• Best Tea Books 2019

2019 Tea Book Roundup

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In this article, I cover 8 tea books that came out since our last roundup in late 2018. Overall, it was a strong year for quality tea books and we're continually seeing authors raising [...]

  • Wine Tasting Lineup

Transparency in Tea: A Manifesto

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Connoisseurs Drive Growth Connoisseurs in any industry drive innovation and growth. This is especially true in the world of tea. Simply by their discerning taste, connoisseurs play an important role in the marketing ground game—educating [...]

  • Guide to Wulong Tea

The Oolong Compendium

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This content is an excerpt from Tony's book, Tea: A User's Guide. For more information on the book, please visit the book's web site. The word Wulong translates to black dragon. The proper pinyin is [...]

  • Nuances of Tea Classification Feature Image

Nuances of Tea Classification

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What is a Tea Processing Chart? What is a tea processing chart? A tea processing chart refers to a chart that shows the processing steps that different tea types go through after being plucked and [...]

  • Tea Processing Chart

Tea Processing Chart

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Tea processing is the most important quantifier when determining or producing a tea type. Green tea, yellow tea, white tea, wulong tea, black tea and fermented teas all begin as fresh Camellia sinensis leaves [...]

  • Tea classification hierarchy of tea types, tea styles, and tea variants

A New Look at Tea Classification

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History of Tea Classification Throughout history, tea has been categorized many ways: by the color of the finished leaves, by the color of the tea liquor, and by the percentage of oxidation the tea leaves [...]

  • Kinetics of Steeping Tea

Kinetics of Steeping Tea

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Steeping is the final step in the lives of tea leaves. And in their final act, they slowly unfold and unravel, creating a beverage that tells the story of where they came from. Every time [...]

  • Chemical components in tea

Chemical Compounds in Tea

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Tea chemistry is complex. Just how complex? Well, on the bush, tea leaves contain thousands of chemical compounds. When tea leaves are processed, the chemical compounds within them break down, form complexes with one another [...]

  • Tea Varieties and Cultivars Feature Image

Tea Varieties and Cultivars

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Plant Classification All plants are classified hierarchically by their division, class, subclass, order, family, genus, and species. They are also classified by variety and cultivar when necessary. Here's how the tea plant shakes out: Division [...]

  • Tea Leaves Withering in Sri Lanka Feature Image

Tea Processing: Withering

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What does "withering" mean in tea processing? That the moment a tea leaf is plucked from the tea plant, it begins to wilt naturally, a process we call withering. But once the tea leaves reach [...]

  • Apple as Example of Oxidation

Tea Processing Step: Oxidation

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What is Oxidation? Oxidation refers to a series of chemical reactions that result in the browning of tea leaves and the production of flavor and aroma compounds in finished teas. Depending on the type of [...]

  • Hwangcha Feature Image

South Korean Balhyocha & Hwangcha

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Venture With Me Down the Rabbit Hole I went down the rabbit hole as they say researching a single topic for my book, Tea: A User's Guide. This time the rabbit hole was related to South [...]

  • Romanization of Tea Terms Feature Image

Romanization of Tea Terms

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What is Romanization? Romanization refers to the transliteration of any writing system to the Roman alphabet. Surprisingly little is understood within the tea industry when it comes to the romanization of tea terms. This to me is [...]

  • Tea drying in the sun on a bamboo mat

Tea Processing: Drying

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What does "drying" mean in tea processing? An important step of tea processing, and something that all teas must go through to be considered shelf-stable is drying. Drying both makes the tea leaves shelf stable [...]