White tea

 

White tea is made from very young tea leaves picked early in the spring, when the buds are still covered with the white down that gives the tea its name. The leaves are then quickly dried and shipped, and this very light treatment makes white tea the least processed of all the teas.

 

Because white tea is not oxidized, it retains virtually the same content of healthy antioxidants as the leaves and buds had when they were still on the tea bush. Studies show that white tea has the greatest concentration of antioxidants (mainly the catechin EGCG) of all the teas, up to three times the concentration in green tea. 

 

Because the tea is made from such young leaves, the caffeine content of white tea is the lowest of any tea, with approximately 10-15 mg per serving. The exact caffeine content of a cup of white tea depends on many factors, like the parts of the leaves that are used, the individual plant, soil and so on.

 

White tea is mainly grown in the Chinese Fujian province, but there exist varieties from other Chinese areas and from Sri Lanka. 

 

When brewed, white tea has a clear, golden tinge, not unlike a mature white wine. The scent is fresh and flowery, while the taste is subtle, fresh, and sweet. White tea is rarely bitter, and if it is, it has not been properly brewed.

 

 

White tea varieties differ largely depending on the part of the leaf that is used, and the general quality of the leaves.

 

Silver Needle (Yin Zhen) is the highest quality of white tea. It consists entirely of the first buds that are hand picked during a few days very early in the spring. This gives the tea a very delicate and subtle flavor. Because of its rarity, Silver Needle is the most expensive white tea, and among the priciest of all teas. The comparable tea from Sri Lanka is sometimes called Silver Tip.

 

White Peony (Bai Mu Dan) is made from the bud and two leaves. It has a somewhat stronger taste and commands a slightly lower price than Silver Needle. 

 

Snowbud is a simpler tea than White Peony, and contains less buds and more leaves. It also has a pleasant, flowery taste, and is one of the milder white teas.

 

Song Yang is a rare type of white tea which consists mainly of buds. Three thousand leaves are harvested to make one pound of this tea. It has a very delicate taste, and can sometimes be hard to acquire in larger quantities. 

 

Other varieties of white tea are often made from what is left over after the Silver Needle and White Peony have been harvested. They include teas such as Tribute Eyebrow (Gong Mei), Noble Long Life Eyebrow (Shou Mei)and the Sri Lankan White Darjeeling.

 

White tea is a delicate tea that does not like water that's hotter than about 180 F, or 80 C. If the water is hotter than that, the leaves will be scalded and the resulting tea bitter. The steeping time varies between the individual varieties, but white tea does not usually require a longer steep than a few minutes. Three minutes is often long enough for the first steep. It is possible to get multiple brewings out of the same batch of tea leaves, and the steeping times will normally increase with subsequent steepings.

 

White tea requires more leaf than most other teas for a satisfactory brew. As a rule of thumb, 1 to 1,5 grams of white tea for three ounces (100 ml) of water gives a proper tasting white tea.  

 

The claimed health benefits of white tea are the same as for green tea, as they are both rich in the antioxidant compound epogallocatechin gallate (EGCG). However, white tea is considered to contain more EGCG by weight, sometimes quoted as up to three times the concentration [2]. The reason is that tea leaves that are unprocessed, unbroken and unoxidized retain more of the antioxidant content [3]. Studies show that the antiviral and antibacterial effects of white tea are greater than those of green tea [1].

 

Tea has been associated with several health benefits, such as these: