Three essentials of making tea

Everyone can drink tea, but making tea is not necessarily right. There are many kinds of tea, the water quality is different, and the brewing process is different, so tea soup will certainly have different effects. If you want to make tea well, you should not only know the characteristics and water quality of various teas according to actual needs, but also master the water and utensils for making tea, and pay attention to orderly and elegant brewing methods and actions.

To make tea, we must first choose tea and identify tea. Only by correctly identifying tea leaves can we decide the brewing method. There are many kinds of tea, which can be divided into spring tea, summer tea and autumn tea according to picking time, alpine tea and flat tea according to different geographical locations, and green tea, black tea, green tea (oolong tea), white tea, yellow tea and black tea according to tea color (different processing methods).

Green tea is a kind of tea with the largest yield in China. Green tea has the quality characteristics of green leaf clear soup. The new tea with good tenderness has green color, exposed bud peak and bright soup color. Its representative varieties are Longjing, Biluochun and Zhucha.

Black tea is a red leaf soup, which is a quality feature formed by fermentation. Dry tea is moist in color, mellow and sweet in taste and bright red in soup color. There are three kinds of black tea: Kung Fu black tea, black broken tea and small black tea, among which Qi Hong, Ninghong and Dianhong are the most representative brands.

Oolong tea belongs to semi-fermented tea, and its color is green and brown as iron, so it is also called green tea. The typical oolong tea leaves are green in the middle and red in the edge, which is called "green leaves and red edges". Its soup is clear and golden in color, with natural floral fragrance and rich, mellow and fresh taste. Guanyin, Dahongpao and Frozen Top Oolong are the most representative.

White tea is made from tea leaves with more white fluff on their buds. White tea is covered with white hair, with natural appearance, bright and clean soup color and fresh and mellow taste. Representative varieties are "Millicent Silver Needle", "Shoumei" and "Bai Mudan".

Yellow tea, yellow leaves and yellow soup have clear aroma and mellow taste. Its bud leaves are covered with fluff, golden and bright, and the soup color is apricot and Ming Che. Representative varieties are "Junshan Yinzhen", Mengding Huangya, Huoshan Dahuang Tea and so on.

Black tea leaves are deep and dignified in color, yellow in soup, yellow and brown in leaves and mellow in aroma. After black tea is made into pressed tea, it is mainly used for drinking by ethnic minorities in frontier areas.

In addition to the above six categories, there are also reprocessed teas, that is, tea varieties reprocessed on the basis of the above six categories, such as scented tea, pressed tea and instant tea. Scented tea is made by baking green tea and black tea. Taking green tea as the main raw material, with tea and flowers, tea can absorb flowers and get the name of scented tea, such as jasmine tea, tortoise shell tea, Cynthia scented tea and rose black tea. Pressed tea takes black tea and dark tea as raw materials and is made into certain shapes by autoclaving, such as "blue brick", "healthy brick", "Liubao tea", "Tuocha" and "rice brick".

Followed by water quality. Water is to tea what water is to fish. "Fish get active water, and tea gets more fragrance, color and taste." Therefore, tea people have been addicted to water since ancient times. Amin Xu Cishu said in Tea Sparse: "Good tea is fragrant and made of water. There is no tea without water. "

Tea people attach great importance to water because water is the carrier of tea. When drinking tea, the generation of pleasure and the aftertaste of endless thoughts must be realized through water. Poor water quality will pollute all kinds of nutrients in tea, so that you can't smell the fragrance of tea and taste the sweetness and crystal of tea.

