Fujian Province, China,  is the historic home of this rare and special tea.  Yin Zhen Silver Needles, the most traditional white tea, is made from a budset -only pluck of a variety of Camellia sinensis indigenous to this region of Fujian. Bai Mudan and Mudan Premium Silvertip are two 'modern-style' Chinese white teas. These teas incorporate budsets in varying proportion with leaf that is plucked from the same tea bushes. Today, white tea is also made in several other regions of China as well as in Africa, India and Nepal, and Sri Lanka.

To learn more about white tea, click here.

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In yellow tea processing, an early spring bud-only pluck or fine mao feng pluck ( a bud-and-two-leaves ) is subjected to a ‘smothering’ step ( after the leaf has undergone its initial firing ) in a unique process known in Chinese as ‘men huan’.

During men huan the heated, softened leaf is removed from the tea firing pan, covered with a cloth, and allowed to ‘rest’ for a few hours or as long as a day. This smothering step can be repeated several times over several days, as determined by the tea master making the tea. In this step (which is not part of green tea manufacture ) men huan encourages the softened leaf to reabsorb its own aromatics. The results of this step will be expressed later as additional sweetness in the taste of the finished tea.

This supplementary processing step is costly, so it is usually reserved for select early spring plucks. 

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In the mountainous region of south-western China, Yunnan Province is home to many plantings of old-growth tea bushes.

If encouraged to do so, these bushes will produce flowers in the autumn of a year that the bushes are rested from being plucked for tea leaf manufacture. 

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