About this tea

This micro-lot of Green Needles is produced from tea bushes called Quntizhong, an indigenous heirloom variety of tea bushes prized in this growing region since the mid-1700s. The rocky gardens of Xuan'en County offer rich tasting and balanced green teas with high density, bold energy, slight umami in balance with evergreen and alpine notes that refresh and invigorate. 

Green Needles, or “Lu Zhen,” is a traditional pine needle-shaped green tea. After indoor withering, the tea leaves are fired in a small tumble-roaster and shaped using special heated table machines that shake the tea leaves back and forth repeatedly to coax the leaves into a straight needle shape. The tea leaves are dried on hot air-flow tables while continuously stirred and shaped by hand and finally baked to perfection in a conveyor oven to raise and fix the aroma and taste.

Every spring we savor the rich complexity of this heirloom garden’s first spring harvested green tea with joy. Green Needles is not a well-known Chinese green tea but it is one of our favorites that showcases remote terroir and small leaf green tea traditions.

Origin

Xiaoguan Village, Xuan’en County, Hubei Province, China

Ingredients

Green tea