Silver Needle & Tea Blossoms 2019

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We visited Tang’s tea estate in April 2019 and Tang took us on the steep hike to see his pu-erh tea garden. I spent several hours there, observing the graceful and efficient way that the elders harvested the tea leaves, studying the trunk structures of the ancient trees, and admiring the vibrant mosses that had grown on them.

For Mr. Tang, crafting beautiful teas from a clean and balanced ecosystem is sacred. He is deeply dedicated to the craft of traditional tea making; this philosophy guides everything he does, and is embedded in every single tea he makes. Alongside being an expression of this special ecosystem, his teas are so distinctly peaceful, and feel extremely clear, just as he feels as a person.

Tea Flower in Silver Needle, is a very unique and special tea from our collection of Mr. Tang’s tea. The Silver Needle is made from the leaves of the Jinggu Big White varietal – trees that Mr. Tang had planted when he first started his tiny organic tea farm 18 years ago.

Tea trees flower! – Something easy to forget, as we are always so engaged with their leaves. They blossom once every year, in November. The delicate flowers used to make this tea come from the same trees grown on Mr. Tang’s farm. They are carefully hand harvested as they bloom, and left to slowly dry in the sun, before being finished over charcoal to remove their remaining moisture; a process that takes over two weeks.

The flowers were pressed with the Silver Needle white tea into small cakes in November of 2019. Each year, only 150 of these tiny tea cakes are made. This limited production is largely due to the importance of the flowers for the life of the tea trees: their nectar is a vital source of food for the bees during winter months, so Mr. Tang will only harvest a small amount of the flowers, leaving most of them for the bees.

The resulting tea is both elegant and delicious. It is delicate, albeit dense and honeyed with the flower’s nectar. The liquor is floral and milky, with refreshing aromatics and sweetness that linger on the palate. We savour this pretty winter tea, and appreciate its nourishing reprieve.