The Unique Fragrance of Scented Tea
3 min readAs the name”scented tea”implies, it is a tea that is mixed with flowers. But different from Lbeautifying tea, which is composed of pure, dried flowers, and is a current trend among girls and young ladies, the perfume of the flowers from the tea can only be smelled, but the flowers are invisible. Scented tea is done by reprocessing the tea, which includes adding dried, scented flowers so as to mix the two types of scent.
By doing so, the scented tea possesses both the pleasant freshness of the tea and the strong scent of the flowers.
The tea leaves for scented tea mainly come from green tea. Sometimes black tea leaves and oolong tea leaves are also used. Among the different kinds of green tea, the baked, dark green tea is the most suitable for making scented tea. There are varieties of fragrant flowers that are appropriate for making scented tea，with jasmine ranking first.The others include gardenia flowers，zhulan flower，roses，and osmanthus flowers.Gardenia-scented tea tastes strong and mellow；zhulan-scented tea，profound；rosescented tea，pleasantly sweet；and osmanthus-scented tea，refreshing.Rose and black tea，which are both red，are a perfect match，while osmanthus goes well with oolong tea，with the former being strong-scented and the latter，light-scented.Of course，it is only natural that ingenious concepts are sure to produce unique tastes.
Jasmine tea fully deserves the honor of queen of different kinds of scented tea.Jasmine has a noble，unsullied character and is pleasantly fragrant.It breaks out into blossom in hot summer and sends forth perfumeat night.When the jasmine flowers are about to bloom，a large amount of jasmine buds that are ready to burst are collected.At nightfall when the buds are half open andsending forth strong fragrance，they are mixed with tea leaves；this process is called”mixing the buds with tea leaves.”The jasmine buds are taken from the tea leaves after the fragrance is spent and the buds have withered；this process is called”removing the buds.”The jasmine buds are usually put into the tea leaves group by group and the fragrance seeps into the tea time after time.When this is done，the buds are removed from the tea.Ordinary jasmine tea needs”mixing”once and one”removing,””mixing”twice and one”removing,”or “mixing”three times and one “removing.”But extraordinary jasmine tea needs”mixing”four times and one”removing,””mixing”
Jasmine tea is produced in Fujian, Guangdong, Suzhou, Zhejiang and Sichuan Provinces. The jasmine tea produced in Fujian enjoys the greatest reputation. Apart from using baked, dark green tea leaves to make jasmine tea, people from Fujian also use longing, biluochun, silver needles and maofeng to make jasmine tea. There are numerous famous brands with these types of jasmine tea.
The well-known Select Fujian Jasmine Dabaihao is made by mixing the Dabaicha young tea-leaf shoots produced in Fuding in early spring as the tea leaves with the singlepetal and double-petal jasmine bud alternately, and the production process undergoes seven “mixings”and one”removing.”The jasmine tea produced in Suzhou also enjoys a great reputation. Jasmine can be seen everywhere around Huqiu. If you’ re visiting Suzhou on a summer night and happen to hear the sound of the bell coming from the outskirts of the city, never forget that the jasmine is breaking out into blossom at that moment and the soul of the flowers has found her home in the charms of tea. What an effervescent fragrance it will be!
