My first yellow tea

All you have to do is post a thread about yellow tea and mention the
leaf and color is brown because the lighting isn't right and your
teapot isn't clean, the leaf is thin and wispy like a bean sprout, and
leave out the fact it might taste fishy like some rancid cooked puerh.
My local tea shoppe owner is meticulous as they come. I put him on the
spot when I asked where it came from like it escaped his mind but I
walked away with some and didn't have to wait for it to hit the
shelves. I trust him enough so I don't have to call back like a pest
and will eventually find the origin and in the meantime reply on this
group for the particulars of yellow tea. Recently he is adding more
eclectic teas for the connoisseur. I don't think the purple teas
whatever that is can be far behind the Indian oolongs whatever that is.
I broached the subject of a tea tasting from my pu collection but I
could tell he wasn't comfortable because he admitted the tastings are
still for neophytes who have been drinking tea less than 5 years with
more group think than individual experience.

Jim

Michael Plant wrote:
> Jim, you are getting a lot more milage out of your yellow tea than I ever
> did. It sounds like a gold mine of comeradery (sp???) there. I lived in
> Germany for some short time long ago, and I found the people rather more
> meticulous than we as a people are here in the USA. So, why not with tea?
> Finally, congratulations on your first yellow tea. Have you tried the new
> rare purple teas?
>
> major snippage
>
> Michael

"Michael Plant" <mplant@pipeline.com> wrote in message
news:BF862886.3ADB3%mplant@pipeline.com...
> snip
>
>>. The process of the post fermentation can be very
>> tedious that many tea producers are 'cheating' these days by either
>> marketing their Yellow tea as green tea, or process the Yellow tea as
>> green
>> and let it sit for a while in the warehouse before selling it as a yellow
>> tea.
>
> Oh Danny, I am SO confused yet again, for this defines Pu'erh, or so I
> thought.
>>
Haha! Exactly the same thought when I was typing that!

There is however one major difference: water. Pu'er makers speed up the
fermentation process by hydro-thermal fermentation, increasing the microbe
activity on the tea, Yellow tea makers do not use water. After the tea is
pan-fried to about 40% dryness, it is roasted to about 70% dryness. While
the tea is hot it is packed and stored up to 7 days to allow it to ferment.
When the tea makers decide the tea is about done, it is returned to the
roast and baked up to 95% dryness.

What Jim had is probably the small or large leaf tea variety, not the bud
tea. Mengding Huangya is a yellow tea with slightly different
characteristic. Good & 'real' quality Mengding Huangya is truly difficult
to obtain, and its price per ounce is worth almost as much as those
prize-winning green teas. & I had only 3 small cups of it once...the others
that I have tried since are nothing like that one time. What we usually have
are teas of a lesser grade, and mostly in what I would term 'an awkard
position' between a green and yellow tea. That said, the Mengding Huangya
tastes more like green tea, with a 'brothy' texture. What I can describe in
food term is that it is like a green tea broth with kombu, while most of the
other yellow teas are more of a kombu broth with green tea...& I'm getting
the itch for Japanese food now...haha!

Danny

I am over the bud hangup. It tooks me many years to realize Sowmee was
good as Yinzhen. I just wished there was a cheap version of Yellow
tea. The second place steer is cheaper at the feedlot than the
prize-winner at the county fair.

Jim

samarkand wrote:
> What Jim had is probably the small or large leaf tea variety, not the bud
> tea. Mengding Huangya is a yellow tea with slightly different
> characteristic. Good & 'real' quality Mengding Huangya is truly difficult
> to obtain, and its price per ounce is worth almost as much as those
> prize-winning green teas.

Hi Mydnight,

I would prefer to think of 'que she' (sparrow tongue) as an indication of
the shape of the tea than the way it is processed.

How did you find the taste of the tea? I once bought a tea called 'Zao Chun
Huang Ya' (Early Spring Yellow Bud), but it turned out to leaned towards
green tea rather than yellow tea!

Danny

"Mydnight" <myseri@m> wrote in message
news:1130457373.260582.176250@z14g2000cwz. o...
>>>. The process of the post fermentation can be very
>>> tedious that many tea producers are 'cheating' these days by either
>>> marketing their Yellow tea as green tea, or process the Yellow tea as
>>> green
>>> and let it sit for a while in the warehouse before selling it as a
>>> yellow
>>> tea.
>
>>yellow tea
>
> Danny,
>
> I got this tea called "que she" which basically translates to bird
> tongue. I bought it in Sichuan, and I have heard some people refer to
> it as yellow tea and some as green tea. Which classification does it
> fall under; I've always wondered.
>
> Heard of it?
>

It hasn't been discussed so far but wouldn't a fermented tea get
'better' with age? I think aged tea rates with virgin monkeys picking
leaves from trees on cliffs in the moonlight. I also think limited
tasting of tea type isn't good for conclusions. You drink enough
darjeeling and flushes are the main factor. You drink puerh and Qinq
Mao grade is main factor. You drink Ceylon teas and districts are the
main factor. Maybe with yellow tea locale will be more important than
taste. I can say my yellow tea has a different taste but nothing to
lose sleep over if it became stale tomorrow.

Jim

Mydnight wrote:
> It's hard to say, but I think my que she tastes a little more like
> yellow tea than green tea. I know this doesn't do anything
> classification wise, but it does turn the water yellow instead of
> green; thus the bosses explanation that it's yellow tea, I guess. I do
> wish I had some that were fresh enough to drink now, though. I have
> about a fourth of a kilo of the stuff left, but it's too old to drink.