Ujeon

Where it grows

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

• Boseong — 50–400 metres

  How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it.

• Hadong — 100–700 metres

  How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it.

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.

• Jaerae-jong — Camellia sinensis var. sinensis

  Small-leaf, cold-hardy and variable bush to bush, with deep taproots from seed. Picked in successive spring grades from ujeon through daejak.

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. Pan-firing (Chinese fixation) — Denatures oxidation enzymes through dry contact heat while simultaneously initiating surface browning reactions in the leaf.
3. 3. Rolling and shaping — Ruptures cell walls to expose leaf juices, and forms the leaf into the shape it will hold through drying and storage.
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.

• Chinese pan-fired green tea — Heat first, shape second. The route puts fixation at position three, before the leaf has been ruptured at all, and everything that follows happens to a leaf that has stopped changing colour.

  Where it is practised: Practised across almost every Chinese producing province, and in Korea, Vietnam and increasingly in Japanese kamairicha production, where it is the minority method.

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.

The compounds that substantially decide what this tea is: Free amino acids, L-theanine.

• 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
• Pan-firing (Chinese fixation)
  • creates Strecker aldehydes
  • locks EGC (epigallocatechin)
• Rolling and shaping
  • converts Leaf lipids
  • creates Theaflavins
  • raises Pectins
• 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

The first Korean picking, taken before the spring rains, and the grade most closely tied to the temple cultivation that kept Korean tea alive through centuries of official disfavour.

Brewing

• Western brewing (teapot or mug)

  1.5–2.5 g/100 ml · 65–75 °C · 1 authored infusion

  Needs: Western teapot

  Open in the brew assistant

• Gongfu brewing (gaiwan)

  3–4 g/100 ml · 75–85 °C · 4 authored infusions

  Needs: Gaiwan

  Open in the brew assistant

• Korean green tea brewing

  2–3 g/100 ml · 55–70 °C · 3 authored infusions

  Needs: Water cooling bowl (sukwoo), Porcelain teapot, Yunomi (Japanese teacup)

  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.

• Water cooling bowl (sukwoo) — A wide open bowl with a lip, used to cool boiled water before it reaches the leaf. It does one job and does it more repeatably than waiting does: a broad shallow layer of water loses heat quickly and by a similar amount each time, so the same sequence of pours lands in roughly the same place without any measurement.
• Buncheong ware — Slip-coated Korean stoneware is one of the common bodies for the cups the earliest picking is served in.

When the cup goes wrong

Written against green tea as a category rather than against this tea in particular, and worked back from the symptom to the likely causes in order. 37 apply to the category; the first 6 are shown.

• I bought a big bag to save money and it was stale before I finished it — A large quantity bought at a good unit price faded well before it was drunk, so the saving turned into waste.
• I bought a water filter for my tea and it changed nothing — A filter jug or tap filter was bought specifically to improve the tea, and the cup tastes the same as it did before — with the same dullness, the same film and the same scale in the kettle.
• I have too many teas open and most of them are going stale — A dozen or more packets are open at once, three or four get drunk regularly, and the rest fade quietly on the shelf until they are thrown away.
• Leaves stick to the cup, the pot and my teeth — Fine leaf clings to the inside of the vessel, comes through into the cup, and ends up in the last mouthful.
• My bamboo whisk is losing tines — Fine bamboo tines snap off during whisking and turn up in the bowl, and the whisk feels stiff and splayed.
• My cold brew tastes like faintly flavoured water — After a night in the fridge the jug is pale and tastes of very little, with none of the sweetness cold brewing is supposed to give.

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.

• Hadong and Boseong: two Korean tea districts that are not alike — One district grows seed-propagated bushes scattered through woodland on the slopes of a mountain; the other has contoured rows photographed more often than any other tea field in Asia. Both are called Korean tea and they are different products with different economics.
• Korean tea practice (darye) — A Korean practice of preparing and serving tea with its own vessels, pacing and aesthetic — distinct from both Chinese gongfu and Japanese chanoyu, and considerably less written about outside Korea.
• Korean temple tea — The Buddhist monastic lineage that carried Korean tea through the centuries when almost nobody else was drinking it — the temple gardens of the south-west, the monks who wrote about it, and the temple-stay programmes through which most outsiders now meet it.
• The Korean tea revival — Korean tea culture very nearly stopped, and what exists now was substantially rebuilt within living memory — by monks, by academics, by tea associations and by a state interested in national heritage, which is a different kind of tradition from an unbroken one.

Guides covering this tea

• Grading by picking date: the East Asian alternative to grading by appearance