: large Pu tea two boxes, two boxes of Pu tea, small Pu tea two boxes, Pu-erh tea two boxes, two boxes of tea buds, two boxes of tea cream, two boxes of Pu tea before the rain.paste çaji

The “Pu Tea” here is the old name for “Pu Er Tea”. This file is regarded as the beginning of the Pu’er tea tribute. In this, it is clearly recorded that “two boxes of tea paste”. Independent of tea, became a separate category of tribute tea. Since then, Pu’er tea paste has been one of the Qing Palace tribute tea.paste çaji

What was Puerh tea paste used for in the Qing Dynasty? A: Elixir. Now stored in the National Palace Museum of Pu’er tea paste package wrote: belly bloating cold, with ginger soup and tea paste with boiled drink, so that the body sweating that is healed, when the mouth broken tongue and throat heat pain, with five points of tea paste in the mouth overnight, that is healed. When the heat, rubbing the skin bleeding, the tea paste research surface compresses the affected area, that is healed.paste çaji

The expression of this paragraph, and the Qing Dynasty Zhao Xuemin “Materia Medica Gleanings” Volume VI “wood” “Pu’er tea” entry in the records are roughly the same. According to this we can speculate, pu-erh tea paste in the Qing dynasty court is a “cure for all diseases” of the medicine. Not only can cure bloating and cold such internal diseases, that is, the mouth and tongue sores also does not matter, containing Pu’er tea cream to sleep, the next day can also be cured. Can be taken internally, can also be used externally, is indeed wonderful.paste çaji