Verdant Tea

Available loose leaf (25g) and in 100g pressings, this is the Dongsa Cooperative's third year finishing thier wild-picked ancient tree tea as a white tea! Inspired by the famous Yunnan Yue Guang Bai or Moonlight White style white tea, this mix of buds and leaves is dried without heat in bamboo baskets outdoors on breezy days fro quickly lock in teh deep complexity of the tea as it tastes picked fresh from the tree. This year's Yue Guang Bai was rested for a half year before gentle steaming and pressing into 100g cakes.

This tea is a world premiere! For the first time ever, the Dongsa Cooperative is using leaves from the ancient near-tea relative Camellia Crassicolumna (厚轴茶) to make a stunning, genre-defying loose leaf white tea. Finished as a white tea, the rare wild crassicolumna leaves light up with powerful aromatics and crisp juicy texture. Mr. Li of the Dongsa Cooperative is one of the park ranger responsible for protecting the ancient endangered Crassicolumna Trees from poachers, and he has found that incentivizing local farmers to stay vigilant by allowing limited, careful and sustainable picking solves the poaching problem entirely. The wild, flavor-packed buds and leaves are spread thin in bamboo baskets and given enough air-circulation to dry out before they oxidize, utilizing ultra-traditional white tea craft. Crassicolumna is naturally caffeine-free and rich in antioxidants.

Rou Gui is better known as a roasted oolong from Wuyi, famous in Wuyi for its intense and aromatic cinnamon flavor. Master Zhang's Rou Gui varietal bushes grow among Tieguanyin fields and wildflowers, and benefit from sweet mountain spring water. Master Zhang's careful finish on this unique rolled Anxi Rou Gui brings out not just rich cinnamon spice, but also dessert-like complexity and aftertaste.

Qilan is a luscious, floral varietal most famous for its cultivation in Wuyishan as a roasted oolong. This expression of Qilan from Anxi brings out all the sweet florals that make Qilan varietal unique, strengthening them with traditional processing and the floral mineral-heavy terroir of Master Zhang's land above Daping. Honey florals are accentuated with a spice and juiciness for a beautiful satisfying counterpoint to Wuyi Qilan.

Ruan Zhi or "Soft Stem" is sometimes better known as "Qing Xin" varietal, used in Taiwan to produce Dong Ding and Baozhong and in Thailand for Doi Mai Salong. The traditional processing truly emphasizes the connection between Anxi and Taiwan tea craft. Any Taiwanese tea afficionado will be impressed by the intense bready sweet notes and deep florals this Anxi Ruan Zhi offers.

This is Master Zhang's absolute highest designation competition-level Tieguanyin, a rare allocation that we are pleased to offer for the first time ever. Most years Master Zhang is unable to set aside a traditional-finish Special Grade, as it requires a perfect alignment of weather, deep-rooted old-growth tea bushes, and perfect craft. Any special Grade designation from Master Zhang must meet his serious standards in terms of having the longest aftertaste, tingling, electrical after-sensation, juicy, mouth-watering sweetness and enveloping aromatics. When a picking is a candidate for meeting these standards it is set aside for full traditional hand-finishing, and even when completed, is only called Special Grade if the result warrants this rare label.

Qilan varieties is almost legendary for its deep luscious orchid notes and its subtle incense spice. The Li Family cultivates established 40+ year Qilan bushes on their rocky volcanic mountainside plot in the Wuyishan Ecological Preserve, letting the tea build complexity through biodiverse plantings, and carefully preserved natural forest cover. They hand-pick their Qilan and expertly bring out the florals through hand-crafting over a meticulous 12 hour turning and fluffing process called yaoqing. The careful and restrained roast on this Qilan really allows the florals to shine through, bolstered by the rocky minerality that the Li Family’s teas are famous for.

