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White tea

White tea is made from uncured and unoxidized tea leaves. White tea can contains buds and young tea leaves, which have been found to contain lower levels of caffeine than older leaves, suggesting that the caffeine content of some white teas may be slightly lower than that of green teas.

Many Chinese provinces specialize in certain teas. White tea is a speciality of the province of Fujian. The leaves come from various tea cultivators, the most popular being Da Bai (Large White), Xiao Bai (Small White), Narcissus and Chaicha bushes. There are a number of grades of white team, according to different standards of picking and selection.

Bai Hao Yinzhen, or Silver Needle, is the the highest grade of the Bai Hao Yinzhen. It should be fleshy, bright colored and covered with tiny white hairs. The shape should be very uniform, with no stems or leaves. Bai Mu Dan, or White Peony, is a grade below Bai Hao Yinzhen and is made by incorporating the bud and two leaves, which should be covered with a fine, silvery-white down. Gong Mei, or Tribute Eyebrow, is the third grade of white tea. The production uses leaves from the Xiao Bai or "small white" tea trees. Shou Mei, or Noble, Long Life Eyebrow, is a a fruity, furry white tea that is a mix of tips and upper leaf. It is know for a stronger flavor than other white teas. It is the fourth grade of white tea. Ceylon White is popular tea grown in Sri Lanka. Ceylon White tea can demand much higher prices than black tea from the area. The tea has a very light liquoring with notes of pine and honey and a golden coppery infusion.

Darjeeling White tea has a delicate aroma and brews to a pale golden cup with a mellow taste and a hint of sweetness. Assam White is a white tea production in the Assam region and is very rare. A white Assam yields a refined infusion that is naturally sweet with a distinct malty character. African White tea is produced in small amounts in Malawi and Kenya, mostly as Silver Needles (Yin Zhen) type made of assamensis buds; usually higher in caffeine and richer in flavour.

White Puerh Tea is harvested in the spring from plantations found high on remote mountain peaks of Yunnan Province in China. Incredibly labor intensive with each step processed by hand, this is a luxury whites are wonderfully rich in fragrance, and possess an alluring, sweet nectar-like quality.

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