That's a good question!
Tea is the second most consumed drink in the world, surpassed only by water. An often surprising fact for tea novices is that all teas (black, green, Oolong, white and Pu'erh) come from the same plant. The scientific name of this versatile plant is Camellia sinensis (in fact, it is related to the beautiful camellia flowers found in botanical gardens and landscapes). Camellia sinensis is a subtropical evergreen plant native to Asia, but is now cultivated all over the world. The tea plant grows best in deep, loose soils, at high altitudes and in subtropical climates. In short, "tea" is anything derived from Camellia sinensis. Any other product, although it is sometimes called "tea", is more accurately called "herbal tea". Herbal teas include chamomile, rooibos and fruit teas. We will learn more about these in a minute.

 

 

The tea plant, which grows naturally in the wild in much of Asia, is cultivated in a wide variety of settings, ranging from small allotments to giant estates covering thousands of hectares. The best tea is usually grown at high altitudes, often on steep slopes. The terrain requires that these premium teas are hand-picked, and it takes about 2,000 tiny leaves to make a pound of finished tea. If this sounds crazy, remember that these methods have been around for thousands of years. Many teas for large-scale commercial production are grown on flat plains to allow machine harvesting. However, it should be noted that some of the best hand-picked teas in the world come from flat fields and lower altitudes. How tea is grown is therefore only one of many factors to consider.

 

Teas that are processed in the traditional way are called orthodox teas. Orthodox teas usually contain only the two tender upper leaves and an unopened leaf bud, which are carefully hand-picked and then processed in five basic steps, creating the thousands of varieties of tea we know and love today (note: although tea plants have small flowers, the tea "buds" people refer to are the young, unopened leaves, not the flowers). Today, most orthodox tea production uses a unique combination of ancient methods, such as bamboo trays, which allow the leaves to wilt, and modern, innovative machinery, such as leaf rolls that are carefully calibrated to mimic the movements originally done by hand. A true art form, tea is handled by craftsmen who have often been trained for generations, from the time of plucking to the end of production. For some teas, a batch may require several days of work.

 

The other way to prepare tea is the unorthodox method, the most common type of which is CTC (crush-tear-curl). This much faster style of production has been specially created for black tea. These teas can be hand-picked or not. For commercial production, large harvesting machines are used that "mow" the tops of the bushes to obtain the new leaves. CTC production uses a leaf crusher that macerates the leaves (crushing, tearing and rolling them, hence the name) into fine pieces. They are then rolled into small balls. The result looks a lot like Grape Nuts cereal, in fact. These teas brew very quickly and produce a bold and powerful cup of tea. Crush-tear-curl is generally used mainly in the tea bag industry, as well as in India to create Masala Chai blends (because of their strength and color).

 

The three main components of brewed tea are:

 

1. Essential oils - they bring the delicious aromas and flavors of tea.
2. Polyphenols - they give tea its "liveliness" or astringency in the mouth and are the components that also provide most of the health benefits of tea.
3. Caffeine - naturally present in coffee, chocolate, tea and Yerba Mate, caffeine gives tea a natural energy boost.
4. There are many other components of tea, we explore them in another article.

The way in which the leaves are processed determines their final classification in black, green, etc. We will discuss these styles of tea in the next lesson.

Although tea is one of the most popular beverages in the world, its culture can be very "local". For example, most tea drinkers in Darjeeling, India, have never had (or even heard of) a Taiwanese Pouchong. In China, most people do not drink black tea. The centuries-old Japanese tea ceremony uses a rare powdered Matcha tea, which most people in Sri Lanka, a black tea-loving country, have never tasted. Tea is a truly special and unifying thing, especially when you imagine how so many tea-drinking cultures have developed on their own. The new American tea culture is unique because we enjoy all types of tea (white, green, oolong, black and pu'erh). No other country can claim this distinction. The amount of knowledge to share and tea to enjoy is enormous. TeaClass seeks to assist in this process by providing accurate and insightful knowledge about tea.