Rock Milk or Shi Ru is an uncommon varietal that the Li Family cultivates on their mist-shaded, mountain spring-fed biodiverse plot within the Wuyi Ecological Preserve. The naturally rocky elements of this tea come through even stronger as they take in the deep minerality of the volcanic rocky soil. As a rare offering, Mr. Li takes the time to bring out the rich mouthwatering lingering yun sensation of this tea through the hand firing at low heat for hours needed to bring out the very best. This varietal is an excellent chance to taste the terroir of the region.

It takes thousands of buds to make an ounce of this tea, hand-picked near Li Xiangxi’s old family home in Tongmu, in a protected ravine with wild bamboo, orange trees and native flowers growing around old growth wild tea bushes. Once a year in the early spring, Li Xiangxi and her family pick the tiny golden buds off the cultivated tea bushes growing below her family home. The beautiful golden color and flavor of this carefully cultivated Jin Jun Mei (Golden Eyebrows) makes it one of the most prized teas in China.

Only a dozen kilos of this unusual tea were picked this year. The entire batch was hand picked and processed solely by Li Xiangxi's brother. Once again, we are excited to have the opportunity to share a large part of the harvest with you, and to try it for ourselves! The name Purple Buds refers to the color of the buds after picking but before processing. They are actually a light purple green on the tea bush and have a uniquely tropical flavor that sets them apart as a rare and intriguing black tea.

The Wu Family's oldest prized tea bushes growing among wild trees, flowers and bamboo are picked once in the extreme early spring for a bud-only harvest, and then allowed to build up nutrients until they are picked a second time when delicate leaves begin to unfurl. This second harvest of buds and leaves is what makes their fine Bai Mudan- full of the complexity that later season sunlight brings but the sweetness and texture of the early cold-weather buds.

This is the Wu Family's masterpiece offering, the pride of Wuyang Village. The oldest most established wild plants, growing among rich biodiversity on a mountainside fully devoted to organic practices are carefully selected and the first budding of the year is hand-picked and meticulously finished to lock in the sweet complexity of the terroir, the early harvest nutrients, and the natural quality of the established deep-rooted bushes.

Bai Mudan, or White Peony tea from the Wu Family represents their most balanced expression of the wild mountain terroir, with both flavorful leaves and tender downy buds for a tea that shows off whiet tea’s iconic sweet smooth texture and a deep wild forest quality. The Wu Family finishes these leaves under a special shaded air circulation process developed by Mr. Wu to lock in the freshest most aromatic flavors possible. This year they pressed a Dragon Pearl individual steeping size Bai Mudan to protect the leaves even better in transit.

The Wu Family’s Shou Mei is deep, rich and bold - a flavorful expression of white tea, picked from later season larger leaves that are packed with the complexity that a wild, biodiverse landscape brings to the Wu Family’s old-growth Da Bai varietal bushes. The Shou Mei grows even deeper, sweeter and darker with age like pu’er, and this year, the Wu Family pressed their Shou Mei in individual single session dragon pearls to protect them for transit and long term aging.

This year is the sixth fantastic harvest of the He Family's new osmanthus-scented black tea. Once again, the He Family is sharing a rich reserve-level Autumn Harvest Laoshan Black, scented during finishing with tiny hand-picked Laoshan Osmanthus flowers. The brown sugar, honey and fruity chocolate notes are melded together perfectly with the luscious almost creamy floral of the He Family’s meticulously hand-harvested Osmanthus blossoms. This tea is one of the hardest to make in the He Family collection since the local osmanthus blossoms are so small that they have to pick thousands just to make tiny batch of finished tea, but the results are worth the effort.

Long, slender hand-twisted green tea loose leaf picked in the early autumn from organic cultivation rocky fields, finished to show off the beauty of the young buds. The flavor is delicate, mineral-driven and sweet through every steeping thanks to the careful hand-finishing, cold northern climate, and innovative growing techniques.

