Why this Chinese language tea prices greater than $184,000 per kilogram

However neither the abalone nor the A4 Wagyu ribeye are the celebrities of the present.

It is the eight glasses of tea that lure patrons to this darkish, wood-paneled house within the metropolis’s busy Causeway Bay neighborhood.

On the left, three shot glasses comprise three totally different forms of sizzling tea: plum-scented uncooked Puerh tea, Gold Needle Dian Hong (a comparatively new black tea from Yunnan) and a peat-scented Rougui — a sort of oolong rock tea from the Wuyi Mountains in China’s Fujian Province.

On the precise, we now have ice drip Full Blossom Rougui tea, served in 5 Riedel glasses.

“Please have a sniff,” says the server. “With the cognac glass, you will get extra of the fruit odor. With the Burgundy glass, you choose up extra floral flavors.”

It is an uncommon and trendy approach of sampling tea. However I am right here on a mission — to seek out out why just some handfuls of some sorts of Chinese language tea leaves value 1000’s of {dollars}.

Glassbelly makes a speciality of oolong rock tea from Wuyi, which is among the priciest tea varieties on the planet. It is a particular form of oolong tea that grows on rocks on japanese China’s Wuyi Mountains — therefore the title, “rock tea.”

Well-known rock tea varieties from this space embrace Rougui, Da Hong Pao and Shui Xian — which interprets to Cinnamon, Massive Purple Gown and Narcissus, respectively.

Glassbelly’s most prized merchandise is the Niu Lan Keng Rougui, a uncommon number of Rougui tea from a valley brook of the identical title within the Wuyi Mountains.

The retail worth? HKD36,000 ($4,560) for 25 grams, or $184,615 for a kilogram, on the time of writing. Having fun with one brew of the tea on the restaurant prices HKD28,000 ($3,577).

To place this into context, a small 150-200 ml pot of tea is often made with about 5 grams of tea leaves.

Tea auctions

Uncommon teas have lengthy been commanding sky-high costs in China. This is not a brand new development.

In 2002, 20 grams of Da Hong Pao — additionally a Wuyi Mountain tea, as soon as reserved for the emperor’s lips solely — was auctioned for RMB180,000 ($28,000) in Guangzhou.

In 2009, a 100-gram Taiping Houkui (inexperienced tea from Anhui) was auctioned for RMB200,000 ($31,300) in Jinan.

Initially, I set out solely to seek out out why these teas proceed to return with such excessive worth tags. However throughout my analysis I found simply how fantastic, secretive and complicated the Chinese language tea world actually is — and met some new gamers on the scene who’re making daring strikes to shake issues up.

Making sense of Chinese language tea

First, let’s begin with the fundamentals. There are six predominant sorts of Chinese language tea: inexperienced, white, yellow, oolong, black tea and darkish tea.

Every of them is categorized by how the leaves are processed and the way lengthy they’re fermented. (Inexperienced tea is unfermented whereas darkish tea is double fermented.)

Beneath every class, there are totally different forms of teas named for a lot of causes. It may very well be the situation it was harvested. Puerh tea, for instance, can solely come from sure locations in Yunnan.

The leaves are vital as nicely. Lapsang Souchong makes use of the whole tea leaf whereas Jin Jun Mei makes use of solely the buds of the leaves.

This a surprisingly difficult query to reply despite the actual fact tea is among the hottest drinks on the planet.

“A significant drawback with Chinese language tea is that there is no such thing as a subjective reply to what good tea is. There are various sentimental tales and creative parts in the case of promoting tea, however so little concerning the precise flavors of the tea,” says Yeung, who has labored within the wine trade as nicely, specializing in Burgundy.

“For those who take a look at wine and occasional, each are plant-derived drinks which were doing so significantly better than Chinese language tea within the industrial market.”

Lack of a well known system

The dearth of a well-recognized standardization system contributes to the pricing confusion.

In comparison with wine or espresso, the market is much less clear, making it more durable for customers to know the way a lot a selected sort of tea ought to value and why.

Yeung claims that her crew has poured HKD40 million (round $5 million) value of tea in pursuit of discovering a solution to that query within the final decade, main them to open Glassbelly in 2021.

The title Glassbelly was impressed by an historic Chinese language semi-mythological character, Shennong (the Divine Farmer).

