Verdant Tea

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.

Master Zhang is proud to be sharing true Tieguanyin varietal oolong, fed by mountain spring water and grown without pesticides or fertilizers under the high mountain mist. Most Tieguanyin sold is actually Benshan or other similar varietals which lack the long drawn out aftertaste of Tieguanyin. The biodiversity of Daping lends complexity and depth of flavor to this tea, with a compelling combination of fresh aroma, clean flavor and compelling aftertaste.

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.

Li Xiangxi's family grows this tea within the Wuyishan Ecological Preserve, hand picking every leaf and delicately roasting this tea in bamboo baskets over charcoal embers to bring out the natural minerality of the region. Li Xiangxi's eldest brother oversees the family's oolong teas, and believes strongly in standing against the modern trend to over-roast and cover the natural flavor of the tea. This makes the family's Big Red Robe unique among its peers. While Big Red Robe is named after five original bushes that still stand today in Wuyishan, modern Big Red Robe is made from Qidan varietal, which is known for its tremendous balance, and deep warmth. It is truly the archetypal tea of the region, and the place to start your exploration of Wuyi Oolongs as a grounding point of reference. The LI Family’s Big Red Robe consistently wins gold medals at Wuyi tea competitions.

The Wu Family's Shou Mei is picked from mature wild-arbor Da Bai varietal tea bushes on their high-elevation biodiverse plot. Their generously downy Shou Mei is a combination of young leaves and buds. This year's 2021 harvest includes small fuzzy buds alongside the mature late spring leaves, brewing up refreshing and balanced - great both for afternoon sipping or cold brewed iced tea.

Bai Hao Yin Zhen is picked entirely from early spring buds, with almost no leaf at all. The result is extremely sweet and thick, with a light flavor but a lingering deep aftertaste and aroma. The biodiversity of the Wu Family’s multi-generational tea garden, left untended for decades yields tea with big rich flavor, the plant's response to competition from other plants and insects. The result is a silver needle with unparalleled refinement but a dynamic structure and energy. This year’s harvest is remarkably creamy while still maintaining a cooling, tingling aftertaste and deep herbaceous undertones.

This relatively new tea is fed by sweet mountain spring water and oxidized in the sun for three days before finishing to bring out signature chocolate notes. Mr. He perfected this tea as a proud reflection of the bold Shandong spirit and the perseverance of Laoshan Village. Laoshan Black is a labor of love to prove to the world how wonderful teas from Northern China can be. The body is light and smooth, without astringency.

The Li Family and other members of the Dongsa Cooperative sustainably forage from towering crassicolumna trees to harvest the early spring woody buds that make this new black tea. Camellia Crassicolumna (厚轴茶) is a wild near-relative of tea native to Qianjiazhai; because this plant currently a protected species. one of the cooperative's responsibilities is to protect these trees from poaching. The incredibly-sweet. flavor-packed buds are traditionally piled and allowed to oxidize fully in the Mt. Ailao sun without heat treatment, locking in the natural flavor and aroma of the region. Crassicolumna is naturally caffeine-free and rich in antioxidants.

Available both loose leaf and in pressed 100g cakes, this new 2019 tea is picked from the early spring leaves and tender buds of the Camellia Crassicolumna tree, a close relative of the tea plant native to Qianjiazhai. Crassicolumna is naturally caffeine-free and high in antioxidants. Since Crassicolumna is native to the Qianjiazhai region, there are many examples of staggeringly old Crassicolumna trees. Mr. Li of the cooperative is actually employed by the local government as an environmental protection officer to make sure these ancient trees are protected from poaching, where outsiders would sneak in in the cover of darkness to cut the tall trees and quickly harvest their precious leaves. Mr. Li has found that the best way to protect the trees is to allow sustainable wild foraging by the people living in the protected region in exchange for their help watching over remote Crassicolumna groves. This extremely rare and labor-intensive to harvest offering is allowed to slowly sun-roast to oxidize and finished as a unique black tea with a rich fruity but wild flavor, all without the caffeine you’d see in camellia sinensis.

Craft and terroir have come together beautifully for this 2021 early autumn harvest from Qianjiazhai's wild tea trees. The Dongsa Cooperative wild-forages buds and tender leaves from tea trees between one hundred and three hundred years of age for this loose sheng pu'er blend. Every hand-picked leaf is withered and sun-dried in bamboo baskets, with little or no heat exposure to lock in the most wild and natural flavor of one of the most remote growing regions in the world.

Master Zhou's Gu Hua harvest is a careful blend of maocha from trees aged between one hundred and three hundred years old, picked for a balanced and rich full body and aroma. Gu Hua is the very early autumn harvest prized for its rich flavor and intense aroma. These wild trees grow in one of the oldest and most remote tea forests in the world, on Mt. Ailao. Every leaf is hand picked and carefully sun-dried with minimal time on the wok for a more natural and pure flavor. The maocha is finished with careful stone-pressing in a custom 100g mold carved by Master Zhou. In addition to 100g cakes, the cooperative has also pressed larger 250g "xiao jin gua" forms this year.