Picked in the October fall weather, this early autumn harvest Reserve Laoshan Green is picked from the first tender growth of the cool weather season. The extreme northern climate means cold winters and short tea growing seasons in Laoshan, but these sweet buds and tender young leaves are picked before the winter cold ends the growing season at the He Family’s ocean-facing plot at the foot of the Laoshan mountains. This special seasonal offering is intensely sweet with a crisp, fresh flavor and juicy, mouthwatering aftertaste.

The He Family saves this time-consuming flat-passing technique for their sweetest most delicate harvests of the year. The flat-pressing technique is inspired by Dragonwell green tea hand-crafting, and with the cool-weather precious autumn harvest, Mr. He brings out floral notes and deep herbaceous complexity. The day-long meticulous finishing process is worth it for the beautiful leaves that dance in the cup, and the sweet aromatics .

The He Family has been perfecting their long oxidation process and unique curling style for Laoshan Black craft for ten years, and this represents their finest autumn offering. Picked from the sweetest most delicate autumn buds, the reserve-level Laoshan Black focuses on rich creamy texture with a balanced deep flavor. It has been years since the weather conditions lined up for a reserve-level harvest, so we are excited that the He Family was able to offer this limited tea to showcase their craft.

Laoshan Roasted Oolong is the most technically-demanding and labor-intensive tea that the He Family produces. As one of the first people in Northern China to take on oolong craft, Mr. He is defining the flavor and value of this new tea for the entire region. He starts with tender hand-picked leaves from his mountain-spring fed ocean-facing plot, and allows them a full two days to oxidize before beginning the critical kneading and shaking stage that brings out deep rich fruit and florals not normally present. These flavors are locked in with a heavy roast for a tea with the satisfying body of Laoshan Black but with the subtlety of the fine oolong.

Laoshan Green Oolong takes the beautiful mineral-forward green bean profile of Laoshan Green and gives it an astounding depth and complexity through meticulous labor intensive craftsmanship. Mr. He starts with sweet rich fresh leaves, then kneads and shakes the leaves to bring out rich florals and fruity undertones. Heat locks in the green quality of this tea before it can oxidize, yielding a fresh pure and honest expression of the unique flavor of the region. The He Family's special combination of green tea and oolong finishing lock in fresh bright vegetal notes, while accentuating deep tingling minerality and building a luscious fruity floral oolong undertone.

This tea highlights Mr. He’s delicate and meticulous hand rolling and straightening technique developed in producing Pine Needle Green, but introducing traditional sun-oxidation to make a rich and deeply complex black tea. The result is Lashan’s most mineral-forward and complex black tea to date. This tea is fed by mountain spring water, picked by hand, and cultivated sustainably using traditional chemical-free farming techniques including growing rows of soybean between rows of tea to restore nitrates to the soil. The finished tea picks up the rocky minerality of the soil, and careful low temperature roasting brings out deep brown sugar sweetness.

This is the He Family’s iconic loose leaf green tea: organic farming, curled leaves that dance in the cup, all carefully hand-finished for rich creamy flavor. Delicate hand-picked buds and leaves are withered in bamboo baskets, and carefully hand curled and rolled under low heat to form beautiful long twists that unfold gracefully in a glass teapot or tumbler. The fresh and delicate leaf material is the first new growth of the cool autumn season as the weather starts turning and the mornings and nights are misty again. 

Exquisitely hand finished loose leaf green tea from the He Family, this flat-pressed style brings out the complex flavor of Laoshan’s terroir and unique organic green tea growing techniques including crop rotation and cut-back cycles. Laoshan tea was originally brought to the area from Dragonwell, so for this cultivar, flat-pressing is a return to its origins. The day-long labor-intensive process to finish this delicate tea makes for beautiful leaves to brew in glass. The flavor is lighter but the aroma and sweetness more pronounced with flat-pressing. The flat-pressing technique really allows the subtle complexity of this season’s harvest to shine through.