In accordance with legend, Shennong had a translucent stomach. To assist the world take a look at the utilization and toxicity of vegetation, Shennong would pattern each herb he got here throughout and report the way it modified in his physique, together with tea.

Yeung hopes that her Glassbelly restaurant will assist shine some readability in the marketplace, due to its trendy and scientific strategy to tea.

“The tea trade could have modified however the promoting method was caught prefer it was 1,000 years in the past. There have been a number of hushed enterprise talks and secret offers,” says Yeung.

Her feedback ring true. A number of years in the past, I took a taxi trip within the metropolis of Wuyi at night time. The motive force, figuring out I used to be a vacationer, slowed down his automotive to round 20 kilometers per hour, giving him extra time to aim to persuade me he had some secret connections who would assist me rating some Da Hong Pao tea at a very good worth.

He was simply considered one of a number of individuals who tried to promote me tea on that journey.

“Everybody in Wuyi would attempt to promote you the ‘genuine Da Hong Pao’ however there are solely six mom Da Hong Pao bushes — they usually aren’t on the market. Genuine Da Hong Pao bred solely from the unique bushes can be very restricted. So it’s totally arduous to seek out out whether or not a tea is what the vendor claims it’s,” says Yeung.

“We have had sums of cash spent on unique ‘high-end’ tea leaves that turned out to be horrible. We discovered alongside the way in which.”

The flavour wheel

After a decade of touring between Hong Kong and mainland China — largely to Wuyi Mountain — Yeung has gathered 1000’s of tasting notes to develop Glassbelly’s model of a taste wheel for Chinese language tea.

“Wuyi tea is the Burgundy of tea, with a lot complexity. It’s what the trade calls a ‘uncooked tea’ (not absolutely fermented) so it retains altering in your glass in addition to in your mouth,” says Yeung.

Rock teas comprise over a dozen sorts of taste profiles however there are just a few your style buds needs to be on the lookout for — citrus, sandalwood and cinnamon.

One Glassbelly workshop invitations patrons to match uncooked and aged Puerh tea, which is extremely prized amongst tea connoisseurs.

“Uncooked Puerh tea smells like plum. Aged Puerh tea typically comes with the odor of camphor mothballs and previous newspaper, which some would say is regular. However in case you pattern it objectively by style, your physique will naturally repel these smells. I believe it’s a good signal that it is not a very good tea, like what entrepreneurs have been claiming,” says Yeung.

“It is the odor of a Puerh tea aged in an unnatural approach — by including humidity to hurry up its ageing course of. It’s an accepted observe within the trade however doesn’t suggest it’s good.”

This contrasts the various long-held beliefs out there that aged Puerh is delicate on one’s physique, whereas uncooked Puerh is shunned as too “chilly” and dangerous to at least one’s abdomen, in keeping with conventional Chinese language medicinal knowledge.

The untold fact

Glassbelly’s contrarian views have raised just a few eyebrows within the trade.

However, Yeung says, “fact is all the time controversial. Controversy makes individuals replicate and assume. Cultural progress often comes after controversy.”

Eager to dig extra into Glassbelly’s claims, I approached revered Puerh tea collector, Raymond Ray.

“I completely admire their outspokenness. So gutsy,” gasps Ray. “They really stated one thing not many within the trade are prepared to say.

“However I might say, good uncooked Puerh tastes like extra than simply plum. And never all aged Puerh is unhealthy — solely people who aren’t aged in a pure approach, which is sort of widespread.”.

The story behind Ray’s rise within the Hong Kong tea trade has made him a little bit of a legend. A few decade in the past, he fell sick from a backbone illness, leaving him briefly motionless.

An extended-time wine lover, Raymond remembers taking his first sip of a very good rock tea.

“It was like my tongue was coming again to life once more. I now had one thing to stay for,” recollects Ray. With a sore again and weak legs, he traveled round Yunnan in quest of the very best Puerh tea.

“Some historians have confirmed that Yunnan is the origin of tea,” says Ray. “I might sit in a automotive for a four-hour rugged journey to the mountains, then walked with a cane with my unhealthy again.”

That is the place he obtained acquainted with the world’s many small Puerh farms.

“You already know, actually good tea comes from previous bushes. When it could actually develop organically with roots huge and robust sufficient that they do not want any chemical compounds and fertilizers. Farmers must climb up the tree to handpick these leaves,” says Ray.

