Chinese Tea

Chinese Tea

    Of the three major beverages of the world—tea, coffee and cocoa- tea is consumed by the largest number of people.At present more than forty countries in the world grow tea. Asian countries produce 90% of the world’s total output. All tea trees in other countries have their origin directly or indirectly in China. The word for tea leaves or tea as a drink in many countries are derivatives from the Chinese character “cha”.China is the homeland of tea. It is believed that China has tea-shrubs as early as five or six thousand years ago, and human cultivation of tea plants dates back two thousand years. Tea from China, along with her silk and porcelain, began to be known to the world more than a thousand years ago and has since always been an important Chinese export. The Categories of Tea Chinese tea may be classified into five categories according to the different methods by which it is processed.

1)      Green tea:Green tea is the variety which keeps the original color of the tea leaves without fermentation during processing. This category consists mainly of Longjing tea of Zhejiang Province, Maofeng of Huangshan Mountain in Anhui Province and Biluochun produced in Jinagsu.

2)      Black tea: black tea, known as “red tea in China, is the category which is fermented before baking’ it is later developed on the basis of the green tea. The best brands of black tea are Qihong of Anhui, Dianhong of Yunnan, Sunhong of Jiangsu, Chuanhong of Sichuan and Huhong of Hunan.

3)      Wulong tea: this variety possesses features of both green and the black teas, being made after partial fermentation. It is a specialty from the provinces on China’s southeast coast: Fujian, Guangdong and Taiwan.

4)      Compressed tea: this is the kind of tea which is compressed and hardened into a certain shape. It is convenient for transport and storage and is popular to the ethnic minorities living in the border areas of the country. As compressed tea is black in color in its commercial form, it is also known in China as Black tea. Most of the compressed tea is in the form of bricks; it is, therefore, generally called brick tea, though it is sometimes also in the form of cakes and bowls. It is mainly produced in Hubei, Hunan, Sichuan and Yunnan provinces.

5)      Scented tea: this kind of tea is made by mixing fragrant flowers in the tea leaves in the course of processing. The flowers commonly used for this purpose are jasmine and magnolia. Jasmine tea is a well-known favorite with the northerners of China and with a growing number of foreigners