The He Family is continuing their tradition again this year of wild-foraging caffeine-free native Laoshan herbs and using their expertise at green tea processing to finish the leaves like a traditional green tea. While Shandong native Lu mulberry leaf would normally be simply air-dried for use in medicinal tea, the He Family has applied withering, heat-fixing, curling and tumble-drying to bring out much richer and more subtle flavor through their craft. We are excited to share the He Family's herbal teas once again this spring season, and to offer a look at the flavor of Laoshan from another plant entirely different from camellia sinensis!

Hand-Twisted Craft Black Tea. First flat-pressed, then hand twisted, Laoshan Gongfu Black is a difficult finish favored by the He Family to bring out sparkling minerality in their tea. This spring tea has notes of rose, caramel flan and tropical citrus.

Suan Zao Ye (Wild Spiny Zizyphus) is a naturally caffeine-free herbal tea that grows unmanaged and wild on the slopes of Laoshan. While the seeds of the sour dates have been used for centuries in Traditional Chinese Medicine (Suan Zao Ren), the He family forages a limited quantity in April and early May, before the tender spring buds grow too large or the spiny thorns too firm. This year, the leaves were then hand-processed just like a traditional Laoshan green tea, with withering, firing and curling. The final result is packed with delicious flavor and complexity.

A member of the Solanaceae family, the caffeine-free Goji berry plant (Lycium barbarum) grows wild across Northern China - including on the slopes of Laoshan in Shandong. Though the plant is most famous for its berries, its dried leaves have been a part of traditional medicine in China for centuries. Early this spring, the He Family foraged young and tender spring goji leaves and carefully finished them with green tea processing and an open leaf style. We are so excited for the opportunity to share this another experimental tea from the He Family!

The green tea loose leaf classic from Laoshan, hand-picked in the He Family’s organic mist-shaded fields and packed with creamy green bean flavor. The He family's signature green tea is fed by mountain spring water, picked by hand, and cultivated sustainably using traditional chemical-free farming techniques including growing rows of soybean between rows of tea to restore nitrates to the soil. The extreme northern climate means cold winters and short growing seasons, but the He Family perseveres, protecting their tea in greenhouses over the winter. The result is a deeply sweet and delicate green tea unlike any other in the world.

The green tea loose leaf classic from Laoshan, hand-picked in the He Family’s organic mist-shaded fields and packed with creamy green bean flavor. This harvest is picked in the cool autumn air after resting the plant through summer. The result is crisp, fresh flavor with more savory green bean and cream that Laoshan for which Laoshan is famous. The He family's signature green tea is fed by mountain spring water, picked by hand, and cultivated sustainably using traditional chemical-free farming techniques including growing rows of soybean between rows of tea to restore nitrates to the soil. The extreme northern climate means cold winters and short growing seasons, but the He Family perseveres, protecting their tea in greenhouses over the winter. The result is a deeply sweet and delicate green tea unlike any other in the world.

The He Family’s Most Popular Tea. This cool autumn season harvest black tea is packed with flavor and aromatics, fully oxidized and roasted to achieve the iconic malty, chocolatey, honeyed Laoshan Black flavor.

The iconic chocolatey and malty Laoshan Black Tea. This hearty rich and malty northern cool-climate tea is hand-picked, fully oxidized, rolled and fired in a family workshop. The He Family brings out notes of chocolate brownie, cinnamon, cherry and honey.

Delicate Laoshan Artemisia blossoms are wild-picked by Mr. Lu in the spring to capture their intensely sweet flavor. Artemisia is related to mugwort and wormwood, but instead of vegetal flavor, it is uniquely sweet, floral and chocolatey. As a member of the He Jia Cooperative and friend of Mr. He, Mr. Lu is dedicated to finishing caffeine-free herbal teas like this one in Laoshan.

The Lu Family wild-forages Yu Zhu (or Solomon's seal) root within the Laoshan Ecological Preserve and gives it a deep dark roast on their tea finishing equipment back at the workshop. This is a far cry from typical pale sliced Yu Zhu you might see at a traditional Chinese medicine apothecary - the Lu Family keeps their Yu Zhu in big whole pieces for an even roast, yielding rich peanut butter flavor and sweet notes of brown sugar.

