Green Tea

Green tea from Shouning, a small high-mountain county in northeastern Fujian, has been cultivated here for over a thousand years. Our local gardens sit between 600 and 1,000 meters on forested, misty slopes, where cool, slow-growing conditions produce thicker leaves and a sweeter, more vegetal cup than lowland greens. The leaves hold up through five or six infusions — well beyond the three or four typical of pan-fired Jiangnan classics like Dragon Well or Biluochun.

Picking follows two short seasons: a spring flush from mid-March through late April, and a smaller autumn flush in September. Most gardens are small, family-run plots under a hectare, and follow traditional, low-input management. The clean, faintly mineral profile distinguishes our local tea from the heavier, more roasted character of Zhejiang and Anhui greens.

Shouning-style green tea is pan-fired lightly to preserve the leaf’s natural sweetness. The liquor is pale yellow-green, with a flavor that opens on cooked chestnut, settles into sweet grass, and finishes clean and faintly mineral — softer than a Dragon Well, more rounded than a Biluochun.

The collection also draws on partner gardens across China’s other green tea heartlands: flat, wok-fired Longjing from the West Lake hillsides of Hangzhou; tightly curled Biluochun from Dongting Mountain on the shores of Lake Taihu; silver-fuzzed Huangshan Maofeng from the slopes of Anhui’s Yellow Mountain; and small pointed-bud Que She from the high-altitude gardens of Guizhou, grown above 1,000 meters. Each origin brings its own character — chestnut, floral, orchid-like, or vegetal — but all share the same spring harvest and the same quick, light pan-firing that defines Chinese green tea.