Tea 101

It's getting hot out there. It's only June and we have a rare heat advisory out today. One of the things you can do to stay cool and energized is make yourself a iced coconut matcha latte. Its a very easy recipe to follow. (Check out the video at the end).

It's getting warm and toasty out there. Guess what's it time for? Iced Tea!!!

Let me share with you today a very easy method of making iced tea. It is a method we use at Leaf Tea Bar. It is a very easy way to make iced tea this way. There is no need to wait for the tea to cool, and you can make this practically with any tea. I love it with Darjeeling first flushes and other lighter delicate teas.

So you might have heard us use the term first flush, second flush and autumn flush particularly when talking about teas from Darjeeling and Nepal. What do these terms mean? Very simply they are used to distinguish different tea productions on the basis of seasons. 

Tea may not prevent COVID-19 but past studies suggest green tea has anti-viral properties with preventive effects on influenza and common cold. We chanced upon some research thanks to a book on Japanese tea ceremony.

Premium white tea is made primarily from the freshest shoots of yet unopened tea leaves and with minimal processing. Organic white tea can be described as the most pristine form of tea. Not much is done to the leaf - just withering in the sun, piling it up for a while for slight oxidation to set in and then gently baked. No rigorous rolling, pan-frying or shaping.

The quality of fine tea is dependent on many qualities, with sunlight, soil content, and elevation drastically effecting the finished product. A lesser known factor, however, is the direction a hill slopes while growing tea.

This is first of a 3 part series on Pu-erh tea.

Pu-erh is fermented and aged tea that comes in a compacted form. Produced exclusively in Yunnan, the South-Western province of China, the tea is produced in two broad styles - raw (sheng), and ripe (shu). Sheng pu-erh is left to ferment naturally, while the fermentation in ripe or shu pu-erh is done in controlled factory settings.

In Yunnan, where the pu-erh exclusively comes from, there are a lot of very old tea trees. The tea plant, camellia sinensis, can grow to be tree if allowed. But it is a rare sight because in most parts of the world the tea plant is regularly pruned to keep it waist high for convenient picking of the leaves. Only in Yunnan, which also happens to be the birthplace of tea, old tea trees are a common occurrence.

In this third part of our series on Pu-erh tea we look into the fermentation in pu-erh tea a little closely and the changes it brings about in post-fermented teas.