Discussion on Long Jing (2)

Discussion on Long Jing (1) is here.


（Blogger's notes: some of the contents were inspired by discussions on Steepster between other Long Jing lovers and me. There is so much fun conversing with these people!)


4. Geographic regions

Authentic Long Jing is from Zhejiang province of China. In the market, there are also “Long Jing” products from Yunnan, Sichuan and other provinces. Whether or not tea from other provinces should be called “Long Jing”, I will not discuss about it here because it’s a “should or should not” question. But most people agree on the fact that teas from other provinces, even made with Long Jing processing method, are dramatically different the real Long Jing from Zhejiang province.

So I will focus the discussion on Long Jing from Zhejiang province only.

The central production region of Long Jing is Hangzhou, capital of Zhejiang province. If you are highly selective about geographic site of your Long Jing, then you would want your tea from one of the tea districts in Hangzhou. According to Chinese national standards (yes there is a set of national standards for various teas, but not all of them are enforced in tea industry), there are three types of Long Jing based on production districts in Hangzhou. All of them are currently called Xi Hu (West Lake) Long Jing or Hangzhou Long Jing.


(1) Shi Feng (Lion Peak) Long Jing. Many people believe this is the best of the three types of Hangzhou Long Jing. Historically Shi Feng Long Jing has been always priced slightly higher than the other two types, although all three types of Hangzhou Long Jing are always priced much higher than Long Jing from out of Hangzhou. The most famous villages for Shi Feng Long Jing are Long Jing Village, Weng Jia Shan and Shi Feng.


(2) Mei Jia Wu Long Jing – From Mei Jia Wu village and surrounding area.


(3)  Other tea producing area near West Lake. (This third type used to be called Xi Hu Long Jing. But currently Xi Hu Long Jing is used as a general name for Long Jing from all Hangzhou production districts. Therefore it will be less confusing not to call the third type Xi Hu Long Jing).

Historically, Long Jing has been cultivated all over Zhejiang province. Overall there are three Long Jing regions in Zhejiang province. They are:

A.   Hangzhou – as above mentioned, it is the most central and most famous Long Jing region.

B.    Qiantang – about 30km (20 miles) from Hangzhou

C.    Yuezhou –about 100km (60 miles) from Hangzhou, of the highest geographic elevation among the three regions. The famous Da Fo (Great Buddha) Long Jing is from this region. 

I hope I didn’t make a mess listing all these production regions. Overall, Long Jing production regions include:

A. Hangzhou (tea from this region, including A1, A2, and A3, is called Hangzhou Long Jing or Xi Hu Long Jing)

A1 – Shi Feng Long Jing

A2 – Mei Jia Wu Long Jing

A3 – Oher Xi Hu Long Jing

B. Qiantang (tea from this region is called Qiantang Long Jing or Zhejiang Long Jing)


C. Yuezhou (tea from this region is called Yuezhou Long Jing or Zhejiang Long Jing. Tea from Xichang county of this region is called Da Fo Long Jing)

All above mentioned regions are under geographic patent protection, which means, tea produced out of above regions cannot be called Hangzhou Long Jing, Xi Hu Long Jing or Zhejiang Long Jing. 

A relevant question is, how much can geographic conditions affect quality of tea products?

In some sense, the question is easy to answer. Hangzhou region produces Long Jing of the best quality – this is not judgment of few people, but conclusion from tea drinkers in the past several hundred years. 

In another sense, this question is very hard to answer. Actually I’ve never seen a person (highly experienced professionals included) who claims he or she can accurately tell a Long Jing’s cultivation area by tasting (or someone claimed so but we wouldn’t know whether to trust the judgment). I believe if we take many samples from various regions, we will find Hangzhou region yields more top quality tea products. But there is always possibility that a very high quality Long Jing from another region is almost as good as Hangzhou Long Jing.

A Mei Jia Wu farmer once did mention to me that he thought Long Jing from a Weng Jia Shan farmer was better than his (although both villages are in Hangzhou region) and he believed it was largely due to the soil of various sites – I think he was very truthful to say that because many farmers won’t have the self-critiquing, out of pride. But he also mentioned that the other farmer’s processing work was better than his, so it was not just the difference of cultivaiton location.

When we compare Hangzhou Long Jing and other Zhejiang Long Jing (“Long Jing” out of Zhejiang province would be totally different), Hangzhou Long Jing usually has the best geographic conditions, the best processing workers, and the most careful work dedicated to it. Geographic factor surely contributes to the differences between Hangzhou and non-Hangzhou Long Jing, but how much the geographic factor contributes to the final result, is hard to say.

Currently Hangzhou Long Jing and the other two regions of Zhejiang Long Jing have been protected by geographic patent. This is good news for consumers, because more accurate information of the tea source must be provided by the producers and sellers. However, I personally believe this is by far not enough. Due to the current cultivation reality of Long Jing, it’s also important to have cultivar information provided for each Long Jing product (for many other teas, cultivar is not a problem). Geographic Patent has been largely advocated by farmers and sellers of original tea production regions, because they directly benefit from it. However, there is not as strong request for specifying cultivar information of Long Jing products. Maybe it’s up to the consumers to demand the information. Just like the harvest date information, few people used to care about it or asked about it. But when more and more consumers want the information, they will eventually push the entire “tea industry”, from producers to retailers, to provide the information. 

cheers for the tea communities

The summer trip took longer than I had expected. There is so much to catch up with the tea community! In fact, the tea community never fails to surprise me and inspire me.

By reading people's tasting notes, I've learned that a generous tea drinker at Steepster kindly shared tea she purchased from our store with a bunch of other Steepsterites. I feel so grateful to this nice gal whom I haven't exchanged a word yet. Because of her generosity, more people got to know and like our tea. More importantly, she spread love of tea in the community. Some people who had never experienced oolong started to like this tea genre, and some people who had never tried dark oolong fell in love with it.  

While I was away, people had fabulous discussions and contributed great thoughts on this blog. And of course, there are so many nice essays to catch up with from fellow tea drinkers' blogs, including the monthly blog carnival held by Association of Tea Bloggers.

Also during the summer, Leafbox Tea has got its new outlook and, as always, great articles! Rate Tea Net has grown a lot bigger over a summer!

There was a lot going on in my personal life in the past summer. I've spent weeks without a drop of tea. And I've also spent days drinking so many types of teas in a row that we called it tea mardi gras. To my great pleasure, in Beijing, I finally got to meet a Korean Teachatter whom I've admired for a long time! He and his Chinese-Medicine-Doctor-to-be friend, who is also a tea aficionado, took me to fantastic places only "insiders" can get in :-D Both my fellow Teachatter and I realized, with a bit surprise, that it was the first time for both of us to ever meet a tea friend from an online tea community. Yet there are so many great tea drinkers from these online communities, and I think I've got to go out more and meet more of them!

The summer flied away so fast. My goals in the coming autumn are working harder on tea, meeting more tea friends and building up more tea karma by giving away more tea to fellow tea lovers.

Two Huang Jin Gui (Golden Osmanthus, 黃金桂) products

Huang Jin Gui is one of my favorite oolong cultivar. When it was first introduced to market in mid-1800s, it was also called Tou Tian Xiang (透天香), meaning its fragrance soaring to the sky. Its fragrance is similar to that of osmanthus flower, and the tea liquor is a golden color, hence it's named as Golden Osmanthus.

Huang Jin Gui is harvested around early April. This year, the early March cold current killed buds of a lot of Huang Jin Gui tea bush. Therefore I didn't get any spring Huang Jin Gui of this year. Fortunately, I still have some of this tea from last autumn and the past winter, one of them is traditional green style and the other is modern green style (less oxidized than traditional style). I am very much pleased by this winter Huang Jin Gui. Usually, it's not super hard to find inexpensive and good Huang Jin Gui, because a se zhong (non-Tie Guan Yin southern Fujian oolong) can easily beat the quality of a Tie Guan Yin with twice the price, due to the relatively high price for Tie Guan Yin. But meantime, it's not easy to find super good Huang Jin Gui or other se zhong oolong, because not many people would put a lot efforts on inexpensive products.

