OnTap Magazine

F or many, tea is a vocation; there’s a lore and a science behind the leaf-to-cup journey and then the cathartic joy in the aroma and taste of the steeped elixir – sweet, oral, tannic, green, astringent, smooth, malty, woody – all playing at varying degrees of intensity. Tea is made from the leaves of the evergreen tropical shrub Camellia sinensis , originally indigenous to China and India. ere are four types of true teas: white, green, oolong and black. e di erent types of tea we know today and their quality arise from the growing conditions and processes applied to the leaf once it’s picked. Herbal infusions, known as tisanes, made from botanicals such as rooibos, chamomile, mint, ginger, etc., are not true teas, and that’s because they’re not C. sinensis . ALL THE TEA IN CHINA According to legend, tea was discovered almost 5000 years ago in southwestern China. Like many events in ancient China, the origin of tea is surrounded by myth, and on this occasion, the tale concerns the Chinese Emperor Shennong in 2737 BC. Shennong was said to be a skilled herbalist, travelling the country discovering new plants, tasting them and noting their e ects. His rst encounter with tea is said to have come one day when, while boiling water, a leaf from an overhanging wild tea tree drifted into his pot. Shennong enjoyed the unusual avour and felt refreshed. ere are many such tales and they all point to tea’s profound e ect on the people who encountered it. ese qualities ensured tea’s expansion across the world. Today it is grown in over 60 countries and is second only to water as the world’s most consumed beverage. Tea rst made its way to Europe courtesy of the Portuguese who, in the early 1600s, reached China and began trading tea. Soon the Dutch started trading tea from Japan. Over time tea drinking spread, but the new commodity led to some confusion as to how to prepare and serve it. ere are accounts of tea being spread on bread, boiled and served with salt and butter, taken with nutmeg, ginger and salt, and even smoked. Despite this, demand increased considerably. Today, of the six billion kilos of tea produced globally, over 40% is Chinese. China also contributes 80% of the world’s green tea. HARVESTING AND PROCESSING Tea is grown both on estates and small holdings. e metre-high verdant tea bushes are plucked, traditionally by hand, but increasingly by machine. e ‘plucking standard’ is two leaves and a bud; the regrowth period (known as the ush) is between seven and 14 days depending on the altitude and climatic conditions of the growing area. Tea pickers require great skill and speed and can harvest up to 24kg of fresh leaf in an eight-hour day. Mechanised harvesting nowadays is pretty high tech, with laser guided systems cutting accurately to give more consistency. Picking however, is only the start. Before it can be packaged and consumed, the leaves need to be processed. ere are two processes: the ‘orthodox’ method, which is the most commonly used, and the ‘CTC’ (cut, tear and curl) method. In both methods the tea leaves go through four stages: withering; rolling; oxidation; and either drying or ring, depending on the desired tea type. It is only during the rolling stage that the two methods di er. 1. Withering – this reduces the moisture content in the plucked leaves from around 70% to 45%. It is traditionally done by laying the leaves on shallow bamboo baskets or mats out in the sunlight or nowadays placed inside long mesh-bottomed troughs through which air is passed; this takes between eight and 18 hours. 2. Rolling – the wilted leaves are rolled either by hand (the traditional way) or in a rolling machine where the leaves are twisted, causing bruising which promotes oxidation. For CTC tea, the withered leaves are put through a series of rollers with teeth that cut and tear them producing smaller pieces ideal for tea bags. 3. Oxidation – here natural enzymes within the leaves react with oxygen, determining the tea’s colour, taste and strength. e leaves are laid out on tables or troughs at a temperature of around 26°C for between 30 minutes and two hours; the longer the oxidation, the darker the colour and the stronger the tea. 4. Drying or ring – to stop the oxidation process and halt the enzymatic activity, the leaves are dried, traditionally by pan- frying, sun-drying or baking, but more In 1908 the New York tea trader Thomas Sullivan prepared tea samples in small silk bags for his customers, thinking they would tip the leaves out before use. In fact, they placed the bag straight into the water. And so, the tea bag was invented. commonly by passing them through hot air dryers to reduce the water content to 3%. TEA STYLE GUIDE White teas (named after the ne white hairs covering the early buds and leaves) are the least processed and not oxidised at all—the leaves are simply dried in the sun, pan- red or steamed and then shaped into pellets or small twigs. Green tea leaves are very minimally oxidised and rolled into all kinds of shapes. For example, gunpowder green tea is shaped like small bullets. e dried tea is also ground to create matcha green tea powder. Pan-roasted green teas are usually smooth and aromatic, while steamed green teas maintain a fresh almost grassy taste. For darker teas such as oolong and black tea, the robust avours are created through a longer oxidation process. Oolong is semi oxidised but with wide variations in oxidation times, the avour pro les can range from sweet and fruity to smoky. Black teas are heavily oxidised to give dark, rich amber or brown tones and the characteristic strong, brisk avours ranging from sweet to bitter, from earthy, spicy to nutty. And then there’s a special tea that is both oxidised and fermented: Pu-erh is the vintage wine equivalent of the tea world. It’s a fermented, aged tea that only comes from Yunnan province in southwest China; and as the world’s most coveted tea it commands a high price. e leaves are cooked to gently drive away moisture, as when making green tea, but still allowing some enzymatic oxidation. It’s then compressed into cakes and will slowly oxidise and naturally ferment while stored in dark underground THE BIRTH OF THE BAG ontapmag.co.za | Spring 2020 | 37