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Farmer's Note
I had been producing tea in Fujian province for over two decades. As my experience grew so did my mental fatigue. I finally decided to uproot myself and move to Meizhou, Guangdong province, to start over, building an organic tea garden and factory. I had to learn to work with different terroir (that is, the environmental factors that affect a crop) and a different cultivar than what I was familiar with; this challenge re-kindled my passion and curiosity about biodiversity-focused tea farming. I felt rejuvenated, conducting many more experiments with tea making.
I took on this special commission project from Annie to create a unique wulong tea with a white tea spin. We followed a one-bud-and-two-leaf plucking standard to harvest the most tender fall leaves of the Red Heart Iron Goddess of Mercy cultivar. The shaking process was gentle; we then let the leaves sit and dry naturally following a typical white tea production process. This unique production resulted in a tea that’s bright, sweet and full of warming sensation.
Barrel Aging Process
After receiving the tea from Chen, we poured the tea leaves into a freshly-emptied FEW Spirits rye whiskey oak barrel to begin aging the tea. FEW Spirits is a GRAIN-TO-GLASS DISTILLERY since 2011, they produce award-winning spirits with bold flavors in Evanston, IL. Every three days, we rotated the barrel so tea leaves could have an even exposure to the barrel’s dizzying aroma.
After 60 days of aging, we opened the barrel to extract the tea leaves. We then go through two rounds of sorting to remove charred barrel pieces, and small broken tea leaves as a result of the frequent rotations. We then slowly baked the tea leaves to remove excessive moisture. The result is an intoxicating wulong tea with ripe peach, jasmine flowers, and whiskey on the nose AND the palate.
Steeping Instruction
Water temperature
212 F
Amount of tea
4 g
Water volume
12 oz
Time
2 min initial steeping time + 20 sec additional time increment for more than 1 steeping
Number of steep
4
Rinse
Yes