“I believe everybody ought to discover a tea that is good for his or her our bodies. Puerh is what works for me,” says Ray, who credit the drink with restoring his well being.

Advertising and marketing, rarity and tastes

A lot of the issue with artificially aged Puerh dates again to the post-WWII interval.

As soon as a tea served to emperors, Puerh misplaced its luster over time. It was even dubbed “coolie tea” within the Canton space, suggesting it was a drink reserved for low-income staff.

Relatively than ageing it and letting it ferment naturally, sellers relied on the humidity within the Canton space to speed up the method, which intensified the flavors. New strategies had been developed so as to add additional moisture to the leaves and creating cultures to additional pace issues up.

The ensuing musty, camphor odor grew to become the signature of aged Puerh.

Immediately, there are totally different colleges of thought hooked up to Puerh tea and its typically excessive worth tags, like with different Chinese language teas.

“It’s arduous to untangle the historical past behind it,” says Ray. “Advertising and marketing undoubtedly performs an vital function in lots of of those record-breaking costs.”

Rarity is one other issue, not only for Puerh tea however all varieties.

A number of the tea is so uncommon that there is no such thing as a price ticket — the leaves are usually not on the market. For instance, the unique Da Hong Pao bushes are state-protected. that means they are not harvested for industrial functions.

“There’s additionally a worth for industrial tea and one other worth for artisanal tea. It is just like the distinction between home wine and collectors’ wines,” says Yeung.

What makes a tea good?

For purchasers sampling these high-end brews, Yeung has an vital reminder.

“Have a bit of meals, or you’ll get tea drunk,” she says.

Tea has an analogous impact as alcohol, however with arguably fewer unintended effects. Consuming an excessive amount of tea could make one calm down and really feel light-headed: tea drunk.

“Tea helps broaden your palette throughout a meal. So I might argue it’s a extra appropriate drink to pair with meals than espresso and wine. Your tongue will probably be extra delicate as you drink tea,” says Yeung.

In accordance with each Ray and Yeung, the senses will play an more and more vital function in the way forward for tea as extra individuals disregard the basic tales and advertising and marketing strategies, purely eager to pursue the all-important query — how ought to a very good tea style?

“I might look into these six classes: colour, perfume, style, aftertaste, chi and nature,” says Ray.

“The latter two are extra summary. Chi is the liveliness and complexity of a tea — the way it will change in your mouth, whereas nature is how the tea reacts together with your physique,” says Ray.

Yeung does not give me a solution instantly. As a substitute, she goes into the kitchen and returns with a server and a pot of tea leaves.

Water boils in a classic silver pot — which is claimed to spice up the ion within the water and make the water’s texture silkier.

The tea is brewed in a violet clay pot that helps hold the leaves heat. As soon as the temperature drops, the leaves will contract and launch fewer flavors.

The brewing is fast. The tea, a transparent purple hue, is poured out virtually as quickly because the pot is stuffed.

“Drink it. That is the Niu Lan Keng Rougui,” says Yeung. She gathers the crew round to have a sip of the subsequent brews. (A batch of excellent tea leaves will be brewed as much as 10 occasions on common.)

“We do not brew a Niu Lan Keng Rougui each day so everybody is worked up,” she says with a smile, pouring about HKD28,000 (or $3,577) value of tea into everybody’s mini tea cups.

The primary sip numbs the tongue. Then the flavors of the citrus and the wooden we sampled earlier are available in slowly however in a way more condensed and mild kind.

“It needs to be clear, aromatic, ‘gan,’ harmonious and alive — it adjustments in your tongue,” says Yeung.

Gan, typically translated as candy, is a Chinese language phrase that describes a selected form of sweetness and freshness that is accompanied by a touch of bitterness.

We develop quiet for a second, making an attempt to deal with the lengthy aftertaste of the advanced tea.

“I believe that is how a very good tea ought to style. And here is what you had been on the lookout for — the reply to why tea might value a lot,” says Yeung. “However a lot nice tea remains to be cheaper than a bottle of high-quality Burgundy. So is it costly, actually?”

High picture: Priced at $4,560 per tin can (25 grams), Niu Lan Keng Rougui is among the costliest Chinese language teas in the marketplace. Credit score: Glassbelly Tea Lab