Choose the source before choosing water. Water can be divided into spring water, stream water, river water, lake water, well water, rain water and snow water, but only water that meets the five standards of "source, living, sweet, clear and light" is considered as good water. The so-called "source" refers to where the water comes from, "living" refers to the water that has a source and always flows, "sweet" refers to the slightly sweet water, "clear" refers to the clean and transparent water quality, and "light" refers to the light weight. Therefore, spring water is the best water source, because most spring water comes from mountains with overlapping rocks, with less pollution and lush vegetation on the mountains. The spring water collected from rock faults is rich in many trace elements beneficial to human body. After being filtered by sand and gravel, it is crystal clear, and the color, fragrance and taste of tea can be fully exerted. Lu Yu, an ancient man, thought that water should be used in "mountains, rivers and underground". Contemporary scientific experiments have also proved that spring water comes first, deep well water comes second, distilled water comes third, and artificially purified lake water and river water, that is, tap water used at ordinary times, are the worst. However, people who use water cautiously suggest that although the spring water is known as "clear stone", it melts more minerals in the process of stratum infiltration, and its salt content and hardness are quite different. For example, mineral water saturated with sulfur can't be drunk, so only spring water containing carbon dioxide and oxygen is most suitable for making tea. After Emperor Qianlong of Qing Dynasty visited the famous mountains and rivers in the north and south, Yuquan in the west of Beijing was designated as the "No.1 spring in the world" according to the proportion of water. Yuquan landscape is not only good in water quality, but also because the capital was bitter at that time, and the water for the palace was taken from Yuquan every year. In addition, Yuquan Mountain is quiet and beautiful, with springs gushing from high places and nectar pouring down, such as the old dragon spewing and clear water like jade, so it has this honor. It seems that good water not only needs high quality, but also has a lot to do with the aesthetic taste of tea people. The reputation of "the first spring in the world" has been controversial in past dynasties, including Zero Water in the south of the Yangtze River, Curtain Water in Lushan Valley in Jiangxi, Jasper Spring in Anning, Yunnan, Baotu Spring in Jinan and Yuye Spring in Emei Mountain. Where the springs are located, some rivers are mighty, mountain temples are remote and beautiful; Some have clear water, gushing valleys, clear blue waves and submerged rocks; Coupled with the praise of celebrities, the water quality is cold and fragrant, soft and sweet, and clean, which really conforms to this reputation. The popular "Longjing Tea", "Tiger Running Water", "Tea on Mengding Mountain" and "Water in the Heart of the Yangtze River" can be described as famous teas, which complement each other.

Scientific tea-making technology also includes three elements, namely, tea consumption, tea temperature and brewing time. The ancients liked to wade into the water to make their own tea. In the process of painting, cooking, frying and drinking, their body and mind are relaxed and satisfied. Every link in the whole process is indispensable, which together constitute the whole art of tea tasting.

Take the boiled water as an example, and its boiling degree is called "waiting for soup". The standard to distinguish "soup weather" is to look at the size of boiling bubbles on the water surface and to listen to the sound of water boiling. Bird's Tea Story in Ming Dynasty vividly describes the process of frying soup: "There are three parts of soup and fifteen parts. First, shape discrimination, second, sound discrimination, third, qi discrimination, shape is internal discrimination, sound is external discrimination, and qi is agile discrimination. For example, shrimp eyes, crab eyes, fish eyes and lotus beads are all sprouting soups. When boiled in waves, the steam disappears completely, which is considered as cooked. If there is a wisp, two wisps, three wisps, four wisps and one wisp of chaos in the air, it is all budding soup. It is a coincidence that the gas is straight. " The ancients' requirements for "soup weather" were scientific. The color, aroma and taste of tea vary with the water temperature, and the chemical composition of brewed tea is also different. Too high a temperature will destroy the nutrients contained, and the beneficial substances of tea will also be destroyed. Tea soup is not bright in color and mellow in taste. When the temperature is too low, the effective components in tea can not be fully leached, which is called incomplete tea soup. It has a light taste and a bad color. These boiling methods have become an important part of China's tea tasting art, similar to today's scientific brewing. It seems that the ancients attached great importance to the temperature of tea. When making tea, the water should be boiled with strong fire, not with slow fire. It is advisable to just boil and foam. Making tea with this kind of water, the tea soup and fragrance are good. If the boiling time is too long, the carbon dioxide volatilizes completely, and the fresh and refreshing feeling of tea is greatly inferior; The temperature of boiling water is low, and the effective components in tea are not easy to soak out, so the fragrance is light. Generally speaking, the temperature of making tea is closely related to the type of tea and the raw materials of making tea. Tea processed with coarse and old raw materials should be brewed directly with boiling water, while tea processed with fine and tender raw materials should be cooled and brewed with boiling water. Specifically, high-grade exquisite tea is generally brewed with boiling water whose temperature has dropped to 80 degrees, instead of boiling water, so that the tea soup is clear and bright, the aroma is pure but not dull, the taste is fresh but not ripe, the leaves are fresh but not black, the tea is delicious, and the nutrients beneficial to the human body will not be destroyed. Like oolong tea, tea sets are often heated before soaking; It is not enough to brew brick tea with 100 degree boiling water, and it must be boiled before drinking. The water temperature of making tea is in direct proportion to the solubility of tea effective substances in water. The higher the water temperature, the greater the solubility and the stronger the tea soup. On the contrary, the lower the water temperature, the smaller the solubility and the lighter the tea soup. Throughout the ages, people know that you can't make tea with raw water, but if you use boiled water that has been burned many times and heated for too long, it will make tea taste like "boiled soup" and even make the taste worse. That's because the water left by a large amount of evaporation of water vapor contains more substances such as salt, which makes the tea soup gloomy and the tea taste bitter.