Dandelion grows wild across Laoshan, and while the He Family finishes dandelion leaves as a green tea, the Lu Family digs up the roots to dry and toast for a rich deep complex caffeine-free herbal tea harvested at the peak of sweetness for a malty, honeyed flavor and notes of vanilla, nutmeg, and licorice.

Honeysuckle bushes grow across Laoshan and Mr. Lu knows just the right secret spots and picking windows to capture juicy sweet wild honeysuckle, drying it at his Laoshan workshop in bamboo baskets and offering it up as an exquisite and unique caffeine-free herbal tea.

This bundle includes four 25g bags of famous Qimen black teas and Huangshan green teas for 100g total (about 20 sessions). Dedicated craftspeople and farmers, the Cheng Family has a beautiful, high-elevation plot above Guixi Village, an excellent micro-climate for Qimen Black Tea in Anhui. Master Cheng picks the tiny buds and young leaves for his family's teas at the very peak of spring and finishes them by hand in his tiny workshop, coaxing out complexity and the underlying minerality of rocky Huangshan.

The iconic Houkui style, inspired by Taiping Houkui, these leaves are picked from a more remote, pristine and perfect terroir than their famous namesake. This flat pressed style is all about the beauty of the leaves unfolding and the drama of presenting the tea before brewing. Houkui green tea has always been a famous tribute tea, even in modern business gifting or new year gifting since its value is so stunningly apparent even before the first sip.  The finishing style yields a rich brew that almost leans towards the sweet green flavor of a fine Japanese Gyokuro, but with the restraint and minerality that can only come from hand picking in the rocky mountain soil above Guixi.

Di Shui Xiang is a uses early, downy, and delicate spring buds, normally reserved for the famous Maofeng style, but coaxes these buds into tight curls like Biluochun. The biluochun finishing adds creaminess and depth to the texture, bringing out intense dessert-like notes and the kind of complexity that can only come from one of China's most famous growing regions, Qimen and the misty mountains of Huangshan.

Huangshan, the home of Qimen Black Tea, is almost as famous for its scenting craft, specifically with jasmine-scented Huangshan Maofeng. It is no surprise that the Cheng Family would tap into this scenting tradition to give an even deeper more honeyed complexity to their reserve-level Qimen Black using golden osmanthus blossoms. The blossoms are spread through the black tea as it dries so that they fresh leaves can absorb all the natural aromatics of the osmanthus.

Qimen is famous specifically for it's tiny buddy black teas like this one. It takes an incredible amount of labor to pick enough buds for even one pound of Reserve Qimen, but the results are so exquisite that Master Cheng shares it as his pride and joy every year. The buddy quality gives this tea a very thick feeling on the palate and potent, powerful flavor and aroma.

We are so excited to finally be representing such a talented family in world-famous Qimen after a ten year search for the right partners. The Cheng family takes their work seriously and the proof is in the tea. Their classic Qimen is packed with sweet, honeyed notes, floral complexity and beautiful malty undertones thanks to the careful picking and slow, small-batch hand-finishing process that Master Cheng uses.

This early spring tea is all about a fine and subtle sweetness, and a long, drawn out aftertaste and crisp texture. Cool spring weather produces a small harvest of truly sweet tea. This is Mrs. Li’s first picking of the season, carefully hand-finished by her husband, Shui Huamin. Her true original cultivar Dragonwell (Longjing Qunti) grows on the mountain slopes of Shi Feng and draws in sweet mountain spring water.

#43 Varietal Dragonwell was specifically bred and selected to bud even earlier than classic Dragonwell in Shi Feng and yields yellower plumper buds that make for gorgeous steeping in glassware. While classic Dragonwell is all about rocky mineral texture, the new #43 is a crisp, bright focused experience centered around stronger flavor and aroma and more pronounced sweetness. Mrs. Li's first picking of the year is full of all the nutrients and sugars stored by the plant all winter long and offers a more complex, sweet and subtle taste experience. It has a longer aftertaste and thicker texture than later harvests. The soil is full of quartz and white sand while the water comes from natural mountain springs, yielding a flavor that simply can’t be matched outside of Shi Feng itself.

