My shou pu-erh tastes fishy or muddy

In short

Usually a young wet-piled tea that has not been rested, and usually a rinse that was skipped. Both are recoverable, and the tea often improves substantially with time in the cupboard.

Likely causes, in order

Most likely first. Answer the question under each one before moving on — several of these look alike in the cup and are told apart only by what was done to the leaf.

1. 1. No rinse before the first infusion

   Technique

   Check: Did you drink the first steep rather than discarding it?

   Fix: Pour boiling water over the leaf, discard immediately, then begin. The rinse removes surface dust and much of the loose pile character, and for compressed dark tea it is standard rather than optional.

2. 2. The tea is freshly wet-piled and unrested

   Leaf quality

   Check: Is the cake or the loose leaf from the last year or two?

   Fix: Fresh shou carries a strong pile note that fades over a few years of dry, ventilated storage. This is a known characteristic of young ripe pu-erh rather than a fault, and patience is the actual remedy.

3. 3. Poorly made or over-piled material

   Leaf qualityInferred by TeaHQ, not established

   Check: Does the note persist unchanged across five or six infusions and after a second rinse?

   Fix: Some shou is simply piled too heavily or carelessly. If several rinses and several infusions do not shift it, the tea will not improve enough to be worth the cupboard space.

4. 4. Damp storage

   StorageInferred by TeaHQ, not established

   Check: Has it been kept somewhere humid, sealed in plastic, or near a source of moisture?

   Fix: Move it somewhere dry, stable and ventilated, and leave it for several months. Dark tea wants airflow; sealing it in plastic traps exactly the character you are trying to lose.

Tea types this applies to

• Dark tea and pu-erh

Brewing methods this applies to

• Gongfu brewing (gaiwan) — A high-leaf, low-volume, many-infusions approach: a great deal of leaf in a small vessel, steeped for seconds at a time and poured off completely, repeatedly.

Guides covering this

• Sheng and shou: two unrelated processes sharing one name — Raw and ripe pu-erh are sold in the same shapes, from the same region, under the same name, and are made by processes with almost nothing in common. Treating them as one category with two settings is the source of most pu-erh confusion.
• Telling stale tea from a tea you simply do not like — Both produce a cup you do not want to finish, and the two have nothing in common. One is a tea that has lost something; the other is a tea that has something you did not want. Three quick checks separate them reliably.
• Earth, mineral and mushroom: the family with the weakest explanations — Earthy has a genuine and well-known chemistry behind it. Mineral does not, and it is one of the most-used descriptors in fine tea. This page separates what is established from what is a convention and says plainly which is which.

Related problems

Sharing a cause category, a tea type or a brewing method with this one.

• My pu-erh tastes exactly the same as when I bought it — A cake bought several years ago to age has not noticeably changed, and it was stored carefully.
• My gaiwan is too hot to hold — The rim and lid become uncomfortable within seconds, the pour is rushed, and tea ends up on the tray.
• My pu-erh cake will not break apart cleanly — The cake resists the pick, then gives way suddenly into powder and fragments rather than intact leaf.
• My pu-erh or dark tea tastes sour — A sharp, tart, almost vinegary note runs through a ripe pu-erh, a sheng or another dark tea where the description promised earthy sweetness.
• My first infusion is always the worst one — The opening cup is thin, dusty or flat, and the second is markedly better — consistently, across different teas.

Sources