Autumn tea, traditional green style. When I first sipped this tea, I wasn't impressed with its fragrance. Sometimes, when drinking a southern Fujian oolong, we just can't help expecting some great fragrance. This tea doesn't have the explicit fragrance in the first a few infusions. I thought it was very comfortable to drink, but not super exciting. After a while, when I reached the third or fourth infusion, I suddenly experienced a sweet and smooth taste. It wasn't explicit aroma, but very tasty. Traditional style oolong sometimes release aroma and flavor more slowly than modern style oolong, and therefore the best tastes sometimes come from the third to fifth infusions. Besides, traditional style tea usually is very good at causing sweet aftertaste in the drinker's mouth. Then by the time of the third or fourth infusion, the taste is positively influenced by the sweet aftertaste built up in the drinker's mouth.

Dry leaves:

First infusion:

Fifth infusion:

Winter tea, modern green style. Many people say winter harvest is the best season for Huang Jin Gui, because that's when Huang Jin Gui has the best fragrance. Modern green style processing can elicit the fragrance and refreshing taste of a tea to a maximum degree. The fragrance of this tea is, like its nickname, "soaring to the sky".  Besides, I am impressed by how good looking the leaves are. In modern green style processing, the leaves are usually largely crushed. That's mainly because the red edge formed on the leaves of modern green style tea can negatively influence the taste, and therefore after the oxidation, the tea leaves will be packed in bags and punched hard on the ground to have their red edges shed. But this manufacturer has a unique way of processing. Somehow they managed to avoid significant red edge on the leaves and bypass the step of punching the leaves. This is the best Huang Jin Gui I've ever had.

Dry leaves:

First infusion:

Seventh infusion:

Concept Tea (3) - certified organic Taiwan GABA oolong

What's GABA? - GABA is gaba-aminobutyric acid. It's briefly called GABA. It's an amino acid that plays important role in nervous system and endocrine system. There are many medical research on health benefits of GABA as dietary supplement. I didn't look into them, because I always think human body is an extremely complicated system, and dietary supplements to human body are seldom as simple as gasoline to cars (well some dietary supplements, such as some vitamins, do have more straight-forward effects).

So health benefit is not the main purpose that I got this tea. It's a nice bonus if it's super healthy, but I think a tea should first be tasty.

Tea leaves with rich GABA contents were first discovered by Japanese tea biochemists. Then Japanese tea professionals started to intentionally cultivate and process tea leaves to promote their GABA contents. The tea leaves are slowly oxidized in an environment with very little oxygen. This is very different from the regular oxidation of tea (I have to say Japanese sometimes are extremely creative). This special process can result in a tea with more than 150mg of GABA content in every 100g tea, which is the standard for GABA tea.

According to some Japanese studies, GABA tea has many health benefits, reducing blood pressure, cardiovascular disease prevention, slimming, liver health... just to name a few. I didn't read much about these benefits but I felt the benefits covered medical conditions of everybody in my family :-p

There are organic and non-organic GABA teas. I got this MOA certified organic one. But the main reason I got this tea is, a few people mentioned to me that this tea tastes somewhat like Oriental Beauty and is more tasty than other GABA teas (some say the special processing causes GABA tea to have less aroma), which I like very much.

I brewed this tea in both gongfu style and with a small tea bowl. The tea does have some honey and fruit aroma similar to Oriental Beauty, but not as prominent as the aroma of OB. I think an obviously feature of this GABA tea is, it tastes very smooth and sugary - a strong sugar taste minus the sweet part. It may fit the tastes of people who love Oriental Beauty, Muzha Tie Guan Yin and/or black tea, although its flavor is not exactly the same as any of them. In later infusions of gongfu style, this tea yield some taste of herbal medicine. Overall, the front taste of this tea is rich, but aftertaste is weak or none. The tea does well in tea bowl or mug brewing. When using a mug, 10-15 dry tea grains can make a good mug of tea with about 3 infusions. Compared with most other oolongs, the tea releases flavor faster, therefore less tea can be used for each session. On the other hand, in mug brewing, the tea gets weak at about the fourth infusion, not as long lasting as many other oolongs.

I am not sure yet if I am fond of the concept of promoting specific healthy content in tea. But it's an interesting phenomenon to observe. Besides the GABA concept in this tea, something else about this tea that attracts me is, the producer tried all means (including adjusting ingredient of organic fertilizers and modifying the procedure within GABA standards) to make the tea tasty. I don't think it's as tasty as my favorite Oriental Beauty, but it does have some good taste. I don't want to drink a tea solely for its health benefits, and I am glad the producer thinks the same way!

Hands of tea workers

Photo taken by 大碗.

For a few times, people asked me, why are many tea workers' hands as dark as ink-stained when they work on fresh tea leaves? It's actually a simple chemical phenomenon - oxidation. As we know, tea contains de-oxidants. That's partially why tea is considered healthy. What a de-oxidant does is reacting with any oxidant molecules (which is a major cause of cell aging and cell damage) very fast. Therefore many oxidant molecules are removed from the cells by such reactions, and the cells live healthier and longer.

Oxidation often causes color change, which can be observed in a lot of fruits and vegetables. For example, if you cut open a potato or apple and leave it on the countertop for a few hours, browning happens to it. The browning is because of oxidation of catechol, which is a biomolecule found in potato, apple and many other plant tissues. Catechol, when oxidized, is turned into benzoquinone. The reaction requires oxygen and an enzyme in the plant tissues. In healthy cells, catechol is not exposed to oxygen or the plants' own enzyme, therefore browning doesn't happen until the cells age or are damaged.

In tea leaf tissues, one of the major tea polyphenols is catechin (there are a group of molecules that are called catechin), which is similar to catechol but a even stronger de-oxidant. Catechin can be oxidized into molecules (such as thearubugins, dark color molecules in red/black tea) that cause dark color. Oxidation of catechin requires an enzyme in fresh tea leaves. When the enzyme is "killed" (which happens in the "kill green" step of green tea processing), the oxidation cannot happen and therefore the tea leaves will be maintained green for a long time. However, any strong de-oxidant can be easily oxidized. That's why green tea has a relatively short shelf life. Eventually oxidation can happen, only more slowly, even without the enzyme from the tea leaves. If the enzyme in tea leaves is active, then when the tea leaf cells are damaged (in harvesting and rolling step of red tea processing), then catechin in the tea leaves will be oxidized, which causes the color of red tea and darker oolong. The mechanisms of catechin oxidation is described by Wan et al. in Oxidation Mechanism in Tea Catechins, in Natural Products Research and Development (2006, Vol. 18, pp171-181. But it's not new discovery and was documented earlier in Tea Biochemistry (a university textbook) written by the same first author.

When tea workers handle fresh tea leaves, the leaf "juice", containing both catechin and enzyme from leaf cells, gets all over their hands. Exposed to the air, oxidation of catechin happens very fast. In a harvest season, a tea worker's hands remain black for weeks.

The above photo tells us two things:
1. Tea is indeed a powerful de-oxidant source.
2. It takes a lot of hard work of tea workers to make the tea we drink.
3. If someone says tea workers' hands are "dirty" or "contaminated", you know they are not.

Tea Longevity (茶壽）

In Chinese culture, there are names for some senior ages. A senior person of 77 years old has "Happy Longevity" (喜壽), because in cursive style of Chinese calligraphy, the character for Happy, 喜, looks like Chinese characters for 77.

A person of 88 years old has "Rice Longevity", because the character for Rice, 米, has two character 八 (Eight) in it, one at the bottom, one on the top, inverted.

A person of 99 years old has "White Longevity", because the character for White, 白, is one stroke short of 百 (One hundred).

