Tea from China - History

Just finished my Skype session with the instructor and other class participants.  WOW!!  Is there ever a lot to know in this module.  The book is like three times the size as the Tea 101 materials and of course the tea list is huge!!  I'm going to summarize here the history of tea in China.

China is the birthplace of tea.  It was discovered in 2737 by Emporer Shen Nong.  He was sitting in the shade of a tree and boiling some water when a breeze came up and blew some of the leaves from the tree into his pot of boiling water.  Instead of dumping it out he drank it and found it to be delish!!  Tea was born, as the tree he was sitting under was a tea tree.

The Chinese also have an answer for how the tea trees came to be:  It was because Bodhidharma, the first patriarch of Zen decided that he was going to sit in front of the Shaolin Temple in China and meditate for 9 years.  Unfortunately he dosed off a little and was so upset with himself (Doesn't seem very Zen like) that he sliced off his eyelids and threw them to the ground.  From those eyelids grew the first tea bush!!

Tea was first brewed by boiling it to death.  This resulted in, as you can imagine a very strong and bitter liquor that was used primarily for medicinal purposes.  It must have worked because they started to cultivate it due to the demand for its medicinal uses.  The first cultivation of tea started in the Szechwan province.  by the mid 4th century.  The imperial court even put a levy on the tea called a 'tea tribute' - the first form of tax on tea.  The unfortunate reality was that the tea tribute was so important that the peasants had to focus on tea growing, and little to no focus on growing food, and for the poor in China it meant many people died of famine.  (Every country's history has something to this effect in their history - how can we be so unjust to each other?).

The first teas were pressed into cakes and then roasted until hard and red in color.  Tea was traded.  The Tibetans traded war horses for tea, and was such as sought after commodity that they used the hardened tea bricks as currency.  They also used tea in their meals as a flavour additive.

The Tang Dynasty in China 618 - 907 was a period of aesthetic quality - it was refined and sophisticated.  Tea was brought to a whole new level.  The brewing, and cultivating and the manufacturing of teas began to be turned into an art.  Fruit juices were being added to sweeten the flavours, and more attention was given to brewing a tea that had distinctive aromas and flavours.

LuYu - the patron saint of tea writes the first book about tea, its origins, methods and tools used for plucking and processing, preparing and serving.  He documented how it should be prepared, served and appreciated.  He was the first to document tea.

Now in China independent privately owned coops share local resources for labour, harvest, processing and distribution.  The government regulates much of the tea and still typically harvests and operates large scale farms.  China has a significant portion of the worlds tea gardens-about50%, but only produces about 20% of the world output.

Teas from China

China is the only country that manufactures all six main classes of tea - white, yellow, green, oolong, black and pu-erh.  All tea is derived from the same plant - the Camellia Sinensis plant.  There are different varieties of these plants that determine leaf size etc, but it is how the tea leaves are processed that determines what type of tea you are drinking.

This week I am tasting eight teas from China.  They include:  White Silver Needle, White Peony, Dragonwell (green), Ti Kuan Yin (oolong), Jasmine (green scented), Keemun (black), Puerh, and Lapsang Souchong (black tea smoked over green pine).

White teas are the least processed of all teas.  It is typically plucked when the leaf is very immature.  it still has the tiny white velvety hairs on the leaf and bud set.  Once plucked it is allowed to wither for a short time and then dried at vary low temperatures.  This is the most delicate of all teas, and has a delicate sweetness on the palate when sipped.  It is grown in the Fujian province of China.

White silver needle (Bai Hao Yin Zhen),  is the premium type of white tea.  Only the unopened bud set is used.  White peony (Bai Mudan) uses a mixture of the bud set mixed with the actual leaf.  The flavour is similar, but because of the leaf being included, it provides for a tea with a bit more body than the bud set only.  It is cheaper but also very good.

Green teas in China are typically pan fired.  This generally imparts a smokiness to the flavour of the tea to some degree.  Dragon well (Longjing) is pan fired in a wood charcoal stoked wok.  The tea maker presses the leaves against the side of the wok to get the flat leaf appearance typical of Longjing.  The smokiness in Longjing is fairly light and it is one of the better tasting Chinese green teas that I have tried to date (those being gunpowder, and an unknown Chinese pan fired in Tea 101). I'm not that keen on the smoke flavour.  Maybe it will grow on me as I taste more.

Oolong teas are semi oxidized teas.  They are oxidized anywhere from 20% to 80%.  In tea 101 and in the current module we tasted Tieguanyin.  The dried leaf is balled and generally has the stem attached.  The tea liquor is fairly light in colour - has a lime greenish tinge to it and the flavour is sweet with a lingering aftertaste of peaches.  This oolong is probably my favourite tea to date.

The Jasmine scented tea is a green tea that has been scented with Jasmine flowers.  It has a strong jasmine smell and flavour.  There are no flowers visible in the dry tea leaves.  A very pleasant tea.  Last month I made lemon and jasmine tea sorbet.  It was very good, but I think the lemon and the sugar was a bit overpowering in flavour.  Once I've tried a few more times and perfected the flavour to what I think is good I will post the recipe.  The original recipe was from Tea Magazine.

We then move into the dark fully oxidized teas.  Keemun (Hao Ya A) is a Chinese black tea from the Anhui Province.  It has a brisk full bodied flavour, but is lighter than the Assam Orthodox I had in Tea 101.  It also does not have that lovely molasses/caramel flavour that I love.  Overall it's a good black tea, with a touch of floral sweetness, and on the lighter side.

The Pu-erh tea was the same as the Tea 101 course.  Pu-erh is from the Yunnan Province in China.  Pu-erh tea has been protected by the Chinese government, and it can only be called Pu-erh if it is from that region.  If its produced anywhere else in the world it may not be called Pu-erh.  Pu-erh differs in that it is only partially dried and then it is piled and left to age - or compost if you will.  Pu-erh teas have a very earthy, mushroomy flavour.

Finally to round out the Chinese teas we tried Lapsang Souchong.  This tea is definitely an acquired taste that has not bee acquired by me.  I'm not sure I'll ever acquire this particular taste, but to tell you how it's made will give you a good indication of what it tastes like.  It is black tea that has been smoked over green pine wood.  So you know it is incredibly smokey in flavour.  OK if you like that.  But I'm not a huge fan.

So that is a summary of teas that I tasted this week!!  My top picks include the scented jasmine green tea, and the Tieguanyin Oolong tea (aka - Monkey Picked Oolong).