What’s the Tea? Exploring Tea Variants
There’s something about tea. Allow the subtle fragrance of musk, spice, fruit, or grass to tease your senses as you raise your cup and let the warm liquid touch your lips. Slightly swirl the tea in your mouth, as you would fine wine, to unlock even more aromas, and sip it to feel the calming warmth spread throughout your body.
Tea has such power that the Japanese and Chinese have formal tea ceremonies, India and Taiwan have tea gardens, and the British have afternoon tea. When people order beverages in cafés worldwide, they’re more likely to order tea than coffee. The world consumes five billion cups of tea daily – three billion cups more than coffee.
What Is Tea and What Are Its Benefits?
Tea is a drink made by steeping tea leaves in hot water – specifically, the processed buds, steams, and leaves of the Camellia sinensis plant. It’s typically compared to coffee, which is brewed or expressed from the processed and roasted beans of the Coffea plant.
Like coffee, tea can help keep you alert because it has caffeine, although an eight-ounce cup of brewed coffee typically has twice the caffeine content of a similar amount of tea. Unlike coffee, however, tea has L-theanine, an amino acid.
L-theanine supposedly increases gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA), dopamine, and serotonin levels.
- GABA is a calming inhibitory neurotransmitter.
- Dopamine is a feel-good hormone that motivates and induces pleasure and satisfaction.
- Serotonin is a chemical that helps regulate and stabilize mood.
Thus, tea is believed to relax and calm you down and relieve anxiety and stress.
Tea is also rich in polyphenols, particularly flavonols, theaflavins, and catechins. Polyphenols are antioxidants and good for the body because they help fight free radicals that cause cell damage. They are also anti-inflammatory, which helps counter inflammatory cells that trigger inflammation responses that lead to chronic conditions like Alzheimer’s and arthritis.
Summary: Tea is a healthy beverage made from the Camellia sinensis plant. It can help you fight stress, inflammation, and oxidative damage. Herbal and fruit teas – those made from steeping dried and processed herbs, spices, fruits, or flowers in hot water – are not true tea. So that jasmine, lavender or chamomile tea you love may be good for you, too, but it’s not a proper tea.
The Different Types of Tea
There are many types of tea available, mainly due to differences in plant variety, the region where the tea plant is grown, and the processing methods applied to the leaves.
The essential process involves harvesting tea leaves. This activates enzymes that oxidize the tea leaves when allowed free rein. Tea makers apply moist or dry heat to stop the enzymatic oxidation.
The amount of oxidation that has been allowed to take place – to be more precise, the processing method used – determines the primary tea variants, just as the various processing techniques applied to coffee beans lead to different types of coffee.
White Tea
When tea leaves and parts are not exposed to the air (i.e., not oxidized), they wilt. The wilted, unoxidized leaves make white tea. White tea has a light color, subtle floral, fruity and grassy aromas, and a mildly sweet taste.
Green Tea
When tea leaves are harvested and immediately heated (steamed, fried, roasted, etc.), they become green tea. Green tea is not oxidized or wilted, preserving the leaves’ green color and fresh flavors.
Oolong Tea
Oolong tea is withered and partially oxidized tea leaves. Freshly harvested leaves are allowed to dry under the sun. Once the desired moisture level has been attained, they are tumbled and bruised to break down the leaves’ cell walls, accelerating the enzymatic oxidation reaction and allowing the tea leaves to develop more flavor.
The tea maker stops the oxidation reaction at their desired level, which can range from just very slight (e.g., 1%) to just shy of fully oxidized (e.g., 99%). The color of the tea leaves is darker, the more oxidized they are. Therefore, darker oolongs are more oxidized than lighter-colored oolongs.
Black Tea
Black tea is fully wilted and fully oxidized tea. The tea leaves are also lightly crushed. The complete oxidation gives them their distinctive black color.
Pu-erh Tea
Pu-erh tea is a specially designated, protected-origin tea variant. Think champagne, a sparkling wine made a particular way using approved grapes in the Champagne wine region of France.
Pu-erh tea is similar because it must be made using the Camellia sinensis assamica subspecies, a large-leaf tea plant grown in China’s Yunnan Province. Pu-erh tea, like specific-designation and protected-origin wine, has particular varietal and terroir characteristics and requirements.
Additionally, pu-erh tea is a fermented or semi-fermented tea, unlike the other variants, which are oxidized tea. After the leaves are harvested, they are tossed in giant woks – enough to stop enzymatic oxidation but not to kill the bacteria in the leaves – then dried in the sun. As they age, the remaining natural bacteria work on the leaves, fermenting them and gradually adding more character and depth to the tea flavors.
A Cup of Tea, Anyone?
Need a pick-me-up? Try tea, which can keep you alert but calm and relaxed.
For variety, try the different main types: white, green, oolong, black, and pu-erh tea.
