A beginner should usually buy a clean, moderately fermented, reasonably priced Liu Bao with clear production information and a sample-size option, rather than immediately spending heavily on very old, heavily stored, or highly specialized vintage tea.
The difference between raw and ripe Liu Bao is primarily the degree and method of post-fermentation the tea has undergone before reaching the drinker, but “raw” and “ripe” Liu Bao are not as standardized a binary classification as sheng and shou Pu-erh.