Master Zhou is still experimenting with other farmers in Qianjiazhai to produce new black tea offerings each year. The cooperative started with simple oxidized and sun dried black tea without any processing. Recently they have begun experimenting with wok-roasted hand finished black tea. The application of heat makes this more closely related to other Yunnan Black, and indeed it shares a rich sweet potato thickness similar to our Yunnan Golden Fleece, but with Qianjiazhai’s signature tulsi complexity and touches of citrus, and florals. Anybody who loves black tea will love this wild complex black tea offering from the Dongsa Cooperative.

Huang Ruiguang's family Mi Lan Dancong is picked only once a year from single trees that are not pruned back to encourage deeper roots & more robust flavor, year after year. His mountain plot and decades of work in improving agriculture techniques for the region have earned Huang Ruiguang's Mi Lan awards such as the recent 2015 Gold Medal at the Sixth Guangdong Tea Expo. This Mi Lan is allowed to naturally oxidize for over 24 hours before being carefully spread, baked and tumbled. The oxidation creates a deep rich black tea flavor, but Mi Lan varietal’s natural juicy floral honey flavor still comes through strong.

Huang Ruiguang's family Mi Lan Dancong is picked only once a year from single trees that are not pruned back to encourage deeper roots & more robust flavor, year after year. His mountain plot and decades of work in improving agriculture techniques for the region have earned Huang Ruiguang's Milan awards such as the recent 2015 Gold Medal at the Sixth Guangdong Tea Expo. Mi Lan varietal is set apart with its distinctive golden green leaf color in early spring & its luscious deep aromatics.

This beautiful experimental tea from Master Zhang brings together the deep complexity and lingering aftertaste of his full day turning and fluffing process required for Revival style, and the luscious sweet floral aromatics of autumn Ben Shan varietal. Master Zhang’s Ben Shan bushes were planted by his grandparents on some of the highest slopes of the family’s mountain plot above Daping Village. Their deep roots take in water from a sweet mountain spring running under the rocky soil, bringing big texture and lingering sweetness to compliment the intensive finishing. The “dragonfly” shape unfolds beautifully in a gaiwan over many steepings.

The Dongsa cooperative wild-forages the leaves for their hand-fired black tea from trees well over one hundred years old, growing on the cool high elevation slopes of the Ailao National Forest Preserve. The biodiversity and well established root stock makes for deeply nuanced and complex tea, normally reserve for pressing and aging as sheng pu’er. This experimental offering is a new project by the cooperative to hand fire over low heat in a wok for a more classic Dian Hong style. The application of heat makes this more closely related to other Yunnan Black, and indeed it shares a rich sweet potato thickness similar to our Yunnan Golden Fleece, but with Qianjiazhai’s signature tulsi complexity and touches of citrus, and florals.

The Wu Family's Shou Mei is picked from mature wild-arbor Da Bai varietal tea bushes on their high-elevation biodiverse plot. Their generously downy Shou Mei is a combination of young leaves and buds. This year's 2021 harvest includes small fuzzy buds alongside the mature late spring leaves, brewing up refreshing and balanced - great both for afternoon sipping or cold brewed iced tea.

This wild-picked Shou Mei from the Wu Family's beautifully-forested misty mountain plot has been carefully aged for over five years to bring out deep complexity. A mix of buds and leaves, this tea has become sweeter and more honeyed over the years and picked up a cooling eucalyptus quality. Fine white tea like this can age for decades and continue to grow over time.

This tea is a new experiment from one of Master Zhou's former students, another member of the cooperative. Qianjiazhai one hundred to three hundred year wild-picked leaves and buds are pile-fermented until they clump together in tight balls in the heat. The balls ferment and age differently than loose tea and yield a rich vanilla-heavy flavor that is impossible to steep out.

Qianjiazhai Gong Ting Shu Pu'er is still a very new practice, made only by one of Master Zhou's students in the cooperative. Using the giant buds of Qianjiazhai's wild trees between 100 and three hundred years of age, this tea is carefully and slowly pile fermented to bring out a deep rich sweetness unlike any other shu pu'er out there. Master Zhou was so excited by this experiment he is sharing the technique across the cooperative and encourage more members to keep developing the craft.

Master Zhang is making some of the finest Tieguanyin in the world. Based in Daping village at the very highest peaks of Gande, Anxi. His terraced fields are overgrown with wildflowers, and fed by naturally sweet and clear mountain spring water. Master Zhang's slow and subtle roasting and aging process adds deep lingering spice to the Tieguanyin florals. This ten year old harvest is already rich and full of spice.