A person of 108 years old has "Tea Longevity". In the character for Tea, 茶, the top part means Twenty (廿); below it there is a 八 (Eight); further below there is a 八十 (Eighty); and finally there is another 八 (Eight). All together, the character for Tea has 20+80+8=108 in it!

Tea is one of the healthiest beverages. Of course we have reasons to think there is an actual relation between tea and longevity!

Do you know anybody who has Tea Longevity?

I think the oldest person I've ever known is my grandmother-in-law, who passed away at the age of 106. She was a strong and smart woman throughout her life. In the last a few days of her life, she still walked around fast, without a walk-stick. And she passed away suddenly in sleep. We believe she left without pain. In fact, as a rural woman who was born in 19th century, she never got any exact information about her own age or birth date. She didn't know when she was born. Her birthday was celebrated by her children and grandchildren on a "hypothetic" day every year. And people, including herself, could only guess about her age. So, we never know if she lived for 106 years, 108 years, or even more.

Uses of unwanted teas

As you know, sometimes some teas are so unwanted or expired that you don't even have a heart to pass them to others. And sometimes a tea is so dear to your heart and you can't bear with throwing the spent leaves away. Here are some extra uses of tea that I've thought of.

1. Marinate hard-boiled eggs in water with tea (unscented black tea only), salt and soy sauce.

2. Put tea leaves (unscented tea) in a pillow or sofa cushion, or small pouch – depending how much you have. (For this purpose, I use spent leaves only. I've seen commercial products made with unused leaves though.)

3. Put tea leaves in small pouches and use them as dehumidifying bags for storage boxes or deodorizer bags in fridge. (Spent leaves do the job well.)

4. Put tea leaves in very warm/hot water for feet spa (I mean, resting your feet in warm/hot water). You can always expand this to the scale of hot tub tea bath. But I’ve found feet spa very convenient and a great enjoyment. Do it before you go to bed. Very helpful for high quality sleep, especially in winter. This is said to be one of the Chinese secrets for longevity. Well, longevity is too big to think about. But feet spa feels great! Before you go to bed, reading a book while having your feet in a big pot of warm water, that's paradise! Having your feet in a big pot of warm TEA water, that's an upgraded paradise.

5. Put tea leaves in small pouches and use them as “sniffing bags” in office. Make sure it’s a flavor that you like. I mostly use spent leaves and apply vodka based essential oil mix on them.

6. Use brewed green tea for facial (with pop-up facial paper, or mix the tea water with other facial product). Even expired green tea is very good de-oxidant and good for facial. In Asia, many women would mix green tea powder in their facial mask formula too.

Any other ideas?

Wu Wo Tea (Selfless Tea, 無我茶會)

I first read about Wu Wo Tea (Selfless Tea) in Tea Culture, a college textbook of China Southwestern Agricultural University, written by Liu Qinjin. The idea attracted me immediately. Later I learned more about it from the website of Wu Wo Tea.

Wu Wo Tea is a tea activity designed by Cai Rongzhang, the first manager of Lu Yu Tea Center of Taipei. Lu Yu Tea Center is a for-profit company, but since its establishment, it has organized many invaluable education and cultural activities. Wu Wo Tea is one of the most influential activities. It's held periodically throughout the year, and is also adopted by companies and organizations as an activity to promote teamwork spirit.

The basic idea of Wu Wo Tea is, tea drinkers gather to drink tea. Everybody brings his or her own tea, a small teapot or gaiwan, small tea bowls (about 4), thermos and hot water - simple and inexpensive gears, pretty much like the set showed in the picture (the small tea bowls were not taken out in the picture). People sit in a circle, in an order randomly assigned by the host. Then, in silence, people start to make tea. Each participants make, for example, 4 cups of tea. Three cups go to the three people on the left of her, and one cup for herself. Then, for each infusion, everybody gets 4 cups of tea, one from herself, and three from people on her right. When everybody has 4 cups of tea ready, the group start drinking tea. After drinking, people start making the next infusion and share the tea in the same way. Throughout the activity, there is no talking, simply making tea and sharing tea. After several infusions and rounds of sharing, the activity ends.

In Wu Wo Tea, every tea drinker serves others and is served by others. Besides drinking his own tea, the tea drinker also get a few other teas, which may or may not be the same type of tea as his own, and can be higher or lower quality. There is no verbal conversation or commands. Tea drinkers try to follow the group pace in tea making, and try to make the best out of their teas to share with others. The activity can be held indoors or outdoors. Once on a scenic site out of Beijing, I saw some Taiwanese tourists sitting in a circle drinking tea quietly. It was such a beautiful scene. Back then I didn't know about Wu Wo Tea. But now when I am thinking of it, I guess they were probably having their Wu Wo Tea.

Ever since I learned about Wu Wo Tea, I've hoped someday I can participate in one! I like the meditative and action aspects of it. After a lot of positive influence, I am still very bad at meditation. It's hard to learn doing nothing! But this tea party sounds fun, because not only it provides you tranquil moments, it requires you to do something - making tea. Besides its meditative aspect, it satisfy tea drinkers' need of making tea. I know a lot of tea drinkers who enjoy making tea as much as drinking tea. A tea part in which everyone makes tea sounds fun! In addition, I like the feeling of tea drinkers united. I guess many tea drinkers are loners (which is not necessarily bad because basically all scientists and artists have to be loners for at least part of their lives). Sometimes tea drinking is entirely private - which indeed sounds unfortunate. How nice to make tea and share tea with a group of tea drinkers! The communication is not through language, but through tea!

I've got my gears ready but don't have a party to join yet. My tea friends, I hope someday we can have some Wu Wo Tea together! And be sure to let us know if you are going to have a Wu Wo Tea party someday!

What is puerh? (2) Debates

There are many debates about puerh definition. Here are some biggest ones. Most of these debates not only exist among ordinary tea drinkers, but also among tea experts and senior tea professionals. It seems that puerh is so complex that it's almost impossible to clarify it with one definition, one interpretation or one straight-forward view. For each of the following debates, there are many protagonists and antagonists. I believe it's important to be aware of them, because sometimes people have to agree to disagree. When we see exactly opposite opinions on puerh, probably neither is ridiculous.

Debate 1 - Is Modern Shu a puerh?
According to 2008 National Standards (which was carefully made and supported by many people), Modern Shu is one type of puerh. But there are also many people who strongly against counting Modern Shu as puerh, because it didn't exist before 1970s, and by inner character, it is much closer to various other type of Hei Cha (Black Tea, which, as a Chinese tea term, is post-fermentation tea. Not the same as black tea in Western tea terminology.) than to Young and Old Sheng. (my notes: I like Sheng a lot more than Shu. So I sympathize with this view.)

Debate 2 - Is young Sheng a puerh?
This may not be as big a debate as Debate 1, because no matter how much you argue about a young Sheng, some day it can possibly become an old Sheng. But there are people who strongly object that young Sheng should be called a puerh. Their major reason is, before a young Sheng gets aged enough, it's not puerh yet. It doesn't have the inner characters of old Sheng, and young Sheng doesn't have the same health benefits of both old Sheng and modern fast-fermented puerh Shu.

(my notes: I have less sympathy for this view, because there can hardly be a well-defined standard about how old a Sheng must get in order to be called an "old Sheng". But I do have some sympathy for it, because obviously, puerh factories benefit from blurring the boundary of young Sheng and old Sheng. This makes people, including me, suspect how much the 2006 and 2008 puerh Standards were influenced by the "puerh industry".)

Debate 3 - Does Shu mean modern fast-fermented puerh product, or does it include both the modern fast-fermented puerh and old Sheng?
This debate is reflected by Definition 5 in "What is puerh? (1)" - Da Yi's definition. Some people believe the modern Shu can never be similar to an old Sheng. Some other people, including Da Yi people, believe old Sheng will share similar characters with modern Shu. (my notes: this view needs to be tested by time and research. It may or may not be true. But obviously Da Yi's current interpretation is helpful for them to sell both young Sheng and modern Shu.)

