Taste-test 6 classic kinds of Yellow Tea in one box!
Yellow Tea, is always considered to be a rare and premium kind of Tea, and of course with “high price” due to its very limited production quantity. As a lesser known Tea among the six type of Tea, it is always a kind of mysterious Tea that people find it difficult to know what actually is Yellow Tea and even quite difficult to buy for drinking due to its rarity. No worries! We are always happy to be a role of middleman between you and all kind of popular and rare Tea that’s worth trying!
In this Master Tasting Collection Box, we have curated six classic kinds of Yellow Tea, covered almost all kinds of Yellow Tea from the three categories – Yellow Bud Tea, Big Yellow Tea and Small Yellow Tea. In this box, you can try the well-known Huo Shan Huang Ya and Jun Shan Yin Zhen, and four other kinds of rare Yellow Tea. Come explore and unbox this Pandora’s Box of Yellow Tea with us!
What’s included in mastertasting collection?
Six unique kinds of Yellow Tea curated, each of them is the very limited batch of this Spring 2022
1. Meng Ding Huang Ya Yellow Tea 2022 (12g)
2. Jun Shan Yin Zhen Yellow Tea 2022 (12g)
3. Huo Shan Huang Ya Yellow Tea 2022 (12g)
4. Ping Yang Huang Tang Yellow Tea 2022 (12g)
5. Bei Gang Mao Jian Yellow Tea 2022 (12g)
6. Guangdong Da Ye Qing Yellow Tea 2022 (12g)
Catergory of Yellow Tea
Based on the size and maturity of tea leaves used, Yellow Tea is sub-catergorized as (1) Yellow Buds Tea/ Huang Ya Cha; (2) Small Yellow Tea/ Huang Xiao Cha; and (3) Big Yellow Tea/ Huang Da Cha
Making Process of Yellow Tea
Some people think that the making process of Yellow Tea is similar to Green Tea because of their similarities in the taste, but it has a special making step called “Men Huang”, which literally means wrapping the Tea in a cloth or paper for oxidation. The making process of Yellow tea is way more complicated and time-consuming, it required few days to a week to make a high quality Yellow Tea.
After plucking the tea leaves, tea maker immediately put the tea leaves into a wok for pan-frying.
After the step of killing-green, the tea leaves are wrapped into a yellow paper or a wet cloth for mild oxidization for around 60 to 80 minute, the temperature will decrease from around 55 degree to around 35 degree, the leaves will then turn into a light green-yellow colour. At that time, it will be put back into the wok for pan-frying again to further reduce the humidity of the leaves. The steps of “Pan-frying” and “Wrapping” will take turns and repeats for several times until the leaves turn into an evenly yellow colour.
After that, the leaves will be put in a place to rest for a while. For the final step, the tea is roasted to lift the aroma and flavour.
Taste-test these distinctive varietals of Yellow Tea!
Meng Ding Huang Ya – Renowned Yellow Tea from Meng Ding Mountain
Meng Ding Hua Ya, a kind of Yellow Bud Tea, from Meng Ding Mountain, a famous Tea Mountain located in Ya’An, Sichuan. It was being recorded for over 2000 years, since Xi Han Dynasty. It act as a kind of tribute Tea in the ancient time , and is now one of the ten most famous Chinese Tea. The Tea is made of tea buds only, the plucking standard is very strict, 5kg of fresh tea bud can only make 1 kg of Meng Ding Hua Ya.
Appearance of Meng Ding Huang Ya
Meng Ding Huang Ya is made of tea buds only. The appearance of Meng Ding Huang Ya is straight, flat and yellow in colour, apparent with pekoe on the dry leaves.
Taste of Meng Ding Hua Ya
Meng Ding Hua Ya is made of tea buds only. The main characteristics the yellow tea made of tea buds is that it is very sweet and with an elegant and umami taste. It is soft and crisp in its mouthfeel, refreshing but not grassy and vegetal. It taste sweet mixed with light floral, very mild nutty and toasty notes, It shows the elegant sweetness of the tea buds with no astringency at all.
Jun Shan Yin Zhen – One of the 10 most famous Chinese Tea
Jun Shan Yin Zhen, a kind of Yellow Bud Tea, one of the 10 most famous Chinese Tea. “Yin Zhen” means Silver Needle – this yellow tea is special of its small needle shape, with apparent white pekoe on the outside and is yellow inside the bud, so people also called it “Jin Xiang Yu (金xiang 玉)” , which means a gold inlaid with jade. It is originated from Jun Shan lsland, also being called as “Dong Ting Shan”. Jun Shan Island located right inside the famous lake – Dong Ting Hu (洞庭湖）in Yue Yang, Hunan. As it is surrounded by the lake with abundant sunshine, the soil absorb the evaporation from the lake water, creating a favorable environment with good nutrition and humidity for Tea Tree to grow. Jun Shan Yin Zhen is also a Tea with long history, it was being recorded since Tang Dynasty, and was chosen as Tribute Tea by Qianlong Emperor in Qing Dynasty. And for now, Jun Shan Yin Zhen is still recognized as a kind of premium and luxurious Yellow Tea.
Appearance of Jun Shan Yin Zhen
Jun Shan Yin Zhen is made of tea buds only. The appearance of Jun Shan Yin Zhen is straight like a needle, apparent with pekoe on the dry leaves. When brewing it with a tall glass, it will float and sink straightly, just like dancing inside the glass.
Taste of Jun Shan Yin Zhen
Jun Shan Yin Zhen is made of tea buds only. The main characteristics the yellow tea made of tea buds is that it is very sweet and with an elegant and umami taste. It is soft and brisk in its mouthfeel, not grassy and vegetal at all. It taste sweet, with very mild roasted rice, nutty and pekoe flavor.
