6 Main Categories Of Tea

Tea

While there are countless types of tea, they all come from the leaves of the tea plant camellia sinensis and varieties of this species.

Almost all types of tea can be group into the 6 main categories of tea.

1) Black tea

Black tea is fully oxidized and produces in various parts of Asia, particularly China, India, and Sri Lanka.

Even though traces of black tea is often used to mix tea blends, most consumption of it it through tea bags found in supermarkets.

Sometimes also referred to as red tea for the drink’s red shade when filtered, it’s best known for it’s rich characteristic due to it’s oxidation process during production.

2) Green tea

One of the overwhelming favorites consumed by the masses, green tea can often be purchased in a form that closely resembles the original tea leaf plucked for it’s production.

Because of it’s unoxidized nature and minimal processing, green tea has long been championed as a superfood used in recipes of healthy food and beverages.

Their leafs come in various shapes and forms and are most famously produced in China and Japan.

The refreshing taste of green tea plays a huge role in making it one of the most popular flavors in the world.

3) Pu er

For tea lovers, pu’er is most famous for it’s fermentation process after it is rolled, steamed, and formed into cakes.

While it is produces in various South East Asian countries, puer is predominantly produced in China.

This category of tea is well-known for it’s health benefits towards digestion and boosting the immune system as it contains probiotic microorganisms.

Because of this feature, it is often the tea of choice in tea products promoting slimming and weight loss.

Because of high demand, producers are known to use accelerated fermentation process to speed up the fermentation of their harvests.

Fermented pu-er that has naturally aged well are well sought after by consumers and command a premium price.

4) Oolong

Varieties of oolong cha are often the tea of choice with seniors and elderly.

This implies that after going through a long tea drinking journey in life, most people would probably end up with oolong as the tea of choice.

They are mostly produced in China and Taiwan.

The production process is one of the most complex and vigorous among the main categories of teas.

The final product goes through a full process from plantation to retail consisting of:

  • Planting
  • Plucking
  • Withering
  • Rolling
  • Oxidation
  • Firing, roasting, drying
  • Sorting
  • Retail

Lightly oxidized leaves are short while heavily oxidized leaves are long.

5) White tea

Even though green tea is most famed among them all regarding health benefits, white tea should rightfully demand the same level of attention from the media.

One reason being that it is full of antioxidants.

Also mostly produced in China, white tea is considered the most “natural” as it’s production process (or lack of) leaves it as the least processed tea, even less than green tea.

The production stage that takes up the most time is the withering process which can take days.

After which, it is only left to bake with low heat to reach a certain percentage of moisture determined by the tea master.

Then sorted for distribution.

6) Yellow tea

Yellow tea is the most rare as it is only produced in a few provinces of China.

You would be lucky to find them overseas as very little is exported.

It’s names come from the it’s distinctive yellow color cast which is a result of it’s processing methods.