To summarize Debate 1, 2, and 3, there are three different views:
1. Both puerh Sheng (of any age) and modern fast-fermented Shu are puerh. This view is consistent with 2008 National Standards.

2. Puerh Sheng (of any age) is puerh, but modern fast-fermented Shu is not.

3. Old Sheng and modern fast-fermented Shu are both puerh, but young Sheng is not puerh, YET. Within this group, some people believe that young Sheng should be called "Yunnan Sun-dried Green Tea" instead. Some other people believe young Sheng is an unfinished product, and is not ready for drinking/sale at all. (my notes: Even if it's not a final product, probably we can still buy them and store them at home. I believe these people's point is, price of Young Sheng should be that of an unfinished products, but nowadays there are too many expensive, upscale Young Sheng. Meantime, I can understand that these people's another point is, once factories sell you young Sheng, they are not responsible for the future of it. So if the young Sheng doesn't have inner quality to be well-aged, it's factories' gain and consumers' loss.) Supporters of this view say, "Although chicken is from egg, you can't call an egg chicken." Ultimately, name is not the most important. People's concern is, if the "puerh industry" attempts to sell an egg for a chicken's price, it's too much value inflation.

Debate 4. Can Hei Cha products from provinces such as Guangxi, Sichuan and Hunan be counted as puerh? Or,  can puerh be categorized as Hei Cha?
Actually this is more of an ambiguity and not as much a debate. Most people agree that puerh is very much different from Hei Cha from other provinces. In tea market, most Chinese sellers wouldn't call Hei Cha from other provinces "puerh". But some Chinese tea books and articles (most of them don't focus on puerh, though) put Puerh under the category of either Hei Cha or Post-fermented Tea. In contrast, an interesting phenomenon is, some western tea articles and sellers would put Hei Cha (such as Liu Bao Cha, Sichuan Brick Tea, Hunan Brick Tea, etc.) under the category "puerh". I guess, listing Puerh (instead of Hei Cha, or Black Tea) as one of the six general categories of tea has something to do with a historical terminology dilemma. In Western tea terminology, the term Black Tea is already adopted for the tea genre which is called Red Tea in Asia, and so far in the West this tea genre is the most popular, best-known and most widely enjoyed one among all tea genres. Therefore it's barely possible for tea sellers to give consumers a strange name to their familiar tea, and use the familiar name "Black Tea" to a tea category that is still strange to them. Sometimes, what a seller wants the least is confusing buyers.

Debate 5. How proper is the geographic patent for puerh? Should the name puerh be restricted to products from Yunnan province only?
The Geographic Patent for puerh started from the 2006 Yunnan Province Standards for Puerh. But as a province document, it doesn't have regulation power on products of other provinces. But once the National Standards for Puerh came out in 2008, it has become illegal for products from other provinces to be called "Puerh". Although puerh originates from Yunnan, Guangdong province has more than 100 years of history of producing and exporting puerh products. Some people argue that the Modern Shu technique is largely from Guangdong. Therefore many people believe it's unfair to forbid Guangdong products of the similar technique to be called "puerh".

Have a great summer!

Dear friends, I will spend the next two months in China. During the time, I am not sure if I will be able to reach this blog over the Great Wall, but I will try :-D I've scheduled some blog entries during the next two months. If I can't talk with you over the two months, I expect to catch up in August!

Blog Carnival on Daily Life Tea Drinking - Teabags and Loose Leaf Tea

This is part of the 2nd Blog Carnival of ATB (Association of Tea Bloggers)! A full index of contents for this blog carnival can be found at The Sip Tip.

1.
I've had probably fewer than 30 teabags in my entire life, with at least half of them made at home in the past months. I started doing this first because I am very frugal and don't want to throw away tea debris at the bottom of each tea container. Secondly, there are days that I am too tired to even lift my fingers. Although I never think brewing loose leaf tea very energy consuming (to me, so much easier than brewing coffee!), there are days that I just want to do as little as possible. That's how I made my first teabag. And I logged it on Steepster. Before that, I was gifted some homemade teabags by tea farmers and tea merchants. (For example, this one.) They are all great. No commercial product can compare with them. There are higher end, even whole-leaf teabag products in the market nowadays. Although they are good, in my eyes they can't compare with homemade ones because only the homemade ones, made by the tea drinkers (or their friends), are tuned to each tea drinker's particular taste. And, of course, homemade teabags are the most economic ones, while many good, especially whole-leaf teabags in the market have very high per-unit prices.

To make your own teabags, you will need heat-sealable teabags and a heat sealer. I got my teabags from a seller in Thailand by searching "tea bag heat seal" on eaby :D If you don't have a heat sealer, then probably foldable teabags are the most convenient. The foldable teabag was invented in Taiwan. It's very convenient to use. The way to fold it is pretty much like how you can fold a pair of socks when putting them away. It looks like this:
http://i00.c.aliimg.com/img/product/65/66/11/65661169.jpg
But I don't know yet where to get more of them. The website indicated in the photo doesn't exist!

2.
The other day, I was SHOCKED by someone's response when I walked into an office holding a glass of tea. The secretary of the office stared at my glass in disbelief and asked what it was. (Did she think it was weed?) When I told her it was green tea, she said "eww..." and frowned. And she had this facial expression which I would interpret as being scared or even disgusted. Maybe as a tea drinker I am too sensitive. But I was convinced by her expression that she was thinking that I was drinking something lousy. I know tea is not new to this office. They serve coffee and assorted teabags all the time in their kitchen, and they are quite familiar with teabags. I've seen all kinds of responses to loose leaf tea. People may think it's novel, mysterious, strange, impossible to deal with, hard to drink, so on and so forth. But, this was probably the first time I've seen somebody subtly indicating loose leaf tea as inferior to teabags. Maybe this lady has a thing about loose leaves and it's not about the tea at all. But, I can't help thinking, is it possible that some people deal with teabags all the time and never see naked tea leaves? When something is "never heard of" and strange, people may just intuitively think it's awful. After this small incident, I've decided to carry my loose leaf tea drink as much as possible to public places, and, in a transparent vessel (including this, this, this and this) when possible. I guess if people are more exposed to it, loose leaf tea won't look like some shocking scene.

Between Green and Red (1) - Cui Yu (Green Jade) Oolong

Oolong, as a semi-oxidized tea, is often said to be in a state between Green Tea and Red (black) Tea. It's often interesting to me comparing products of the same tea cultivar made with different processing techniques. This happens a lot in oolong. I also believe for green tea lovers and black tea lovers, oolong is a great tea type to expand their tea territory. One can always find oolong products closer to green tea taste or black tea taste. Then it's possible to move to the other side little by little. Therefore I plan to go over several pairs of oolongs. Each pair of tea are made with leaves of the same cultivar, but one is lightly oxidized, and the other is more oxidized.

Here are two Cui Yu teas made with lighter and heavier oxidation. Cui Yu (Green Jade) is one of the four major oolong cultivars in Taiwan. The story about origin of Cui Yu and another Taiwan Oolong cultivar, Jin Xuan, is here.

The first Cui Yu Oolong is typical Taiwan light oxidation style. It's indeed very close to green tea, both in color and taste.

The light oxidation technique retain the refreshing taste of high mountain oolong to the largest degree. The tea has an uprising fragrance of spring grasses, with some floral notes. The tea doesn't last for many infusions, usually 3-5. I would recommend this tea to every green tea lover. I've found the taste of this tea is somewhat between Japanese green, Chinese green and most other greener oolongs.

