Long zhu

Honey is, really, bee vomit.  I know this.  So the following didn’t weird me out as much as it could have.

At a tea party, the host brought out a canister of long zhu, which translates to dragon balls, or, more nicely, dragon pearls.  Long zhu is black and formed of little, tiny spherical pellets.  What is it?  Well, it’s the leaves of a plant native to East Asia.  That have been fed to bugs.  Then their feces is gathered.  That’s long zhu.

No, I don’t know what kind of bug.  But hey, bee vomit, bug shit, what’s the difference?  I was game.

He took a tiny amount — less than a gram — and put it in a strainer.  Then we started brewing 1950s pu-erh gong fu style.  For those who were willing to try it (which eventually was everyone in attendance) he would pour it over the long zhu, into the cup.

First off, this stuff is strong.  Flavor-wise.  It is also delicious.  It enhances the flavor of the tea to which it’s added — makes a dramatic difference — and we’re talking about just pouring the tea over the pellets, not dissolving them.

Secondly, this stuff is strong.  Psychotropically.  It is, really, a drug, it turns out.  I didn’t know this.  One gets high, and stoned, but somehow has subjectively clearer thoughts, even though there feels like a cloud in your head.  It’s also, I think, allergenic.  Everyone in attendance had their nasal passages clog immediately, and some developed sinus headaches.  But did we stop drinking it?  No.  We kept asking for cup after cup.  I probably had about 300 ml.

Yes, all the dumb jokes were made, mostly by me.  “This is good shit!”  “Where can I get some of this shit?”

It costs $200/kilo which might (?) sound like a lot, until you realize that four of us got high on a gram, which works out to a nickel apiece.  And he put the rest of the gram away.  Because, you know, there was some left.  w00t.

(I had been planning to comment near the end of the party that, since I had now switched from whisky tastings to tea tastings, I could safely drive home afterwards.  I hadn’t counted on dragon pearls.  Er, bug shit.)