Tea expertise from plant to cup

Tea picking is mostly still done in the traditional way, where tea leaves are handpicked and gathered into wide baskets by the tea pickers. Hand picking ensures that only the best leaves of the plant are collected and used for tea production. The best leaves are actually “two leaves and a bud”, with the leaf bud itself accompanied by two nearby young leaves.

For approximately 10 – 12 hours, the freshly picked leaves are spread over mats where warm air blows over them. This results in a loss of moisture of the tea leaf (of up to 50%). It becomes softer and is thus prepared for the following production steps.

This step is a game-changer. It defines how black or green tea is produced.

• Green teas are being steamed or roasted. This quick exposure to high temperatures stops further fermentation and keeps the natural substances sealed in the leaf. The tea leaves retain their delicate flavour and green colour. 
• Black teas are fermented. As the leaves are ripped open, the substances in their cells react with oxygen. This is called “rolling” and is usually done by machines. With the ongoing fermentation the tea's colour changes to brown and it develops its characteristic black tea taste. And all this in only 2-4 hours of time. 

Drying is necessary to finalise the tea and assure its long storability. In black tea production, it’s the drying that finally stops the fermentation processes. Fermentation masters in the tea factory decide when the tea has reached the perfect level of fermentation so that it will be put into the oven and dried down.

This is a quick process step, taking only 10 to 20 minutes. Exposing the tea to smoke of burning wood or applying higher temperatures the tea gardens can give their teas special taste notes.

At this stage, the tea is already “finalised” and can be enjoyed. Yet, tea plantations sort the raw teas into different qualities, also called (leaf) grades. The tea runs through different layers of sieves. As a result, you can differentiate between four main classifications: whole leaves, broken leaves, fannings and dust.

Some tea gardens are using different species of the tea plant and various levels of fermentation to the tea lots. That is why very often teas are blended into bigger lot sizes already on the tea gardens. Cupping and evaluating each lot produced and then blending them cautiously allows the producers to homogenize qualities but also to give the teas the 'special something'. This step requires a great deal of experience and is in many cases, based on secret recipes which can be hundreds of years old.