TIL about the existence of white tea. Thank you!
Fun fact: "White tea may have first appeared in English publication in 1876, where it was categorized as a black tea, ..."
So white can be black sometimes!
Fun fact: "White tea may have first appeared in English publication in 1876, where it was categorized as a black tea, ..."
So white can be black sometimes!
[1] The technical difference between oolong and white is simply that white is processed naturally, whereas oolong has more “steps” (oxidation, drying, steaming, etc.). The steps can be manipulated to give the tea a different character. Oolongs are often roasted, for example.
I regularly drink shoumei and white peony; I should really try silver needle.
A good friend was such a master, and I had the joy of learning how to prepare Silver Needle with mastery. I had brewed it hundreds of times, but when he did it, it was inexplicably different. Same leaves, same water, same vessel. White tea is a portal to a world of subtlety that I had never experienced previously, and have rarely encountered since.
I helped open Tao of Tea in Portland in the late 90s. We had over 250 fresh loose-leaf teas with which to experiment. Paradise!
Both were 'drunken masters'. When they brewed, they did it with no concentration - the mastery flowed through them. Joe, actually, was quite sloppy at the tea table, never talking, always smiling. It would be hard to describe how impossibly different tea was when brewed by these two.
I dedicated two years of my time in an adventure to possibly reach the lowest rungs of this kind of mastery. I think I may have hit it here and there, but never consistently. These were perhaps the most useful and educational years of my life.