Book Review: The Great Teas of China

Roy Fong's new book The Great Teas of China, available from Amazon is an excellent reference guide to Chinese Teas. The slender tome packs a tremendous amount of information and wisdom.

It covers the world renown Chinese varietals in an approachable, informative manner. Master Fong covers history and tradition, as well as geography, growing and finishing, and the characteristic of the teas. His conversational manner imparts understanding and appreciation, as opposed to just knowledge transfer. It leaves on feeling like you had a personal tasting session, with the Master.

The book pays particular attention to each teas processing and finishing methods, as these are very important to the characteristics of the teas. It is wonderfully illustrated with drawings and photos, and has interesting personal anecdotes interspersed. Practical suggestions about buying, brewing, and drinking these teas makes it a very compelling work.

The Great Teas of China has become one of my go-to reference tomes, and I highly recommend it.

American Tea

Terrior, or the concept that the land and environment greatly conspires with the genetics of a plant or animal to create a unique taste is not just limited to wine. Tea is very much a product of the place it grows: the soil, the rain, the heigth, the winds, temperature etc, as it is of when harvested and the details of how it was processed. There are aurguments that are made that a certain type of tea (like Dragon Well) is inherently lined to a place that it cannot be produced anywhere else. (I agree.)

Keep in mind, all tea comes from 2 varietals of tea bushes. White, Green, Oolong, Black etc are catagories of tea processing (tea is dryed, roasted, shaped, rolled, aged, fermented in different combinations known as processing). Darjeeling, Assam, Wuyi, etc describe the region the tea was grown - and can be considered appellations in some cases. Highgrown, sping picked, 2nd flush, etc describe some of the details. But all teas come from two vareities of bush - hence why I think terrior is important.

Why the lesson: A friend asked the other day if there were any good america grown teas? I have tasted some blacks from central america (Hondorian, Guatemalian, Brazillian) that were not bad. Pretty much anywhere you can grow coffee, tea can often be grown. But there has not been a lot of good quality teas, an almost none grown north of Mexico.

I've had ( and reviewed)Kona grown, Hawaian Green tea "Kilinoe" ("Misty Rain") distributed by the folks from Narien Teas. Part of Kona have attribute very similar to some of the regions in China, and there are several gardens underway there. The early teas I've had are greens, and show a lot of promise. As the producers get more experience in finishing, the quality will increase.

Tea Master Roy Fong, of the Imperial Tea Court in San Fransisco, recently acquired property in California to start a tea garden, which you can read about here. (His blog is worth the read for any tea fan!) I am excited and encouraged that soon more high quality tea will be domestically sourced!

Tea better for you than water! Drink more, Better Tea!

This post from the BBC highlights some of the recent and most common health benefits of drinking tea. I think tea is a victim of a lot of pop-science seeking to explain its medicinal value. As several of my medical, bio-chem, and chem buddies will attest, we know more about what we don't know.

In the Chinese traditions, tea is combined with other ingredients (like banana, lychee, rice, seaweed, spices) to treat specific aliments. Many families treat colds with "hot toddies" - tea laced with lemon, honey, and a health hooker of brandy, wine or other booze.

But I think the comments on the re-hydrating properties of tea are the most interesting. It is commonly assumed that anything with caffeine has a diuretic effect. (Coffee, soda-pop. etc). But some of this is due to the higher amounts of caffeine compared to tea, and also the other chemical compounds involved.

I also believe that the simple fact that tea is warm, relaxing, conducive to both contemplation and social interaction, adds to the health factors.

Drink More Better Tea!

Welcome to Better Tea

Tea is consumed in just about every culture, in just about every way imaginable. It is a social lubricant, a healing tonic, a catalyst for quite contemplation, a stiff pick me up, and a small moment of joy in otherwise chaotic lives. There are thousands of years of tea culture, wisdom, and insight. Each culture has its own preferences, own little and big ceremony, and its own seasons of consumption.

It dose not matter if it is a simple cuppa Lipton Yellow tag tea -bag, or a delicate early spring white, a other worldly Formosa Oolong, or a earthy Pur-eh. Tea is simple to brew, enjoy, and appreciate. It is also very simple to brew BETTER TEA!

I hope to provide insights into tea varietals, steeping methods, history, culture, and appreciation. We'll explore steeping techniques, simple rules for Better tea, suppliers, resources, and reviews.