Turkish çay

Where it grows

The districts recorded against this tea, all of them in Turkey. Elevation is given as the band the district is recorded at, not a measurement of the garden this leaf came from.

• Rize — 0–900 metres

  How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it. Plantings run from near sea level up the coastal slope; the upper limit varies with aspect.

The plants it is made from

Cultivar is the level below the variety group: a named selection of the tea plant, propagated as clones from one parent. Most consumer writing stops at the country and the category, which leaves out the layer that decides how the leaf behaves before anyone picks it.

• Turkish seed-grown population — Camellia sinensis var. sinensis

  Cold-hardy small-leaf material picked in a short season on steep coastal slopes, largely by hand-shear, and processed almost entirely for the domestic market. Its variability is invisible in the finished product because the finished product is a blend of an entire region.

• Derepazarı 7 — Camellia sinensis var. sinensis

  Cold-hardy material selected under the same constraint that shaped the population it came from. Planted in small quantity against a background of seed-grown fields.

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. Withering — Reduces water content, softens the leaf for later handling, and permits early enzymatic and aromatic development.
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. Oxidation — Allows polyphenol oxidase to act on leaf polyphenols after cell rupture, converting them into the larger coloured compounds that give oxidised tea its colour and body.
4. 4. 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.

• Orthodox black tea — Rupture first and let the reaction run. Heat arrives only at the very end, to stop something that has already been allowed to finish.

  Where it is practised: The whole of the fine black tea trade: Darjeeling, Assam's orthodox lines, Sri Lanka, Nilgiri, Nepal, Kenya's orthodox factories, and the Chinese gongfu black teas of Fujian, Anhui and Yunnan, which run the same shape with markedly gentler settings.

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.

• Withering
  • creates Geraniol
  • creates Linalool
  • creates Linalool oxides
  • creates Theasinensins
  • raises Methyl salicylate
  • raises Nerolidol
  • raises Soluble sugars
  • lowers cis-3-Hexenol
  • lowers Green-leaf volatiles
  • lowers Leaf lipids
• Rolling and shaping
  • converts Leaf lipids
  • creates Theaflavins
  • raises Pectins
• Oxidation
  • converts Carotenoids
  • converts Catechins
  • converts ECG (epicatechin gallate)
  • converts EGC (epigallocatechin)
  • converts EGCG (epigallocatechin gallate)
  • converts Epicatechin
  • converts Linalool
  • creates Beta-damascenone
  • creates Beta-ionone
  • creates GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid)
  • creates Linalool oxides
  • creates Tea cream
  • creates Theaflavins
  • creates Thearubigins
  • raises 2-Phenylethanol
  • raises Geraniol
  • raises Nerolidol
  • lowers Anthocyanins
  • lowers Theogallin
• 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.

History

Turkey planted tea at Rize in the 1920s after losing its coffee-supplying territories, as a deliberate state substitution policy. Within fifty years Turkey had the highest per-head tea consumption in the world, from an industry that did not exist within living memory of its founding.

TeaHQ synthesis — TeaHQ's own reading of well-attested general knowledge, with no single source behind it.

Brewing

• Western brewing (teapot or mug)

  3–5 g/100 ml · 95–100 °C · 1 authored infusion

  Needs: Western teapot

  Open in the brew assistant

• Çaydanlık brewing (Turkish double pot)

  5–8 g/100 ml · 88–96 °C · 1 authored infusion

  Needs: Çaydanlık (Turkish double kettle), Tea glass, Tea strainer

  Open in the brew assistant

Vessels this tea suits

Recorded against the tea rather than against a brewing style, because the vessel does not always follow from the method — a whisk needs lateral room whatever the schedule says, and compressed leaf needs a pick before any method applies at all.

• Çaydanlık (Turkish double kettle) — Two kettles that nest: a larger one below that boils water on the hob, and a smaller one above — the demlik — that holds the leaf. The upper pot never touches the flame, and is held at steeping heat by the steam and the hot metal beneath it.
• Tea glass — The glass is how strength is communicated: the drinker asks for a colour, and the server dilutes to it.

Common mistakes

• Brewing the concentrate for too long — over twenty minutes on the boil turns it harsh and no amount of dilution recovers it.

When the cup goes wrong

Written against black tea as a category rather than against this tea in particular, and worked back from the symptom to the likely causes in order. 19 apply to the category; the first 6 are shown.

• My chai catches on the pan or boils over — A scorched note runs through the finished drink, or the pan foams over the moment your back is turned.
• My chai is harsh and drying rather than rich — The drink is strong enough but unpleasant with it: a rough, drying grip on the tongue and a flat cooked note, rather than the round sweetness a good chai has.
• My chai tastes of hot spiced milk rather than tea — The drink is pleasant and sweet and the tea is nowhere in it — no colour to speak of, no briskness, and nothing that would tell you tea had been involved.
• My iced tea has gone cloudy — Tea that was clear when hot turns hazy or milky once chilled.
• My iced tea tastes watery once the ice melts — The tea is good for the first mouthful and thin by the bottom of the glass.
• My milk curdles or separates in the tea — Flecks or threads appear when the milk goes in, or the surface breaks into small islands, and the drink looks grainy rather than smooth.

Every diagnosed brewing problem

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

Where this tea is drunk

Documented practices that name this tea. Each page describes what is done and by whom, and separates what is recorded from what is repeated.

• The Turkish tea garden and the tea run — Turkey drinks tea in specific places and by a specific logistics: the outdoor tea garden, the all-male tea house with its backgammon boards, and the tray-carrying boy who delivers glasses to every shop on a street all day.

Guides covering this tea

• Tea in Turkey and Georgia