The second Cui Yu Oolong is made with Dong Ding style technique (featured with medium oxidation and medium to high roasting). It's a Grade IV (Award of Excellence) from 2009 winter Tea Competition of Nantou County Tea Commerce Association. (See more descriptions of Competition Grades of Taiwan Oolong here.) All the teas in this competition are either in or influenced by Dong Ding style. Cui Yu is a new cultivar in Taiwan oolong history, and most Cui Yu products we see in market are greener style.

(This is a little off-topic: Sometimes leaves of Cui Yu are mixed among others to make Dong Ding Oolong, but we wouldn't know if the product is not labeled with tea cultivar names. And often they are not labeled. Traditionally Dong Ding Oolong should be made with Green-heart oolong cultivar only, but nowadays there are more leaves from other cultivars used, sometimes all leaves are mixed to make a Dong Ding product. Such mixing sometimes promotes tea taste by combining various flavors. But it's also very confusing, because very often cultivars influence tea tastes much more than geographic locations of tea production.)


Now back to the topic - This Dong Ding Cui Yu, I think, is very unique. It serves as an excellent contrast with the popular greener Cui Yu. This is the first Dong Ding style Cui Yu I had. If I hadn't seen the product label and had done a blind taste, I guess I would have been totally confused. I would have thought it was like a Dong Ding Oolong, but I would have been deeply puzzled because the taste was quite unique and unlike other Dong Ding products I have seen. I put this tea in a tea guessing game on TeaChat, because I think it's a very tricky one :-D

Dry leaves are by far not as green as the other one. These look typical Dong Ding to me.

Tea liquor color is closer to a traditional greener style Dong Ding I have, and is nothing similar to the other Cui Yu.

Then I brewed these two teas side by side in small tea bowls (and by the way I found both of them are good for mug/tea bowl brewing).

I first put some 20 dry tea leaf grains in each tea bowl (fewer grains of the greener Cui Yu because its tea grains are larger). This was when I thought of using number of tea grains as a measurement in the Quick Notes 1d of tea brewing. I would rather counting tea leaves than using a scale. Although I use scales to weigh tea products all the time, I am anal about NOT using a scale in my personal tea drinking - it's just my idiosyncrasy :-p

All pictures have greener Cui Yu on the left and Dong Ding Cui Yu on the right. Greener Cui Yu's leaves are generally thicker and more intact, compared with Dong Ding Cui Yu. This is partially because Dong Ding Cui Yu was more heavily processed, and partially because this greener Cui Yu is from a higher elevation than leaves of the specific Dong Ding Cui Yu. Since leaves of the two products are not from the same production location, the comparison is not perfectly scientific. It's more of a fun game :-D The photos do not perfectly reflect their differences either. But fortunately the differences are big enough to stand out.

Finally their spent leaves. Greener Cui Yu on top and Dong Ding Cui Yu at the bottom.

These two teas have been kindly reviewed by tea drinkers at Steepster and Teaviews.
http://steepster.com/teas/life-in-teacup/9151-taiwan-cui-yu-green-jade-high-mountain-oolong
http://www.teaviews.com/category/tea-brands/life-in-teacup
http://www.teaviews.com/category/tea-brands/life-in-the-teacup/

What do you do with the first infusion of an oolong

When people brew oolong, the first infusion is often discarded. It's called "rinsing the tea" by some people, and "warm-up infusion" by some other people. I prefer to call it "warm-up infusion", because I drink it up most of the time (which is not a common practice) and I don't want to feel like drinking dish-washing water :-p In addition, I believe functionally, the warm-up step is almost essential for many oolongs.

The historic root of "washing the tea" is the combination of a few factors. Many old people would say, the discarded first infusion is meant to be an oblation for the God (whatever relevant God s/he is) and ancestors. This is an important aspect of Chinese traditional life, considering tea is always an essential part of traditional ancestor worship ceremony. Another tea custom related to ancestor worship is, in Gongfu tea session, when several small tea bowls are used, it's the best to arrange them in a half circle, but never in a straight line. The reason behind this custom is, only at ancestor worship, the tea bowls are lined up in front of ancestors' memorial tablets. In other words, it's considered improper and ominous to serve a living person in the same way as serving tea to ancestors (who are dead people). On the other hand, there were numerous rules in Chinese traditional society, so many that at certain point people may get tired of them. Nowadays, many young people don't care about the old rules, or don't know them at all. Sometimes the young people may break the rules and are chided by the old guys. I do follow the "not to line up the tea bowl" rule, because you never know if a guest in front of you minds a lot about any ominous signs. But when I drink tea alone, I steal most of the first infusions which are said to belong to ancestors :-p

As a science major, I believe many cultural phenomena have physical science reasons behind them. Many oolongs, fisted or strip-shaped, are tightly rolled. And therefore it's often necessary to allow them sometime to "wake up" in hot water before they can yield full flavor. I believe that's an important reason for the "warm-up infusion". I usually use hot boiling water for the warm up, pour the water in brewing vessel, let the water submerge tea leaves, and then pour water out as soon as possible (some people would hold it longer for this infusion). Then I would spend a minute or so taking care of other things, so that the tea leaves further "wake up" in the hot vessel before the official "first infusion".

The "rinse" or "warm up" infusion also helps remove small pieces of tea debris. This can be important because many people prefer not to use a filter in their Gaiwan brewing sessions. Some oolongs, such as Wuyi, Dan Cong, many Taiwan oolongs and traditional style Tie Guan Yin, have very neat whole leaves. With these teas, after an initial rinse, there won't be much more debris coming out of later infusions.

A side benefit I've experience from drinking the warm-up infusion is, by tasting it, I get an idea how fast the tea leaves opens and release flavor. I usually use 20 sec. to 30 sec. for each of the first a few infusions in a oolong session. Some teas, such as an excellent Tie Guan Yin, can yield a sweet and fragrant warm-up infusion. Then I would use shorter time (around 20 sec.) for the next a few infusions. Many people may think it improper to drink the warm-up infusion. So I steal this infusion only when I drink alone :D

Some people believe the purpose of rinsing is to clean the tea. I generally believe tea is already one of the cleanest food stuff in our life (considering the entire procedure of sorting, pan frying, and/or roasting). In certain type of modern sanitary view, anything handled with human naked hands without gloves is thought of as "not perfectly clean". But it's not in my concern. Besides, I don't believe a short hot water flush can clean anything to much extent. If a tea is not clean enough, a rinse won't help anyway.

I've also known people who don't carry out a rinse or warm-up infusion. A Taiwan tea farmer once told me he would never rinse his tea because his tea doesn't have debris and he hates to discard any tea water. That's understandable. I often feel the tendency not to discard any tea water either. If you prefer not to have a rinse or warm-up infusion, then probably a longer initial infusion is necessary.

For a few times, I've seen people who rinse all types of tea, including green tea. Seeing green tea rinsed, makes my heart ache.

At the last, I want to address a myth. It's more than two or three times that I've read a statement that "the Chinese always rinse their tea and discard the first infusion". It's not true. I can't speak for all the Chinese, but most Chinese I know don't "always" rinse their tea, and many never rinse their tea, especially considering green tea drinkers are still the largest tea drinker group in China.

Competition Grades of Taiwan Oolong

Taiwan has great oolong tea competitions. The competitions are organized by local tea associations and endorsed by local governments to guarantee their credibility. The participants are mostly oolong farmers. Each candidate tea is submit by a total of 20 tai jin (12kg, or about 27 lb.). Winners of the competitions win honor, and their competition tea can be sold for a good price. Most competitions hold evaluation events twice a year, spring and winter. Although in current market, many Taiwan oolong products are not labeled with their cultivar names (Qing Xin/Green Heart; Jin Xuan/Golden Lily; Cui Yu/Green Jade; Si Ji Chun/Four Season Spring), in most competitions, different cultivars are put in different groups. The products called Oolong are all from Green Heart (the original Taiwan oolong cultivar). The other three cultivars are put in the same competition group called "New Cultivars Group" in some competitions and in some other competitions, they are put in three individual groups.

