Guangdong Da Ye Qing

Where it grows

Not established — China is the level this record can honestly claim.

How it is made, in order

Read top to bottom: the list is the production sequence, and the sequence is what makes this tea its category rather than a neighbouring one. The same leaf from the same bush becomes a green tea or a black tea depending on where the heat falls relative to the bruising, so reordering these steps would not vary the tea — it would produce a different one.

1. 1. Kill-green (fixation) — Denatures polyphenol oxidase and related enzymes, arresting enzymatic oxidation.
2. 2. Rolling and shaping — Ruptures cell walls to expose leaf juices, and forms the leaf into the shape it will hold through drying and storage.
3. 3. Two-stage drying (mao huo and zu huo) — Removes free surface moisture in a hot first pass, allows internal moisture to migrate outward during a rest, then removes it in a cooler second pass, avoiding a dry shell around a damp core.
4. 4. Sealed yellowing (men huang) — Holds fixed, still-damp leaf warm and enclosed so that slow non-enzymatic change proceeds without the browning that free air would allow.
5. 5. Drying — Reduces residual moisture to a level at which enzymatic, microbial and oxidative change effectively stops, stabilising the leaf for storage.

The route it is made by

The steps above are what happens; this is the named production route they belong to, with the other teas made the same way.

• Coarse yellow tea with a high finishing fire — The yellow tea that behaves like a dark tea. Coarse leaf and stem, yellowed in bulk rather than in a wrapper, and finished with a fire long and hot enough that the roast becomes the tea's main character.

  Where it is practised: Huoshan and the surrounding counties of western Anhui, with related coarse yellow productions elsewhere in the province and in Hubei. It is a local staple rather than an export tea.

What its chemistry turns on

Every true tea contains caffeine, catechins and amino acids, so listing them would say nothing about this one. What differs is what the processing above does to them — and that is the same list of steps, read for its chemistry instead of its craft.

• Kill-green (fixation)
  • locks 2-Phenylethanol
  • locks Anthocyanins
  • locks Catechins
  • locks cis-3-Hexenol
  • locks Green-leaf volatiles
  • locks L-theanine
  • locks Leaf lipids
  • locks Methylated catechins
  • locks Theogallin
• Rolling and shaping
  • converts Leaf lipids
  • creates Theaflavins
  • raises Pectins
• Two-stage drying (mao huo and zu huo)
  • creates Melanoidins
  • creates Strecker aldehydes
  • raises Epimerised catechins
• Sealed yellowing (men huang)
  • creates Pheophytin
  • lowers Catechins
  • lowers Chlorophyll
• Drying
  • creates Strecker aldehydes
  • raises Beta-damascenone
  • raises Thearubigins

These are statements about the leaf and the cup. What any of these compounds does in a body is a different kind of question and is not answered here or on the pages linked from it.

Brewing

• Western brewing (teapot or mug)

  2–3 g/100 ml · 85–92 °C · 1 authored infusion

  Needs: Western teapot

  Open in the brew assistant

• Gongfu brewing (gaiwan)

  3–4 g/100 ml · 80–88 °C · 4 authored infusions

  Needs: Gaiwan

  Open in the brew assistant

Common mistakes

• Brewing it as gently as Junshan Yinzhen. Mature leaf needs hotter water and longer than a bud tea does.
• Expecting the category to be uniform. Yellow tea spans bud teas, small-leaf teas and this; they share a step, not a style.

When the cup goes wrong

Written against yellow tea as a category rather than against this tea in particular, and worked back from the symptom to the likely causes in order.

• My green tea tastes flat and looks dark in this house — A delicate green tea that tasted bright elsewhere comes out dull and heavy here, with a darker, browner liquor than it should have and none of its aroma.

If you like this

Grouped by why they were suggested, strongest reason first. Nothing here is a blended score — a suggestion appears under the best reason that exists for it, and never under a weaker one as well.

Compare this tea with another