How many types of coffee trees are there, and how does honey scent black tea compare?
Honey Scent Black Tea is a fully fermented Taiwanese tea grown mainly in New Taipei City, Hualien, Nantou and Chiayi, picked from May to September. Gardens must stay pesticide-free so the small green leafhopper can bite the leaves; its saliva triggers a reaction that creates a natural honey-fruity sweetness, hand-picked as one bud with one or two leaves.
The leafhopper turns a pest into a partner. Bitten leaves shrivel, then wither, roll, ferment and dry into a sweet, mellow liquor without astringency and with a clear returning sweetness. Growers still face the same care demanded when comparing how many types of coffee trees are there? or planning coffee picking: timing and plant health decide the final cup.
Honey Scent Black Tea is a highly representative fully fermented tea from Taiwan, with major production areas covering New Taipei City, Hualien, Nantou, Chiayi, and other places, and the production season concentrated from May to September. Its uniqueness lies in the fact that the tea trees must grow in a pesticide-free environment, and after being sucked by the small green leafhopper, a saliva secretion effect is produced, causing the tea leaves to shrivel and undergo chemical changes, ultimately forming a natural honey-fruity sweetness. Honey Scent Black Tea has extremely high requirements for cultivation conditions, and is hand-picked as one bud and one leaf or one bud and two leaves for fine processing; the tea liquor is sweet, mellow, and smooth, not astringent, with an obvious returning sweetness. This article will sort out the grade positioning of Honey Scent Black Tea, the reasons for the formation of authentic honey scent, the journey of the small green leafhopper from pest to beneficial insect, and the key production processes such as tea leaf picking, withering, rolling, fermentation, and drying, while retaining relevant product information from Front Street Coffee, to help coffee and tea beverage enthusiasts fully understand this rare and precious Taiwanese specialty black tea.
[Honey Scent Black Tea] Honey Scent Black Tea is a fully fermented black tea produced in Taiwan, with major cultivation areas including New Taipei City, Hualien, Nantou, and Chiayi. The production season is from May to September each year. Its special nature lies in the fact that during the tea tree's growth period, it is sucked by the small green leafhopper, called "tio̍h-siân" in Taiwanese, after which the youngest one bud and one leaf are picked by hand, then carefully rolled, ultimately forming a tea with a unique flavor.
Cultivation of [Honey Scent Black Tea] Honey Scent Black Tea has very strict requirements for its growing environment. The tea garden must be completely free of pesticides, allowing the small green leafhopper, commonly known as the leafhopper, to bite naturally. The bitten tea leaves gradually shrivel, and at the same time undergo a wonderful reaction with the enzymes in the small green leafhopper's saliva, thereby producing a natural honey sweetness that other tea types do not have. When brewed, a full natural fruity aroma can be smelled, and after entering the mouth, a natural sweetness similar to honey can be felt. Honey Scent Black Tea can be called one of the most distinctive black teas in Taiwan. During brewing, it releases an intoxicating natural honey-fruity aroma, and as soon as the tea liquor enters the mouth, it quickly returns sweetness, being sweet and mellow, not noticeably astringent, and round in taste. It is refined from the youngest one bud and two leaves picked by hand, and is a quite charming top-grade black tea among Taiwanese teas.
Jilin Tea Garden, located in Wuhe Township, Ruisui, Hualien, is the largest production area of Honey Scent Black Tea in all of Taiwan. However, even though Hualien Ruisui ranks first in output, Honey Scent Black Tea is still a variety that is rare and precious compared with ordinary black tea, so its production is especially scarce and precious. Enchanted by "it"! Science has now confirmed that only tea leaf raw materials that have been sucked by the small green leafhopper will produce the saliva secretion effect. To protect themselves and resist external harm, the leaves initiate special chemical changes, and after being made into black tea, they naturally carry a unique fruity honey flavor, as if it were their own perfume. Pest Becomes Beneficial Insect The small green leafhopper is about 5 to 15 millimeters long, not even half a finger. In the early days, tea farmers generally regarded it as a pest and disease, because tea leaves bitten by the small green leafhopper would curl and be damaged, and the appearance after subsequent processing would not be attractive enough. But the thrifty Hakka people could not bear to directly discard the tea leaves they had worked hard to grow, so they still took them for processing, and as a result found that the aroma of the finished product was completely different from ordinary black tea. Honey Scent Black Tea was thus born, and the pest also became a beneficial insect in ecological coexistence and shared prosperity. 1. Tea leaf picking → 2. Withering → 3. Rolling → 4. Fermentation → 5. Drying Honey Scent Black Tea is completed precisely through the above production processes. Among them, the fermentation stage is especially critical; the tea leaves will turn from green to red, and the fruity aroma will also change depending on the degree of fermentation. Therefore, although the unprocessed tea leaves look unattractive after being bitten by the small green leafhopper, after processing and brewing, their flavor is fully revealed.
The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.