The competitions select teas very strictly. Only teas of the best quality can enter the final competition, and the rest will be rejected. Teas from some competitions are very hard to get. Most competition teas are sold out before or soon after the awards are publicized. And for most competitions, it's extremely hard to get the top award teas. Generally speaking, I am most interested in competition teas that are relatively accessible with affordable prices.

Taiwan Oolong Competitions have unique culture, and in my eyes it's an admirable culture that can be adopted by other agricultural fields and other production regions. I think the advantages of Taiwan Oolong Competitions include:

1. All teas are submitted by farmers or tea merchants who are directly related to tea farmers. The honor goes to the farmers and local factories, the real producers. 

2. Each award title is restricted to the specific 27 lb. tea submitted to the competition. The same farmer may submit multiple entries to a competition and may win multiple awards of various levels. But a farmer may produce hundreds of pounds of tea each year, and winning awards doesn't mean all this farmer's tea is award-winning tea. When you buy a competition tea, what you get is just the tea accepted and strictly inspected by the competition committee. Taiwan Oolong Competitions' solid credibility is established on this strict rule.

So far we have been dealing with award-winning teas from two competitions.

1. Mei Shan Village Farmers' Association (梅山鄉農會) Competition (Mei Shan is a high mountain region of Ali Shan Moutain range). It's one of the highly reputable competition of light roast high mountain oolong. Candidate teas are from tea plantations of 1200m (3600 ft.) elevation. There are five evaluation events every year in this competition. We focus on Spring and Winter competitions, products from which are the most popular. The award levels are (from the highest): Superior Grade (特等獎), Grade I (頭等獎), Grade II (二等獎), Grade III (三等獎), three-plum-flower (三朵梅) - we label this as Grade IV, two-plum-flower (二朵梅) - we label this as Grade V.

2. Nan Tou County Tea Commerce Association (南投縣茶商同業公會) Competition (Nan Tou is the home county of Dong Ding Oolong). This competition is featured with medium to high roasted tea products. It is one of the most inexpensive competitions in terms of the final prices of award-winning teas - this is compared with other competitions, but the teas are still generally more expensive then non-competition tea products in the market. There are two competition events every year, in spring and in winter.

The award levels used to be titled: Superior Grade (特等獎), Grade I (頭等獎), Grade II (二等獎), Grade III (三等獎), Excellence Award (優良獎) - we label this as Grade IV

But starting from this spring, the award titles are changed to: Superior Grade (特等獎), Grade I (頭等獎), Gold Medal (金牌獎), Silver Medal (銀牌獎), Excellence Award (優良獎). I guess the changes are because people simply prefer Gold or Silver Medal to Grade II or  III. But the competition is still the same. In fact, all competition teas are of solid quality, and generally have better quality than teas of grand titles given by many commercial companies.

What is puerh? (1)

Ha! I don't know. But it's interesting to look into all the different definitions of it. Even if you and I end up being even more lost, just for the fun of looking :-D

I always feel I don't really understand Puerh, which is partially because puerh is hard to understand from the beginning, and partially because I have very limited experience with old aged puerh. Old puerh is both rare and expensive, and I am often reluctant to spend big money on what I barely understand. Following are some notes I've taken in my efforts of trying to know more about puerh. I will first go over five different definitions of puerh. Then in the second part, I will go over some of the hottest debates about puerh (debates that didn't lead to standard answers). And in the last part, I will go over what I've read from a few tea books and how they treat the concept of puerh differently.

Due to the confusing situation we may soon get into, let me define a few terms first:

Young Sheng - Sheng puerh that's younger than 8 years old (some people think this number should be 15, but I guess most people agree younger than 8 years is a young Sheng, and here let's not consider tea of 9-15 years old).

Old Sheng - Sheng puerh that's older than 15 years old.

Modern Shu - Shu puerh that's made with Wodui (fast fermentation) technique. If by any chance I say "Shu" without additional notes, then I am most likely meaning "Modern Shu".

Definitions of puerh.

(The blue-colored texts are definitions quoted from official documents.)

Definition 1 - by Yunnan Province Standards for Puerh, DB53/103-2003, application started on March 1, 2003

"The raw materials of puerh come from Yunnan big-leaf tea tree cultivars grown in certain regions of Yunnan. The leaf materials are sun-dried and processed (my notes: Based on context and practice in reality, I believe the "processing" here include both fast-fermentation of modern shu puerh and slow-fermentation during the course of traditional storage.)  with post-fermentation (my notes: this is in contrast with pre-fermentation/oxidation in red tea. In puerh, fermentation happens after the enzymes in tea leaves are partially killed.) to become loose tea or compressed tea of puerh. Puerh products are of brown to red color; the liquor is dense, bright red, with unique aged aroma, rich flavor and sweet aftertaste; the spent leaves are of brown to red color." 

Did I hear somebody say, "Wait a minute... So, by this definition, young sheng is not puerh?" It's one of the big ongoing debates about puerh. Although not mentioned here, in a later part of the document, it's specified that the post-fermentation include both traditional storage (for years) and modern Wodui technique. It's actually quite interesting to see how the Official Standards (Yunnan Province or National) changed in just several years, and think why they changed.  

Definition 2 - by Yunnan Province Standards for Puerh, DB53/103-2006, application started on January 1, 2007

Puerh is unique geographically-patented products of Yunnan. It is made with Yunnan big-leaf tea tree cultivars grown in locations that are qualified for puerh production regions. (my notes: the document defines such qualified regions else where.) The leaf materials are processed with specific methods and become products of specific unique characters. Based on processing methods and how inner characters of the tea are formed, puerh can be categorized into Puerh Sheng and Puerh Shu. 

Puerh Sheng is made with Yunnan big-leaf tea tree cultivars grown in locations that are qualified for puerh production regions. The leaf materials are processed with procedures including kill-green, roll-and-twist, sun-dry, steam-compress, etc. Puerh Sheng products are of dark green color. The aroma is refreshing, pure and long-lasting. The flavor is rich with sweet aftertaste. The liquor is green to yellow, clear and bright. The spent leaves are bountiful, of yellow to green color.

Puerh Shu is made with Yunnan big-leaf tea tree cultivars grown in locations that are qualified for puerh production regions. The leaf materials are processed with post-fermentation (fast or slow) to become loose tea or pressed tea products. The products are of brown to red color; the liquor is dense, bright red, with unique aged aroma, rich flavor and sweet aftertaste; the spent leaves are of red to brown color. 

Compared with the 2003 version, major modifications on the definition in 2006 version include:

- The concept of Geographic Patent is introduced. 

- The terms Sheng and Shu are included in the definition.
- According to this definitions, Young Sheng is counted as Puerh. Old Sheng is counted as Shu. 

I highlighted "fast and slow" because I didn't find explanations within the document about how fast and how slow. I believe, based on context, that "fast" means modern Wodui (渥堆) post-fermentation and "slow" means post-fermentation during years of storage. Based on this definition, Old Sheng can be called a Shu. I know people who would call Old Sheng "Shu", and also know people who won't call it so. If an Old Sheng is called "Shu", then a potential problem is, how can a modern Shu puerh and a traditionally stored Old Sheng share the same name while they are from very different manufacturing procedures?

Later on, with the development of administration system on food products, National Standards replaced Province Standards on many food products, including puerh. 

Definition 3 - by National Standards for Puerh, GB/T22111-2008, application started on December 1, 2008. The "Definition" section of this document is exactly the same as that in 2006 Province Standards.

The text of puerh definition is the same as in Definition 2. 

Since Puerh Wodui procedure started only in 1970s (if we don't consider super-wet storage which was conducted even before 1970s, is a little bit similar to Wodui, but not exactly is), the puerh definition before 1970s didn't need to involve concepts of Sheng or Shu at all. Here I will call the pre-1970s puerh definition Historical Definition.

