Beigang Maojian

Classification and Origin

Category: small-leaf yellow tea — huáng xiǎo chá (黄小茶).

yellow tea is classically divided by the tenderness of the raw material into three groups — huáng yá chá (黄芽茶, from buds), huáng xiǎo chá (黄小茶, small-leaf), and huáng dà chá (黄大茶, large-leaf). They are all united by one technological solution — mèn huáng, a light moist-thermal "yellow" maturation, which is absent in both green tea and other tea classes. Beigang Maojian belongs to the middle tier — huáng xiǎo chá.

in the same huáng xiǎo chá group stand such names as yuǎn'ān lùyuàn (远安鹿苑) from Hubei, píngyáng huáng tāng (平阳黄汤) from Zhejiang, and the Hunanese "smoky" wéishān máojiān (沩山毛尖). Small-leaf teas differ from the bud-only "three famous yellow buds" (jūnshān yínzhēn, méngdǐng huáng yá, huòshān huáng yá) precisely in raw material: instead of a single bud, a shoot consisting of one bud and one or two leaves is used here.

Origin: Kangwang Township (康王乡, kāngwáng xiāng), Yueyang County, northern Hunan Province, in a zone gravitating towards the Dongting lake system.

Type: yellow tea.

Botany and Raw Material

a shoot of one bud and one or two leaves (1芽1~2叶).

this is the formula for a small-leaf yellow tea — the raw material is more tender than that of the large-leaf "folk" yellow teas, but more developed and leafy than that of the pure bud huáng yá chá. Such raw material gives the infusion body density and sweetness, without losing the neat shape of the finished leaf — hence the category "maojian" (毛尖, "downy tip"), indicating the tender, downy tips of the shoot.

Brewing

soft, temperature moderately hot (approximately 80 – 90 °C) — boiling water straight on will easily roughen the sweetness of the tender shoot.

short, with time control — the goal is to reveal the sweet-mellow body without driving the tea into astringency.

in contrast to the needle-shaped jūnshān yínzhēn, whose showcase is the "dance" of buds in a tall glass ("sān qǐ sān luò", 三起三落, "three times rise — three times fall"), Beigang Maojian is a more "everyday" tea, and its aesthetics rest on taste and color, not on a spectacle in the glass.

Teaware: glass or white porcelain, to appreciate the golden tone of the infusion, so important for yellow teas.