Tight-pressed Tea occupies more than half of the Anhua dark tea market. Compared to loose tea, tight-pressed tea takes longer to infuse and enter its optimal state, making it particularly important to Rinse the tea thoroughly as a kind of “warm-up exercise.”

Fu brick tea, dark brick tea, flower brick tea, and Qianliang tea are all tightly pressed forms of Anhua dark tea, but they vary in how tightly they are compressed. The general rule for rinsing is that the tighter the compression, the longer the rinsing time should be. If one rinse is not enough, two or three rinses may be necessary. In practice, this often depends on the tea maker's experience and personal preference.

Here are some suggestions for new tea enthusiasts, with the level of compression from loosest to tightest:

Hand-made Fu brick tea: Boiling water for 15-20 seconds, rinse once;

Mechanically made Fu brick tea, Qian/Bai/Shi Liang tea: Boiling water for 20-30 seconds, rinse once;

Dark brick, flower brick, green brick: Boiling water for 20-30 seconds, rinse twice.

On the other hand, there's the matter of smoky aroma and aged tea.

Smoky aroma is a characteristic scent imparted by the unique baking process using seven-star stoves in Anhua dark tea production, similar to eating spicy food—some people like it, while others do not.

Aged tea, especially those stored for a long time, can sometimes acquire unpleasant odors due to improper storage.

For smoky aromas and surface-attached odors, these can be effectively removed through rinsing. After discarding the first infusion, leave the lid open and let the tea sit for 2-3 minutes. These surface odors will quickly dissipate with the steam from the hot water.

However, this method is not very effective for removing odors that have permeated the tea or developed during aging.

Finally, we'll discuss the effect of rinsing on the golden flowers. To summarize, rinsing does not affect the flavor or effectiveness of the golden flowers. This section touches on the relationship between golden flowers and dark tea, which I will explore in more detail in a separate article at another time.

Simply put, the flavor and effectiveness of the golden flowers do not come from the fungus itself but rather from its metabolic activity and products on the dark tea.

Rinsing merely washes away a limited number of golden flower fungal bodies from the surface of the leaves and does not fundamentally impact the mechanism that produces their benefits. The amount of effective components lost in the rinsing process is negligible. So don't worry about it—rinse as you normally would!