Spring tea is the best, and it was picked before the Qingming Festival (the fourth and fifth day of the solar calendar), also called tea before the Qingming Festival. At that time, there were no bugs on the tea trees, so this kind of tea can be regarded as "green" food. After Tomb-Sweeping Day, insects grew, and most tea farmers in China used pesticides. You can imagine the following ...
Tea production process:
Green tea: It is made by directly deactivating enzymes, kneading and drying after picking without any fermentation process. It tastes fresh and mellow, refreshing and pleasant. Due to different construction methods, it can be divided into pot-fried green tea, such as Longjing and Biluochun, and steamed green tea cooked with high-temperature steam, such as Japanese-fried tea and Yulu. The former has a strong aroma, while the latter has a fresh and green feeling.
Yellow tea: the production method is similar to that of green tea, except that the tea leaves and tea soup are slightly fermented after being stuffy yellow. The fermentation degree is about 10 ~ 20%, and the taste is sweet. For example, Junshan Silver Needle and Mengding Yellow Bud are all well-known tea styles.
White tea: the picked tea leaves are only slightly fermented by about 10 ~ 30%, and directly dried or dried without any frying or kneading. With fine fluff, the taste is light and smooth, which is very unique. China Fujian specialties, such as Bai Hao Yinzhen and Shoumei Peony, are well-known tea styles.
Green tea: also known as oolong tea. The degree of fermentation is about 20 ~ 60%, which is a semi-fermented tea between green tea and black tea. The taste is changeable, compatible with the freshness of green tea and the mellowness and sweetness of black tea, and often has diversified and rich aromas such as floral, fruity and cereal. This is the most famous tea in Taiwan Province Province. Well-known tea styles include Baozhong, Tieguanyin, Narcissus and Wuyi Tea.
Black tea: Fully fermented tea with a fermentation degree of 80-90%. In the production process, tea polyphenols contained in tea are oxidized into thearubigins by direct withering, rolling and shredding, and then completely fermented, thus forming dark black tea and black tea soup unique to black tea. However, it must be noted that in English, black tea is not called "red" tea, but black tea. )
Black tea: It belongs to post-fermented tea. When making, the seeds are killed, twisted, dried in the sun, and then stacked (called "heap-fermentation") to ferment them again, so the color of tea and tea soup is deeper and the taste is richer. For example, Pu 'er tea and Hunan black tea are all famous tea models.
Black tea production
Knowing the classification of tea, we can further explore the production process of black tea:
Tea is made from the tender leaves and buds of tea trees. Generally speaking, high-quality black tea generally adopts one bud, two leaves and three leaves, and the leaf age and tenderness should be consistent.
Withering: spread the picked tea evenly indoors and let it stand for a period of time, so that the water in the tea slowly evaporates and becomes soft and easy to knead. At the same time, tea will gradually undergo chemical changes in the process of water loss.
Twisting and chopping: Twisting withered tea leaves by hand or machine, on the one hand, destroys the tissue of tea leaves, and releases the endoplasm and aroma contained in tea juice and tea leaves on the surface of tea leaves for rapid dissolution in future brewing; On the one hand, tea leaves are tightly rolled and shaped, which is convenient for packaging and preservation. However, different ways and weights of tea rolling will also form different flavor differences.
If it is chopped black tea (except Kung Fu black tea and small black tea in China, most black tea is visible now), the machine will chop it at the same time in this process.
Fermentation: Spread the kneaded and cut tea leaves out and put them in humid air for several hours for fermentation, so that the tea leaves are oxidized in the air, and the color and fragrance of black tea are fully formed in this step.
Drying: drying the fermented tea at high temperature, stopping fermentation and removing water. After that, it can be screened, matched, packaged and listed.