To make tea well, we must master the quantity of tea. The key is to master the proportion of tea. Tea with more water and less water tastes strong, while tea with less water and more water tastes light. The amount of tea varies from person to person and from place to place. Tea drinkers are tea people or laborers, so they can appropriately increase the amount of tea and make a cup of fragrant tea soup; If you are a mental worker or a beginner who has no habit of drinking tea, you can put less tea and make a cup of fragrant tea soup. Making tea at home is generally based on experience. Generally speaking, each gram of tea can be soaked in 50 to 60 ml of water, boiling water is better, but the amount of tea is different. If oolong tea is used, the consumption of tea will be more than double that of ordinary red green tea, and the amount of water brewed will be reduced by half. The length of tea brewing time is also closely related to the utilization of effective components contained in tea. Generally, red and green tea is brewed for three to four minutes, and the taste is the best, but when the time is short, the tea soup lacks stimulating taste; After a long time, the freshness is weakened and the bitterness is increased; Only by extracting effective substances such as vitamins, amino acids and caffeine from tea with boiling water can tea soup taste fresh and mellow. The brewing time of delicate tea leaves is shorter than that of coarse old tea leaves, and vice versa; Loose tea leaves and broken tea leaves have shorter brewing time than tightly pressed tea leaves, and vice versa. For tea leaves that pay attention to aroma, such as oolong tea and scented tea, the brewing time should not be too long; However, when white tea is processed, the cells are not destroyed, and the tea juice is difficult to leach, so the brewing time is relatively prolonged. Usually, once the tea leaves are brewed, the soluble substances can leach about 55%, and the second time is 30%. The third time was 10%, and the fourth time was only 1-3%. Nutrients in tea, such as vitamin C, amino acids, tea polyphenols, caffeine and so on. The first leaching is about 80%, the second leaching is 95%, and there is not much left for the third time. The aroma and taste are also fresh and mellow, the second tea is strong but not fresh, the third tea is light, the fourth tea is less, and the five teas and six teas are similar to boiled water. Therefore, it is advisable to make tea two or three times, oolong tea five times and white tea twice. In fact, any kind of tea should not be soaked for too long, nor should it be brewed too many times. It is best to drink it immediately, otherwise the beneficial ingredients will be oxidized, which will not only reduce the nutritional value, but also soak out harmful substances. Tea should not be too strong, strong tea is harmful to the stomach.

All kinds of tea have different characteristics, such as heavy fragrance, heavy taste, heavy shape or emphasis, so making tea should have different emphasis in order to give full play to the characteristics of tea. All kinds of famous teas are special handicrafts, with different colors, fragrances, tastes and shapes, but it is an artistic enjoyment to savor them carefully. In order to really taste all kinds of tea, it is best to follow the procedure of tea art, and the steps such as cleaning utensils, setting tea, brewing, offering tea, tasting tea, and refilling water are indispensable. Use a teaspoon to drink tea; It is advisable to fill the brewing water with seven minutes; It is advisable to lift the pot down three times, one is to show respect, the other is to turn the tea up and down, and the concentration is even. Commonly known as "Phoenix Three Nodes". When serving tea, avoid touching the cup mouth with your fingers. To appreciate precious tea, we should observe the color first, then taste and observe the shape. When you drink two-thirds of the tea, you should continue to drink water, otherwise the tea soup will be tasteless when you continue. The most typical tea tasting procedure is oolong tea, and each stroke and style has a beautiful meaning.

