How many steps are there in the processing of green tea?

The processing of green tea is simply divided into three steps: enzyme fixation, rolling and drying, among which the key is enzyme fixation. Fresh leaves are inactivated by enzyme activity, and the chemical components contained in them are basically unaffected by enzymes, and change through heat, thus forming the quality characteristics of green tea.

Green tea fixation

Immobilization plays a decisive role in the quality of green tea. Through high temperature, the characteristics of enzymes in fresh leaves are destroyed, the oxidation of polyphenols is stopped, and the leaves are prevented from turning red; At the same time, some water in the leaves is evaporated, which makes the leaves soft and creates conditions for kneading and shaping. With the evaporation of water, the low-boiling aromatic substances in fresh leaves evaporate and disappear, thus improving the aroma of tea.

Except for the special tea, the process is carried out in the green-fixing machine. The factors that affect the quality of enzyme fixation are enzyme fixation temperature, leaves left, enzyme fixation machine type, enzyme fixation time and enzyme fixation method. They are a whole, interrelated and restricted.

Fried green tea

Meridian research

Due to the different mechanical or artificial forces in the drying process, the finished tea forms different shapes such as long strip, round bead, flat fan, needle and spiral, so it is divided into long fried green, round fried green and flat fried green.

Long-fried but refined, it is called eyebrow tea. The finished products have different colors, such as Zhenmei, Gong, Yucha, Needle Mei, Xiumei, etc., each with different quality characteristics. Ruzhenmei: The rope is tight and straight or looks like a lady's girl. The color is blue and cream, the aroma is high and fresh, the taste is strong and refreshing, and the soup color and leaf bottom are slightly yellow and bright; Gong Xi: This is a kind of round tea in fried green tea, which is called Gong Xi after refining. The appearance particles are similar to pearl tea, with uniform round knot and no broken tea, and the color is green and uniform, the aroma is pure, the taste is still strong, the soup is yellow-green, and the leaves are tender and uniform; Rain tea: the long tea rain tea originally separated from pearl tea is mostly from eyebrow tea, with short and tight shape, even green color, pure aroma, rich taste, yellow-green soup color and delicate and even leaf bottom; Round fried green: Round and compact in appearance. Due to different producing areas and processing methods, it can be divided into flat fried green, Quangang Bai Hui and Yongxi Huo Qing.

Flat fried green: produced in Shengxian, Xinchang, Shangyu and other counties in Zhejiang. Historically, coarse tea was refined in Pingshui Town, Shaoxing, and the finished tea was round and firm as pearls, so it was called "Pingshuizhu Tea" or "Pingshui Tea", while coarse Chaze was called Pingchao Tea. Fried green: due to different origin and preparation methods, it is mainly divided into Longjing, Qiqiang and Dafang.

Green tea bakery

It is dried in a drying cage. After reprocessing and refining, most of the roasted green tea is used as the tea blank of smoked tea, and its aroma is generally not as high as that of roasted green tea, and a few roasted green teas are of good quality. According to its shape, it can also be divided into strip tea, pointed tea, slice tea and needle tea. The main tea-producing areas must produce strip roast; Pointed tea and flake tea are mainly produced in Anhui, Zhejiang and other provinces and cities. Among them, the special green baking mainly includes Mabian Yunwu Tea, Huangshan Mao Feng, Taiping Monkey Kui, Tingxi Lan Xiang, Lu 'an Guapian, Jingting Lv Xue, Tianshan Green Tea, Ancient Bamboo Purple Bamboo Shoots, Jiangshan Green Peony, Emei Mao Feng, Jinshui Cuifeng, Zhou Xiabi Peak and Nannuo Bai Hao. Such as Huangshan Mao Feng: produced in Huangshan, Shexian County, Anhui Province. The appearance is tender and slightly curly, the buds are full and even, and the edges are sharp. Shaped like a "sparrow tongue", it is golden and shiny, commonly known as ivory. The aroma is fresh and long, the soup color is apricot yellow and clear, the taste is mellow and fresh, and the leaves at the bottom of the leaves are blooming, rich and bright.

Green tea sunning

It was dried by the sun. Mainly distributed in Hunan, Hubei, Guangdong, Guangxi, Sichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou and other provinces, with less output. The quality of sun-cured green tea is the best in Yunnan, which is called "Dianqing". Others, such as Qing Chuan, Qian Qing, Guiqing and Eqing, have their own merits, but they are not as good as Yunnan.

Steamed green tea

Steam fixation is an ancient fixation method in China. During the Tang Dynasty, it spread to Japan until now. But in China, it changed to frying from the Ming Dynasty. Steaming green is to destroy the enzyme activity in fresh leaves with steam, forming the "three green" quality characteristics of dry tea with dark green color, light green tea soup and green tea bottom, but the aroma is stuffy green and the astringency is heavy, which is not as fresh as pot-fried green tea. Due to the need of foreign trade, China has also produced a small amount of steamed green tea since the mid-1980s. The main varieties are Enshi Yulu, produced in Enshi, Hubei; China fried tea is produced in Zhejiang, Fujian and Anhui provinces.

Green tea is the earliest tea in history. Ancient humans collected wild tea buds and dried tea leaves, which can be regarded as the beginning of green tea processing in a broad sense, at least three thousand years ago. But the real green tea processing began with the invention of steamed green tea in the 8th century, and ended with the invention of fried green tea in12nd century. The processing technology of green tea is relatively mature, which has been used to this day and is constantly improving.

Green tea kneading

Kneading is a process of shaping the shape of green tea. Using external force, the leaves are crushed and lightened, rolled into strips, reduced in size and convenient for brewing. At the same time, some tea juice overflows and adheres to the surface of leaves, which also plays an important role in improving the taste concentration of tea. The rolling process of making green tea can be divided into cold rolling and hot rolling. The so-called cold kneading is to spread the green leaves and roll them up; Hot rolling is to roll the leaves while they are still hot, and don't scatter them. The tender leaves should be cold-kneaded to keep the bright yellow-green soup color at the bottom of the tender green leaves, and the old leaves should be hot-kneaded to facilitate close knot and reduce fragments.

Green tea drying

The purpose of drying is to evaporate water, tidy up appearance and give full play to tea fragrance. There are three drying methods: sun drying, frying and drying. In the drying process of green tea, it is usually dried first and then fried. Because the water content of the twisted tea leaves is still very high, if fried directly, lumps will quickly form in the pot of the frying machine, and the tea juice will easily stick to the pot wall. Therefore, tea leaves should be dried first to reduce the water content to meet the requirements of pot frying.