Chapter II · The Implements: Terroir — The cheng base, also called tai or zhen, is made…
Photo: Wikimedia Commons · CC BY 2.0
The passage
“The cheng base, also called tai or zhen, is made of stone; otherwise of locust or mulberry wood, half-buried in the ground so that it will not rock.”
Terroir
“The cheng base, also called tai or zhen, is made…” opens the question of terroir: the same cultivar can taste different on a different slope, soil, altitude, or mist line.
The Classic of Tea ranks soils by drainage and minerality. Modern growers still begin with the same questions: water, roots, shade, and air.
When tasting, ask where the tea grew before asking how famous it is. Terroir is not a marketing word; it is a set of physical conditions.
Reading note
Read the passage once for the image, once for the judgment, and once for the practice it implies.
Practice
- Name one thing the passage asks you to notice.
- Compare it with a tea you know.
- Keep the question open.