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6 Types of Tea – Different Tea Types Explained
Did you know there are six different types of tea, green tea and Black tea are just two, but what about the other four? In this blog, we’re going to talk about the six different types of teas, how they are made, and what they taste like. We’ll talk about the benefits of green tea, how green tea is made, how to select the perfect tea, and how to prepare it. But today we’re going to start with the basics before we get started. On our journey, it makes sense to answer one basic question. What is tea? Tea is more than just something? You brew your cup with hot water. It actually has a very specific definition. All true teas come from the same plant. Camellia sinensis. Camellia sinensis is an evergreen shrub native to southern China and India. It’s been cultivated for the past 4 thousand years as both a medicinal plan and as a social and cultural beverage. Hot drinks made from peppermint. Royvis, hibiscus, chamomile and urrbaatete are not actually teas, but rather tissa after the Greek word tissa which literally translates to crushed barley. There are six main types of true teas, white tea, yellow tea, green tea, ong tea, red tea, and dark tea. All six of these main types come from the Camellia sinensis plant. One of the common themes you will notice here is that oxidation can lead to big differences in the types of teas being produced. When the tea leaves are picked, they will begin to oxidize which will change not only the color of the leaf but the chemical makeup as well as the catkins are converted into theoflavins and theiaubicins. A tea farmer can manipulate this oxidation process depending on how they produce the tea and these processing styles are what lead to the different T types.
So let’s start with white T. White tea is the most minimally processed of all the tea types. The leaves and buds are picked and then allowed to dry off in the sun, which stops most of the oxidation. Although this tea technically maintains some oxidation, white teas can be made from both old and young leaves, but it’s most recognizable for these young white buds, which is where the tea gets its name. When you brew the tea you may notice a very bright pale color if the tea is made from mostly buds or an orange amber color if the tea is made with a lot of older leaves, the flavor is slightly dry with a hint of fruitiness. Next we have green teas. Green teas are unoxidized. After the leaves are picked, they are heated to stop the oxidation process. The tea retains its more grassy or vegetable flavors and the leaves maintain their green color. The flavor of the final green tea depends on the type of heating method. In Japan,
It’s more common to steam the tea leaves and this is why Japanese green tea take on this fresh, almost seaweed taste profile. In China, it’s more common to heat the leaves in a large pan and for this reason the teas taste more cooked with a slightly nutty flavor. These teas are great for cold brewing and they often come with a high caffeine and thein content.
Caffeine and Thein work together in synergy to give you a long-lasting, calm, alert energy throughout the day instead of getting a rapid jolt of energy and then a crash later on in the day, tea drinkers report having this long laststing smooth energy. If you want to try some of the best green teas we found during our travels around Japan, you can browse our selection at neots.com. So next we have yellow tea. This is the rarest of the six types of tea. It’s similar to a green tea, but with the extra step called the Men Juan or a ceiling yellow.
After the leaves have been panfired, they are wrapped in a cloth as the natural aromas of the leaves are sealed in. Apparently this softens the grassy taste that people normally associate with green teas, making it a unique category altogether because the grassiness has been mellowed out during the Man Juan phase. The flavor of this tea is in between a green tea and a white tea. Next we have Uolong tea. Ung tea is partially oxidized anywhere between fifteencent to 85 percent. Oxidation. Ung is a broad category of tea, but many ung teas follow a similar pattern. The leaves are picked and then withered in the sun and then they are bruised or rolled. This exposes the enzymes of the leaf to oxygen and speeds up the oxidation process. Once the oxidation process has been accelerated, it’s later slowed down as the tea leaves are pan fired.
The leaves are then continuously rolled and dried and in some cases roasted. Ung is actually the most processed of the teats so it doesn’t need to be made from the top buds and sprouts. It can actually be made from the older tea leaves. The flavor of less oxidized oongs can take on a fresh, sweet and floral flavor. The darker uongs can take on a hint of spice, fruit and a little bit of char. While most teas in Japan are green teas, there are a few farmers in the south of Japan that are producing rare Japanese ong teas using traditional methods. This tea takes on a light floral flavor profile with a nice creaminess to it and if you want to try it, you can find it on our website. E. Ots. Dot. Com. Next we have red tea. In Europe and North America, this tea is called black tea, but in much of Asia it is referred to as red tea or hongcha so as not to be confused with hecla or dark tea. This tea is not heated after harvesting, but it’s rather allowed to oxidize naturally up to 90 to 95 percent. Oxidation. After the tea leaves are picked, they are either hand or machine rolllled to accelerate the oxidation process. During the oxidation process, the tearates these fresh grassy notes for warmer notes of caramel or cooked fruit. The leaves turn a dark brown color and the liquor is a beautiful amber or ruby color. Before we get to the final T on our list, it would really mean a lot to us if you could subscribe to our youtube website and like this blog to see more T blogs in the future without further ado. Let’s get into dark tea, so this tea is also known as post fermented tea. This includes the better known poor tea. Although the term poor technically refers to dark teas produced in the area of Unnao made from large leaf tea varieties, the broader category is hea, or dark tea.
These teas are often pressed into cakes and stored for long periods of time to develop their flavors. These teacakes were originally made to be transported long distances across China. As the leaves traveled through many different climates, they accumulated microorganisms that led to a natural fermentation. This natural fermentation is still replicated in the so-called raw poor teas, which are quite similar to green teas, but with a smoother and more mature flavor profile. Ri par tea undergoes an accelerated fermentation process called wai or wet piling where the leaves are piled up and sprayed with water so they can ferment within a matter of weeks rather than years. This tea takes on a black color almost like coffee and has a much earthier flavor to it. If you’d like to learn more about tea, just click the link in the description, and we’ll send you our book Secrets of Green Tea absolutely free. We included just a few pages of information in this blog, but when you get the book, you’ll have access to all 100. You’ll also get ten percent off premium Japanese Green tea and teawaarre at neots. Dot com. When you sign up, thank you all so much for watching, and we look forward to teaching you more about tea.
