Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Tea Rut

When tea bloggers stop blogging actively, one doesn't always know the reasons why the signal has gone quiet.  Although lack of free time and energy is often at the root-  I've been struck with an unexpected curse.  Mostly due to the duress I've been under recently, my tastebuds have lost a certain sensitivity.  Nuance I used to enjoy not only in tea but all foods has been flickering  for the last two weeks. I find I'm forced to salt my food more than ever before. 

What's a girl to do when those taste receptors are not getting stimulated like they used to. I had various plans to remedy this grievous condition like eating gruel and drinking CTC bagged tea for a month.  I remember reading of a traveler who shared some instant flavored rice in a remote village in Papua New Guinea-  one of the villagers actually got up abruptly and left the hut. The traveler was worried she had somehow offended him culturally  but it turned out he made himself scarce because he had tears in his eyes. Apparently her rice was the most delicious thing he's consumed in his life.  I've never actually cried because something tasted so wonderful but I want to!  Deprivation surely must be the shortest path to taste recovery.

Reduction in taste is known as hypogeusia and can commonly be the side effect of medication or even zinc deficiency and frighteningly is yet another benefit of old age.  As we gray and crumble,  the cells in our taste buds don't regenerate as quickly and so a reduced density inevitably correlates to a declining sensitivity to flavor.  Don't shudder.  If it's going to happen to all of us to a certain degree as we age, it's best to prepare yourself.   I still have many decades to go.  I guess if you drink puerh just for qi- hypogeusia is no barrier.  I should take advantage of this hopefully temporary loss of sensitivity and drink some gross shu tomorrow.
 

9 comments:

  1. Sorry to hear about both your taste buds and the duress. I hope things change for the better soon. I miss the Hster posts.

    I find it very easy not to blog. This new job is taking it out of me.

    -Israel

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    1. Thanks for your concern Israel. I've been trying to heal the a stress fracture on my foot along with an enflamed elbow nerve and the constant pain is just wearing down on me. I'll try to write but I'm simply too grumpy to.

      Jobs new or not can really take it out on anyone. It's unfortunately a quandary of most of us must endure.

      I sometimes look at Lisa Kristine's photos of modern slaves to feel more grateful:
      http://www.lisakristine.com/modern-day-slavery/#prettyPhoto[pp_gal]/4/

      But it's hard to control what we feel even about our own jobs.

      H

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  2. Hey H, hope your taste buds wake up. and the duress lightens up.

    I have gotten that loss of taste also, but mine always comes in the spring when my allergy starts to act up, due to the plants and trees starting to bloom. It usually lasts for a few days but sometimes a few weeks. And it almost always happens when I get my first spring tea order in so I have to wait till my taste buds wake up again to get any flavor. At that time I drink the cheapest tea I have, just for the fix.

    You could try to drink mineral water with a lot of lemon for a few days, that helps me out if I remember correctly.

    Emmett.

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    1. Oh Emmett. I also have allergy season to look forward next year. I've been just cleaning out the stale bagged Ceylon tea in my cupboard this week- stuff I'm not even sure how it got there. But cleansing with lemon juice seems a welcome refreshing thing to do and my lemon tree is full of lemons that need squeezing.

      H

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  3. Sorry to hear about your buds :( hope wake up. When Its happens to me, I have to charge. My routine by drinking something. Else. Like more cooked puerh.

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    1. Hobbie,

      Change in routine! I will take your advice not only in tea drinking but elsewhere as well. The cooked puerh just is not sitting well with me.

      H

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  4. I have to confess that I don't really drink much of Pu Erh, but I have experienced something similar with Assam, because this is the tea I drink most and hopefully the advice of Hobbie is the solution for our problem. I talked with a vendor about this experience and he told me, that this is the reason why he is drinking his favorite tea only for a short period. After consuming about 100g of this tea, he sticks to another for 100g and changes back to his favorite after that. Once you get used to a specific tea, it might happen that the taste will become thinner, more like water, he said. Thats the reason why I put away all my Assam for a month and I hope to get the taste I love so much back this way.

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    1. Dear Luke-

      Thanks for sharing this insight. The word "thinner" really leapt out at me. I guess familiarity breeds contempt even with beloved teas.

      H

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  5. Hoping you are better!

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