White Tea
How It Is Picked?
The white tea is picked from the same source like the other types of tea.
It is picked before the leaves are opened, when it is completely in bud stage. The buds are wooly, they look like white hair. Some of them are silver colored while some are gold colored. They look like silver / gold needles. They are picked by hand very meticulously. A tea picker can pick 3000 buds a day. This corresponds to nearly 1 kg. It can be picked for a few days each year, therefore its price is just like the price of gold. Of course, this is for white tea balls. Although these buds can be picked during each shoot, the most valued ones are the ones picked on the first days of the shoot. They should not be picked during the rainy days or morning drizzles.
The white tea is not only obtained from the buds.
The white tea can be obtained from the bud and one leaf. It can be obtained from a single bud and two leaves -two and a half leaves. This depends on the harvested shoot and country.
How Is It Produced?
The white tea is similar to the green tea, it is passed through few processes during the production stage and no oxidation occurs.
There are only two processes during the white tea production: withering and drying.
The tea leaves are laid indoors; the air withering and drying processes are carried out only by removing the saturated air in the environment at ambient temperature. It is ideal when the withering and drying processes take a few days. 24 hours of withering at ambient temperature can be enough if there is no time problem. This time can be shortened by increasing the temperature for withering process. The withering temperature shall not exceed 35ºC. The withering reduces the humidity rate of the targeted fresh tea to 55%. Lower temperatures give better results. 45-50ºC is recommended for ideal drying process. The drying process shall be continued until the humidity rate becomes 2-3%. It is required to wait for a while before the packaging process, during that waiting period the humidity rate shall not exceed 5%.
When the drying process is desired to be accelerated, it is recommended to ensure that the temperature shall not exceed 80ºC. It is recommended to prevent the dropping of the humidity rate of dry tea to lower than 5%. If white tea is withered at a very hot environment it will become reddish, and too cold will make it blackish. Steam shock withering, dry air withering and sometimes the sun withering methods are used. The withering and drying periods can be extended or shortened depending on various systems, laying thickness and temperature degrees.
How to brew and drink?
The white tea is generally very light, therefore you need to be sure that you have added enough tea to the teapot or glass. You can brew the same tea three times consecutively. But you need to add extra 2-3 minutes for each brewing after the first brewing that takes 6 minutes.
You should have water at 70-80 C to use for brewing. It must absolutely never be boiled together with the water. In other words, it must have lower temperature than the water used for the black tea. Or let the boiled water rest for 1-2 minutes.
You should prefer white tea after light meals. You cannot enjoy if you drink after spicy meals. Most of the types of green tea have a herbal taste, while the white tea has a pleasant taste that reminds the melon. The ideal brewing color is pale yellow.
If the white tea you are going to consume is prepared in single-use packs (tea-bags), just keep them in hot water for 30-60 seconds. Do not keep them longer.