Huo Shan Huang Ya 霍山黃芽 – One of the ten most famous Chinese Tea
Huo Shan Huang Ya, a kind of Yellow Buds or Small Yellow Tea, one of the 10 most famous Chinese Tea. In recent years, most of the Huo Shan Huang Ya found in the market is being made into Green Tea rather than Yellow Tea. Tea maker find the market demand of Green Tea is higher than Yellow Tea, and it is way more difficult and time consuming to make Huo Shan Huang Ya Yellow Tea. As a result, it is very difficult to find the authentic Huo Shan Huang Ya in the market nowadays. Luckily, we find this very limited batch of traditional handmade Huo Shan Huang Ya Yellow Tea, this newly harvest 2022 batch is from Jin Ji Shan of Huo Shan. It is made of Small Yellow Tea, it is soft and brisk in its mouthfeel, not grassy and vegetal at all. It taste sweet, with chestnut and floral notes , accomplish with some light milky and pekoe flavor.
Huo Shan Huang Ya is originated from Huo Shan Mountain in Anhui. This high mountain is having long history in producing Tea, it is high in altitude, surrounded by cloud and abundant rainfall throughout the year, soil is high in permeability with good nutrition. The Tea grown in this high mountain is less affected by direct sunshine, the Tea here is lower in the level of chlorophyll and high in amino acid, thus the taste is soft and rich in taste.
Appearance of Huo Shan Huang Ya
Huo Shan Huang Ya is usually made of buds or one buds and one leaves. It looks small, straight with slightly opened buds, apparent with pekoe on the dry leaves.
Taste of Huo Shan Huang Ya
Soft and brisk in its mouthfeel, not grassy and vegetal at all. It taste sweet, with chestnut and floral notes , accomplish with some light milky and pekoe flavor.
Ping Yang Huang Tang 平陽黃湯
Unique Yellow soup with flavor of soft sweet corn
Ping Yang Huang Tang, also called Wen Zhou Huang Tang, is a kind of Small Yellow Tea. The name “Ping Yang” is the place of origin of this Tea, located in Wen Zhou, Zhejiang province of China. “Huang Tang” means yellow soup. It is one of the four famous yellow Tea in China. The main characteristics of Ping Yang Huang Tang is recognized as “Three Yellow and One Aroma”, “Three Yellow” indicates the yellow colour of the dry leaves, wet leaves and tea liquor; and “One Aroma” indicates its special sweet and soft sweet corn aroma.
Appearance of Ping Yang Huang Tang
The appearance of Ping Yang Huang Tang is small and slightly twisted, it is yellow-green in clour and apparent with pekoe on the dry leaves. It is soft and well-balanced in its mouthfeel, not grassy and vegetal at all. It taste sweet, with light sweet corn, honey and pekoe flavor.
Taste of Ping Yang Huang Tang
Ping Yang Huang Tang is special in its very sweet taste, people considered it as the aroma of sweet corn. It is soft and well-balanced in its mouth-feel, not grassy and vegetal at all. It taste sweet, with light sweet corn, honey and pekoe flavor.
Bei Gang Mao Jian 北港毛尖
Special Yellow Tea made of downy Mao Jian Tea
Bei Gang Mao Jian, a kind of Small Yellow Tea. The name “Bei Gang” is the place of origin of this Tea, located in Yue Yang, Hunan province of China. Yue Yang is a famous tourist place in the ancient time, and the Tea from Bei Gang is very famous in the Tang Dynasty. Yong Hu(邕yōng湖) is the ancient name of the place of origin of Bei Gang Mao Jian, locating inside the lake of Bei Gang, so the tea was also called as “Yong Hu Cha” (邕yōng湖茶) in Tang Dynasty, and was chosen as one of the ten Tribute Tea at that time. It was said that the Princess Wen Cheng love this tea very much and brought this “Yong Hu Cha” with her when she was married to Tibet’s Emperor.
Appearance of Bei Gang Mao Jian
The appearance of Bei Gang Mao Jian is small and slightly twisted, it has strong tea buds and the dry leaves are apparent with pekoe.
Taste of Bei Gang Mao Jian
It is soft and brisk in its mouthfeel, not grassy and vegetal at all. It taste sweet, with light honey and pekoe flavor.
Guangdong Da Ye Qing 廣東大葉青
A Special kind of Yellow Tea made of Yunnan big leaf varietal
Guang Dong Da Ye Qing, a kind of Big Yellow Tea. “Guangdong” is the place of origin of this Tea, which literally means the Guangdong province of China. Guangdong is a big area with humid subtropical climate, which is favorable for growing Tea. Da Ye Qing is usually produced in Shao Guan “韶關”, Zhao Qing”肇慶” and Zhan Jiang”湛江”, and the Tea we have chosen is from the Zhao Qing area of Guang Dong.
“Da Ye Qing” means big leaves, as it is made of big tea leaves of Yunnan big leaves varietal. The making procedure is a bit different from other yellow tea, there is an extra step of withering before the step of killing-green. After the step of withering, the following steps will be the same as other yellow tea.
Appearance of Guangdong Da Ye Qing
Da Ye Qing is made of Yunnan big leaf varietal, with plucking standard of one bud and 2-3 leaves. The appearance of Guangdong Da Ye Qing is big and strong in its dry leaves, and the colour is dark green with some yellow in between.
Taste of Guangdong Da Ye Qing
It is strong in its mouthfeel, with some bitter and vegetal undertone. It taste stronger when comparing with other yellow tea, special in its roasted rice and nutty flavor.
