Bamboo Tube Tea: Pu'er Packed in Bamboo

In the mountain villages of Xishuangbanna, Pu'er, and Lincang in Yunnan, you'll often see sections of scorched, golden bamboo tube. Split one open and inside is a tightly packed column of tea. This is bamboo tube tea (zhutongcha), the age-old ingenuity of Yunnan's ethnic minorities in "putting tea into bamboo."

What Is Bamboo Tube Tea?

Bamboo tube tea is compressed tea that uses a bamboo tube as both mold and container. Fresh bamboo holds moisture and withstands heat, and the inner wall of the tube has a natural fragrance, so tea stuffed inside and roasted becomes a column of tea scented with bamboo.

The Dai, Lahu, and other peoples of Yunnan have traditions of making bamboo tube tea, with slightly different names and methods from place to place. Dai bamboo tube tea is often called "bamboo tube fragrant tea" (zhutong xiangcha) and is known for its fresh bamboo aroma.

How Bamboo Tube Tea Is Made

There are roughly two traditional methods:

Fresh Leaves Straight into the Tube

1. Choosing bamboo: fresh bamboo is cut into tubes, each closed at one end by a node and open at the other.
2. Filling: freshly picked tender leaves, or fresh leaves that have softened slightly, are stuffed into the tube.
3. Roasting: the tube is roasted slowly beside the fire pit or over charcoal, and moisture from the bamboo steams the leaves soft.
4. Tamping: once the leaves soften and shrink in the heat, they're tamped down with a wooden stick. More tea is added, roasted, and tamped again until the tube is full and tightly packed.
5. Drying: roasting continues until the outside of the tube is scorched golden and the tea is completely dry, then it's cooled and stored.

Steamed Maocha into the Tube

Finished sun-dried maocha is steamed soft first, then stuffed into the tube, roasted, tamped, and dried. This method is more common in modern bamboo tube tea products.

The bamboo used for tube tea is traditionally a fragrant kind called "fragrant bamboo" (xiangzhu), also known locally as fragrant sticky bamboo, with long sections and thin walls that give off a good aroma when roasted.

What Does Bamboo Tube Fragrance Smell Like?

The aroma of bamboo tube tea comes from the inner wall and membrane of the bamboo releasing their scent when heated, along with the warmth of roasting. Tea drinkers often describe it as:

• Fresh bamboo: like freshly split bamboo or bamboo leaves.
• A sweetness like sticky rice: some say it's like the aroma of rice cooked in bamboo.
• A touch of roast: the warm note from roasting by the fire pit.

The taste depends on the material: tube tea made from tender leaves is lighter and sweeter, while tube tea made from ordinary maocha keeps pu'er's body. Its aroma blends with the tea itself into a flavor with strong local character.

Getting the Tea Out and Brewing It

1. Splitting: split the tube lengthwise with a knife, peel off the bamboo, and take out the tea column. Bamboo membrane often clings to the column, and you can leave it on.
2. Breaking off pieces: the column is dense, so pry off the amount you need from one end with a tea needle or knife, or break it into short sections.
3. Brewing: put it in a gaiwan, rinse once with boiling water at 100°C, steep the first few infusions 10–15 seconds, and adjust to taste once the pieces open.
4. Boiling: bamboo tube tea is also great for boiling. Simmer the pieces in a pot over low heat for a few minutes, and the bamboo aroma comes through even more.

Locals sometimes boil or roast tea right in the bamboo tube, another way of drinking tea in mountain village life.

Is Bamboo Tube Tea Pu'er?

That depends on the material and method. If sun-dried maocha from Yunnan large-leaf tea, from within the protected area, is steamed soft and shaped in a bamboo tube, it can be considered pu'er compressed tea in an unusual shape. Traditional tube tea roasted from fresh leaves in the tube uses a process different from sun-drying, and is better understood as one of Yunnan's ethnic teas.

Storage

Bamboo tube tea is best stored with its bamboo shell intact, somewhere dry, ventilated, and odor-free. Once split, wrap the tea column in cotton paper or a paper bag and, like other pu'er, keep it away from damp. The bamboo tube itself also dislikes damp and molds easily, so take particular care.

There's more on the tea customs of Yunnan's peoples in our articles on culture and daily life. For an overview of pu'er shapes, see Cakes, Bricks, Tuocha, Dragon Pearls, and Loose Tea: The Shapes of Pu'er.

Bamboo Tube Tea and Mountain Village Life

In Yunnan's mountain villages, bamboo is the handiest material there is: for building houses, making tools, and holding and boiling tea. Bamboo tube tea is closely tied to life in the mountains: heading up to work, you could cut a section of bamboo and use it to hold and roast tea, and the finished tube tea was light, kept out damp, and easy to carry. Today, bamboo tube tea is mostly a product or souvenir, but the waft of bamboo when you open the tube still calls to mind a fire pit in a mountain village.

What Bamboo Tube Tea Looks Like

A whole bamboo tube tea usually has a shell of bamboo roasted golden with scorch marks, sealed at one or both ends. Split open, the tea column has a smooth surface, often with a thin layer of bamboo membrane stuck to it, ranging from yellowish brown to dark brown depending on the material and how much it was roasted. The column is tightly packed, and you can see layers of leaves in the cross-section. When choosing one, a tube with an intact shell, no mold spots, and a clean smell of bamboo and tea has been well kept.

FAQ

What is bamboo tube tea? Tea stuffed into fresh bamboo tubes, roasted, and tamped into shape, a tradition of the Dai, Lahu, and other peoples of Yunnan.

How is bamboo tube tea made? Fresh leaves or steamed maocha are packed into the tube, roasted soft beside the fire, and tamped down, with more tea added repeatedly until it's finally roasted dry.

What does bamboo tube fragrance smell like? Fresh like split bamboo, with a sweetness like rice cooked in bamboo and a touch of roast.

How do you get the tea out and brew it? Split the tube lengthwise, take out the column, pry or break off what you need, and brew or boil it with boiling water.