Definition 4 - Historical definition. (my notes: although called "historical definition" here, up till today, there are still people who believe this should be THE definition of puerh.) This definition is quite consistent with the above cited Definition 1, except that in the historical definition, there is no product made through Wodui. Puerh is seen as a product of post-fermentation during years of storage. 

The above Definition 1 is cited by Meng Hai Tea Factory (manufacturing factory of Da Yi). I don't know if it's because they prefer this definition or because they haven't updated their website information since several years ago. Their website does indicate that Definition 1 was (at least partially) forged "by more than twenty tea experts from China, Japan, Korea, Malasia, Hong Kong, Aomen and Taiwan in an international puerh conference."  

Definition 2/3 is cited by Da Yi (Taetea) Group. Interestingly, Meng Hai Tea Factory is under the management of Da Yi Group, yet they use different versions of Puerh Definition. Is it because the factory sector and the management sector have different view of puerh definition? Or probably the inconsistency is simply a result of website update lag. Probably update lag, because on another page of Da Yi website, there is the definition used by Meng Hai Tea Factory. 

What's more interesting to me is, on the website of Da Yi (Taetea) Group, the specific definitions of Puerh Sheng and Puerh Shu are slightly different from those in the National Standards document. So maybe this can be called Definition 5. 

Definition 5 - by Da Yi Group. Their interpretation is different from the National Standards mainly at:

- Da Yi defines Puerh Shu as fast post-fermentation product, which is in contrast to the highlighted part in Definition 2/3. 

- Da Yi points out that "although new Sheng and new Shu have very different characters, with time being, for example, after 10-15 years, inner characters and flavors of the two will be close to each other."  (my notes: this is another major debatable point, among numerous others, about puerh definition.)

Besides all the various definitions, another major stream opinion is, none of the above definitions is proper. There are various reasons (which don't necessary agree with each other).

If we compare all the five definitions, what seems most interesting to me is, Definition 5 is the one currently used by most tea manufacturers and tea sellers, not exactly Yunnan Standards or National Standards. It is indeed easier to use, especially in the conversations among manufacturers, sellers and consumers. With this definition, a tea cake won't be called different names (Sheng and Shu) during its entire shelf life. Besides, this definition also clearly separates products of fast (Wodui) and slow (storage) fermentation. Potential problem of this definition is, the meaning of the term Shu (ripe) is somewhat affiliated with fermentation. When a Young Sheng is newly made, it's definitely Sheng. But many people think it's odd to still call it Sheng after 20 years when the tea is very much fermented with time being.

Another interesting phenomenon is, the change from Definition 1 to Definition 2/3, although may not be a direct result of industry influence, it seems that puerh companies indeed benefit from such changes. Definition 1 doesn't see Young Sheng as a final product of puerh, while Definition 2/3 justifies factories to sell Young Sheng, as well as Modern Shu as Puerh. Therefore Definition 2/3 is clearly very inclusive. Whatever out of the factories can be called puerh. Some people believe such changes in definition reflect the natural changes in puerh technique, puerh market mode and puerh purchase habit. Some other people believe such changes are due to the factories' manipulation on puerh standards. I think, it may have to do with consumers' mentality. Nowadays, good Old Sheng is rare and expensive. Many consumers can mostly afford Young Sheng and Modern Shu. It may sound not cool to buyers if most of their purchase is not counted as Puerh by some standard definition.

Since Definition 5 is in some sense clearer than the National Standards, why wouldn't its terminology adopted by the National Standards? I have no idea, but guess (without much confidence) that the National Standards were probably compromise of different views. 

China's Famous Teas Top 10 - money and power?

There are various versions of Chinese Famous Teas Top 10. The most "official" version was from the Agriculture Department of China in 1959. In this version, the Ten Famous Teas are:

1. Xi Hu (West Lake) Long Jing (Dragonwell) 西湖龍井
2. Bi Luo Chun (Green Spiral Spring) from Dong Ting Mountain 洞庭碧螺春
3. Huang Shan Mao Feng 黃山毛峰
4. Lu Shan Yun Wu (Lu Shan Cloud) 廬山雲霧
5. Liu An Gua Pian (Melon Seeds) 六安瓜片
6. Jun Shan Yin Zhen (Jun Shan Silver Needle) 君山銀針
7. Xin Yang Mao Jian 信陽毛尖
8. Wu Yi Yan Cha 武夷岩茶
9. Tie Guan Yin 鐵觀音
10. Qi Men (Keemun) Red Tea 祁門紅茶

In some other versions, Du Yun Mao Jian (都勻毛尖) replaces Xin Yang Mao Jian. As great as Du Yun Mao Jian, it's understandable why Xin Yang Mao Jian was selected into the list in 1959. Xin Yang Mao Jian was one of the first group of teas that won international award in 1915 Panama World Expo. Besides, Xin Yang is in He Nan province. Located in central China, the national influence of Xin Yang Mao Jian was greater than Du Yun Mao Jian in history.

In some versions, there is Bai Hao Yin Zhen (白毫銀針), which is quite understandable. The official version lacks a representative of white tea.

In some versions, there is Tai Ping Hou Kui (太平猴魁), which is quite understandable. Whether or not listed in the top 10, Tai Ping Hou Kui is one of the most prestigious and expensive teas in China. However, there are more than 30 provinces in China and there are too many great teas in An Hui province only. With Huang Shan Mao Feng and Keemun Red Tea (both are from An Hui ) in the list, the official version had to exclude Tai Ping Hou Kui.

Puerh was not nationally popular in China until recent decades. But once the value of puerh is widely recognized, many puerh fans protest that puerh was not included in the Top 10. Actually in 1959, most people didn't know much about puerh yet. But nowadays, puerh is included in some versions of the Top 10.

Some versions include Dong Ding Oolong of Taiwan.

In all previous versions of Top 10 I've seen, there are always Xi Hu Long Jing, Bi Luo Chun and Huang Shan Mao Feng. Generally speaking, these, in my opinion, are the most popular teas of China in the past 100 years (considering green tea has been the main stream in tea drinking of China, in spite of the rise of oolong in recent decades). If a Top 10 list doesn't include these three teas, then I personally think the list doesn't have reference value.

Now comes the 2010 World Expo famous teas official Top 10 list, which is the strangest Top 10 list I've ever seen. Here is the list:
1. An Xi Tie Guan Yin
2. Du Yun Mao Jian
3. Hu Nan Hei Cha (Hu Nan Black Tea, "Black Tea" is the Chinese sense of post-fermented tea, not the "Black Tea" in western sense)
4. Xi Hu Long Jing
5. Wu Yi Yan Cha
6. Run Si Keemun Red Tea (What is "Run Si"? I had to google to learn that it's a company name.)
7. Yi Xiao Tang Liu An Gua Pian (What is "Yi Xiao Tang"? Again, I had to google to learn that it's a company name!)
8. Tian Mu Lake White Tea (This is a green tea, from the same cultivar as the famous An Ji White Tea. This Tian Mu Lake White Tea is by far not as famous as An Ji White Tea.)
9. Zhang Yi Yuan Jasmine Green Tea ("Zhang Yi Yuan" is a company name too. But to be fair, this company is very much different from above-mentioned companies. This one has 110 years of history.)
10. Fujian Fu Ding White Tea (It is Bai Hao Yin Zhen. The official name specifies it's Bai Hao Yin Zhen from Fu Ding county, not from Zheng He county.)

I am totally shocked, not because two of the "favorite 3" in my mind were excluded from the list. I think it's actually all right if the rest of the list were fair. Xi Hu Long Jing is still in the list. I guess, if it were not there, all Chinese, even non-tea-drinkers, would think the list were a joke.

