Delicious Lu Shan – welcome back again to be an important component of our selection of premium teas for the 2021 tea season.
Our memory of you from the last few years is that you have been one of the most delightful teas each year. Focused, direct, and the exemplification of the taste of eastern China spring green tea.
Lu Shan Yun Wu is from the ‘Golden Triangle’ region of eastern China: the geographic point at which Jiangxi, Anhui and Zhejiang Provinces come together. Some of the finest Chinese green teas each year come from the tea gardens there, plucked and processed by hand, as they have been for centuries. These vast tea growing areas provide most of China’s ‘famous‘ green teas, the gardens sharing their tea mountains with an abundance of heavily-forested, lush terrain.
The term ‘clouds & mist’ refers to blankets of nourishing mists that develop in the forests and valleys each day and provide a lush, moist environment for the forest, birds and tea gardens. Lu Shan is blessed with ample water from the Yangtze River and Lake Poyang. Rich hydration results in sweet, tender buds and leaves that are filled with abundant plant nutrient and sweetness. The deep green color of Lu Shan suggests this rich, unspoiled environment. The long, thin leaves speak to hand-processing skills that are second to none. This is an extremely well-made tea.
Lu Shan tea has a stunning aroma – it is full of vibrancy and spring life. If one has never tried a Chinese spring green tea before, this would be our recommendation of where to start. You will be a convert for life if you follow its traditional steeping instructions. Once you are familiar with the traditional steeping result, you can experiment to find how you prefer it best, because this tea is good short-steeped, long-steeped, steeped multiple times, and every way possible!
During the Tang dynasty ( 618-907 ) the tea sage Lu Yu wrote of the delicious nature of Lu Shan tea. Today, because of the natural beauty of Lu Shan, a part of the mountain has become a high-level resort area. Both Chiang Kai-chiek and Mao Zhedong had summer cottages here, far away from the demands of life in government.
Lu Shan tea has been cultivated for nearly 1500 years and there are very exacting quality control regulations in place for tea farmers. We were told that nearly 40% of the fresh leaf grown in the area is deemed to be not good enough to become finished and marketable Lu Shan Yun Wu. Instead, this leaf is used to make other local types of green tea, drunk mostly in the domestic market.
Note:
Pre-Qing Ming teas are the first teas plucked each new spring season. Depending on the location and altitude in each tea producing region, leaf plucking can begin as early as the middle week of March and continue until April 5th ( Qing Ming). Pre-Qing Ming teas command the highest prices because the demand for these teas outpaces the supply each year.
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