Making tea with boiling water is the process of dissolving the soluble substances in tea into water to become tea soup. The process of making tea requires high cultural accomplishment, not only extensive knowledge of tea culture and profound understanding of the connotation of tea ceremony, but also elegant manners, otherwise, even if you have good tea in your hand, you will not be able to appreciate its true taste. On the basis of imitating other people's actions, beginners will continue to learn and think deeply, and eventually form their own style from form to spirit. If you want to be a tea maker, you should not only insist on whether the process of making tea is complete, but also increase your cultural literacy and improve your comprehension ability. The appearance, charm and inner world of the tea maker will be displayed in the process of making tea. Tea can cultivate one's morality and cultivate one's sentiment, so as to achieve a comprehensive understanding of the environment, utensils, water and art of tea matching. The uniform concentration of tea soup also reflects the skill of making tea. If the concentration of tea soup is uniform, you must practice your eyesight and accurately control the proportion of tea. The "infiltration" summarized by tea people, and the "Guan Gong patrolling the city" and "Han Xin soldier" that people often say, all well reflect the combination of knowledge of nature and humanistic knowledge. Tea people in China advocate a natural and extraordinary lifestyle, so do drinking tea and making tea. Tea was born between the peaks and valleys in Shan Ye, and exposed to deep valleys and rocks in spring. Both of them are bred in the beautiful valleys of green mountains and become symbols of being far away from the hubbub and close to nature. The cleanliness, purity and purity of tea are the tastes that people pursue. Both man and nature have the same fate of giving up. The Ming family's pursuit of tea tasting is to seek lofty artistic conception and "true interest in the pot" in peace and indifference, simplicity and truthfulness. In the simple and true process of making tea, it is an extraordinary spirit and a high-level aesthetic exploration for tea and water, for people and art. For people nowadays, drinking a cup of tea is so particular that most of them are difficult to understand. That's because the ancient form and content of tea ceremony in China have been lost, and many people don't even know that there is China Tea Ceremony. There are so-called "tongue, flag and cannon", "before dawn and before rain", and there are differences between Huishan spring water, Yangtze river water, first snow water and snow tea on plum blossoms. Tea tasting should also pay attention to the harmony between personality and environment, and appreciate the cool breeze, famous sayings, Songtao, Zhu Yun, Mei Kai, snow poles, etc. These are all in one pot.

Five misunderstandings in making tea

Tea is an excellent health drink and one of the three major drinks in the world. Therefore, tea has the reputation of "king of leisure drinks". However, we should pay attention to science when drinking tea, so as to achieve the purpose of improving spirit, benefiting thinking, quenching thirst and worries, eliminating fatigue, prolonging life and keeping healthy. But some people's drinking habits are unscientific, and the common ones are as follows:

(1) Making tea in a thermos cup: it is advisable to use ceramic pots and cups for making tea, but not thermos cups. Because the tea leaves are soaked in the thermos cup, the tea leaves keep high temperature for a long time, and some aromatic oils in the tea leaves escape, which reduces the fragrance; The extracted tannic acid and theophylline are too much and bitter, so some nutrients are also lost.

(2) Making tea with boiling water: Making tea with boiling water will destroy many nutrients. Such as vitamins c, p, etc. When the water temperature exceeds 80℃, it will be destroyed, and it is easy to dissolve out too much tannic acid and other substances, making tea bitter. Therefore, the water temperature of tea is generally controlled at 70℃ ~ 80℃. Green tea, in particular, will lose its original fragrance and cool taste if the temperature is too high and the tea leaves become black tea after soaking.

(3) It takes too long to make tea: it is best to soak for 4-6 minutes before drinking tea. So 80% of caffeine and 60% of other soluble substances are soaked out. If it takes too long, the tea will be bitter. Tea cooked in thermos bottles or stoves for a long time is prone to chemical changes and should not be drunk again.

(4) Pour out the brewed tea: Most people pour out the used tea after making tea. In fact, this is not economical. Tea should be chewed slowly, because tea contains more nutrients such as carotene and crude fiber.

(5) Habit of making strong tea: To make a cup of tea with moderate concentration, you generally need about 10g of tea. Some people like to make strong tea. Chata strong, too much caffeine and tannic acid leaching, too much stimulation to the gastrointestinal tract. After making a cup of tea, you can add water and make 3 ~ 4 cups.