What shocked me the most is Tian Mu Lake White Tea. I am sure it's a great tea, but in terms of popularity, I wonder if it could possibly enter "top 200" China famous teas. The tea is introduced from An Ji, home of An Ji White Tea. But Tian Mu Lake White Tea is not comparable to An Ji White Tea in terms of quality, popularity, production, history... actually not in any aspect. Yet An Ji White Tea was excluded from the "Top 10". An Ji White Tea being excluded is not a big problem. After all, there are so many famous green teas in China. However, it seems to me a huge problem that Tian Mu Lake White Tea is listed as "Top 10". No that it's not a good tea, but how exactly did it get there? Some tea professional says that the top manufacturers of Tian Mu Lake White Tea paid $$$$$$ to get in. I don't know the source of the information, but I am sure it takes something, money or something else, for it to be listed in the "Top 10".

What shocked me the second hardest is that of the ten famous teas, three of them are named with manufacturing companies (number 6, 7 and 9). Keemun, Melon Seeds and Jasmine Green Tea are all historically great, no matter who the manufacturers are. Historically (such as in 1915 Panama World Expo in San Francisco) it happened that tea products of certain manufacturers were given international awards. But all of them are examples when the manufacturers were The Master level manufacturers regionally. It also happened that tea products with company names were included in tea encyclopedia books. But all of them are examples when the companies designed or invented those tea varieties. The three teas in the current "Top 10" list are none of such cases. Zhang Yi Yuan Tea House of Beijing does have a respectable 110 years of history. In spite of that, the jasmine green tea produced by Zhang Yi Yuan is not an invention of this company. The other two companies don't even have a impressive history, and in my eyes it's very odd to have their names in front of two most famous teas of China. When reporting about the "Top 10" teas, many media removed the names of the two companies, which, I guess, means that I am not the only one frustrated by the names.

Previously I've seen companies are included in events of famous tea selection, which didn't surprise me as much. After all, it's easy to figure out who paid for those events. But this "official" list did shock me! My initial, intuitive response to this "Top 10" list is, How dare you! But then, I thought, should I be shocked at all? After all, today is not 1915. Nowadays, World Expo is a commercial event. Isn't it the most normal that money talks?

Besides the big shocks, here are a few smaller surprises of mine.

1. Hu Nan Hei Cha, I had never thought this would be one of the "Top 10". It's said that the committee (I don't know who they are, how many people are there and how they made the selection) was determined to be "politically correct" and would include at least one tea from the "Six Varieties" (green, white, yellow, red, oolong and black). So here Hu Nan Hei Cha is the representative of Black Tea. Many people thought puerh would be the representative. But it's a fact that not all the people agree that puerh is a Black Tea. More important, people simply don't agree on the answer of the basic question "What Puerh Is". Probably such ambiguity cost Puerh its place in the "Top 10". Also I guess (which may not be true), because Puerh is already hot and Yunnan province is already making big money from puerh, probably Hu Nan province has stronger incentive of lobbying around to get their tea into the "Top  10".

2. Lobbying power of local government cannot be ignored. It surprises me that 3 Fujian teas are in the "Top 10". It surprises me only a little, because it's indisputable that the best white tea of China is from Fujian, and the other 2 Fujian teas are famous Tie Guan Yin and Wuyi. Therefore it is understandable that 3 Fujian teas are in the "Top 10". However, considering how many great teas there are in provinces such as Zhejiang, An Hui and Jiang Xi (which got none of its great teas in the "Top 10", not even the wonderful Lu Shan Cloud), I can imagine how hard Fujian province would have to work in order to get 3 teas into the "Top 10". In fact, in the past 10-15 years, Fujian province has made great efforts (including government funded advertisement on national TV, special tea tax policies and political lobbying) to promote their teas, first Tie Guan Yin, then Wu Yi Yan Cha, and in recent year or so, Fu Ding White Tea. It may seem somewhat unfair that 3 teas from the same province enter the "Top 10" list. But I guess we can't blame a local government for doing all they can to promote their teas.

3. It surprises me a little that a jasmine green tea is included in the "Top 10". I personally love jasmine green tea, but I also think one can easily find dozens of other teas more suitable to the "Top 10" list. Again, power of the company, and probably the "political correct" factor also partially caused the committee to select a representative of flower scented tea. A positive light I can see from this, however, is that it may help promote jasmine green tea generally. It's not an uncommon thought that jasmine green tea is usually made with inferior tea leaves, which I strongly disagree. I believe, any tea can be made with inferior tea leaves, or great tea leaves. We can't blame a whole tea category just because of some bad products.

Two Great Teas of Jiang Xi Province (1) - Orchid Fairy Twig 蘭香仙枝

This spring my biggest nice surprise is from Jiang Xi.

Jiang Xi Province is home of Lu Shan Cloud, one of the most famous Chinese green teas. Jiang Xi has long history of being a center of tea production and tea trade. It also provided tribute tea to royal family of every dynasty in Chinese history, since the earliest record if Tang dynasty. The historically famous Jiang Xi green tea is not frequently seen in western market. Even in Chinese domestic market, Jiang Xi tea is often overshadowed by teas from its surrounding provinces, An Hui, Zhe Jiang, Fu Jian and Guang Dong. However, as one of the oldest tea centers of China, Jiang Xi is full of tea treasure.

This is the tea that gave me the biggest surprise - Lan Xiang Xian Zhi (Orchid Fairy Twig, 蘭香仙枝). It's from the remote 800m (2400ft.) mountain range of the beautiful Wuyuan, Jiang Xi. The tea grows in the wild, without using any pesticide or artificial fertilizer. It's not certified organic, but it's organic in the real sense. This is my first time to have this tea. My heart was full of curiosity about it.

The tea is completely hand-processed. The dry tea strips are not as pretty as machine-processed tea, but the dry tea leaves look tight and heavy. The dry tea aroma is one that I had never experienced from any other green tea. I think, the dry leaves smell of honey and flowers.

The tea leaves are tight and heavy. Therefore they sink in water fairly easy. When brewing this tea, instead of pouring water on tea leaves, you can throw tea leaves in water, and they will soon sink to the bottom. If you prefer to use a gaiwan, then make sure to allow more time for the first infusion, because the tightly curled tea leaves will need some time to open themselves. This tea was harvested in mid-April, which is the earliest time of harvest for this elevation. Therefore I used lower than boiling water temperature (about 90 C or 195 F).

At the bottom of the water, the tea leaves opened little by little, like blooming flowers. The flavor has something very honey-like, something I had never experienced. I think, this is the most wonderful green tea experience for me this spring! Long Jing, Huang Shan Mao Feng, Snowflake on Green Lake... they are all fabulous. But nothing compares to experiencing a new variety with a whole new flavor profile. From the first sip, I knew I was committed to this tea and I would have to look for it every spring in the years to come!

Although I reminded myself the leaves were tight and seemingly small amount may end up being a lot, alas, I still used too many leaves. The photo above and the photo below was the same cup of tea! What's great, though, is that even with so many leaves in a cup, the tea didn't yield any bitterness or astringency, but only rich flavor. I think that's a great demonstration of high mountain, slow growing leaves.

When giving me this tea, the manufacturer told me apologetically that this year, due to the impact of the cold current in March, there is no Superior Grade, and their highest grade this year is only Grade I. After tasting this tea, thinking of what he said about this excellent tea being "only Grade I", I feel I like this manufacturer even more. 

A few decades ago, when the entire Chinese tea industry was state-owned, in spite of problems here and there, the grading system for tea was very much standardized and strict. My dad told me this story again and again. Thirty years ago, when he went to Hangzhou, he got some Grade Four Long Jing, which was the best in domestic market. And the tea was fabulous, although it was only Grade Four. Today in Chinese market, we see more and more Superior Grade products. Sometimes, Superior isn't even enough. There are grades above it, with various names, Royal, Imperial, Taoism... you can forge endless grand titles with Chinese characters :-p Yet there are many small manufacturers who are very loyal to their own standards. Their pride is not built on calling all their tea Superior Grade and above. Instead, they are proud of it if their Grade II tea is better than Grade I tea of other companies.