For the second year, Li Xiaoping has set aside her beautifully-crisp textural masterpiece that is Shi Feng Dragonwell and scents it with fresh osmanthus blossoms. Her incredible plot sits on a quartz-laden rocky hillside in the tiny Shi Feng microclimate, where sweet mountain spring water, designated national treasure protection from development, and misty mornings yield sweet clean nuanced green tea that sets the standard for all green tea in China. With such famous and in demand tea, it is remarkable that Li Xiaoping is still incentivized to do such bold experiments like this osmanthus scenting, but we're so happy she did! The results are spectacular, and perfectly balanced. The osmanthus notes are light, accentuating the natural sweet juicy qualities of the Dragonwell.

This famous tea is grown using beyond organic green tea cultivation techniques for rich sweet flavor, incredible texture and notes of bamboo and jasmine. Situated on a perfectly-shaded mountainside, Li Xiaoping’s Dragonwell benefits from Shi Feng’s unique climate, rocky quartz soil and sweet mountain springs. Her craft captures a rare example of true Dragonwell- deep minerality, persistent sweetness and complex aromatics.

This spring harvest pre-Qing Ming white tea is traditionally scented and made with Da Bai varietal white tea. This white tea is not sprayed with artificial oils or aromas. Instead, it is dried together with fresh jasmine blossoms scattered among the buds, allowing the natural aroma of the jasmine to absorb over several days into the tea itself. The process of adding fresh wild Yunnan jasmine blossoms is repeated six times over six days to get a full rich and creamy infusion that holds its intense sweetness and natural potency over many steepings. The creamy dessert-like Yunnan silver needle white tea is the perfect delicate pairing with Lincang's local luscious jasmine.

This unique buddy black tea offering from Wang Yanxin is only possible because of her deep connections in both Henan and Laoshan. Her farmer friends produce extremely tiny bud Xinyang Maojian, a fine downy showstopper of a green tea. The second picking of the year is still all delicate downy buds, but tradition dictates only the first harvest is used for Henan's iconic buddy green tea. Wang Yanxin works to rush-ship fresh tea leaves the day they are picked from Henan all the way up to Laoshan Village, where they are allowed to traditionally oxidize in the sun to make a black tea, and then finished using Laoshan's extremely honed-in roasting and finishing techniques to combine the buddy steamed bun texture of Jin Jun Mei with the chocolatey goodness of Laoshan Black. This cross-province collaboration continues to prove that the world of tea is still full of innovators, pushing the boundaries of tradition.

This spring harvest Yunnan black tea gets its name to honor the soft, rich textural experience of tasting this beautiful small harvest tea. Golden Fleece is hand picked from wild growth (unmanaged) Yunnan Da Bai tea bushes over forty years old. The biodiversity of the growing region and deeper roots mean a more complex flavor and aroma. Only the most perfect large tender buds are hand-harvested, and carefully hand-finished. The down from the buds infuses into every cup, yielding a uniquely thick mouthfeel. This year's harvest is full and complex with cooling cedar, and spiced nutmeg and cinnamon undertones to bolster the luxurious creamy base.

This spectacular high elevation yellow tea is made entirely from perfect buds, and scented with orchids for a deep, rich, well integrated flavor and aftertaste. Called Ta Xue Lan Fei  Yellow Tea, or snowy orchid Yellow Tea, the tiny buds are allowed to wither with fresh Xuelan varietal orchids and slowly absorb their aroma over several days. The yellow tea process requires a 'smothering' or covering of the buds for more complex oxidation after sha qing. These unique steps lock in a fresh flavor somewhere between white tea and green tea with all the textural silkiness of Silver Needle White and the minerality and crisp aftertaste of Dragonwell Green.