High Mountain Silver Downy Raw Pu-erh Tea 2014

Tea made from 1 bud and 1 leaf

High Mountain Silver Downy 2014 is made of tea grown in natural farming style. This is a raw pu-erh tea, and as it is, this is a very unusual pu-erh tea. This is because the plucking standard of this tea is “1 bud and 1 leaf”. It is actually a very unusual plucking standard for pu-erh tea. Usually, the common plucking standard of tea leaf for pu-erh tea is very random, normally it is one bud and 2 or 3 leaves. To make pu-erh tea, the more grown-up leaves contain more poly phenols, and it will give a desirable effect in flavor when tea is further matured after a period of time. In HOJO’s tea lineup, most of pu-erh tea follows this standard.

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Mao-cha of high mountain silver downy

The top is the common plucking standard, that follows 1 bud and 2-3 leaves and the bottom is the mao-cha of high mountain silver downy that consists of 1 bud and 1 leaf.

Soft mouth feel thanks to 1 bud 1 leaf

In fact, some tea drinkers enjoy the soft mouth-feel. To meet the various preferences of tea drinkers, we have set-up the different plucking standards for making pu-erh tea, white tea and black tea. For example, we use 1 bud and 2 leaves for Yan Ming Shan raw pu-erh tea. This is the reason that Yan Ming Shan gives quite smooth drinking sensation. The High Mountain Silver Downy raw pu-erh tea also gives very soft and creamy texture. It gives natural sweetness like we are drinking a white tea. With less number of leaves, the amino acid in tea bud plays the dominant role in influencing the drinking sensation. The soft mouth-feel is because of richer content of theanine. The theanine also affects the flavor of tea during maturation. The High Mountain Silver Downy develops the flavor reminiscent to sugar cane or brown sugar. Based on our experience, tea will develop the sweet flavor after 3 years of aging onwards.

Time-consuming tea plucking

As high mountain silver downy consists of only 1 bud and 1 leaf, it appears like silivere velvet. In fact, a farmer prefer to wait until tea grows with 1 bud and 2-3 leaves as it is much faster to accumulate the production yield in a day. Comparatively, a farmer has to spend much longer time to collect 1 bud and 1 leaf. Consequently it is reflected in its price.

Tea plucked following the standard of 1 bud and 1 leaf.

Tea plucked following normal standard, 1 bud and 2-3 leaves.

Tea is grown in the mountain located near the Myanmar border.

The High Mountain Silver Downy 2014 is produced in the village located at Lincang, Yunnan in China. The village is located about 20km away from Myanmar border. The tea is collected by the mountain-Thai tribes. The altitude of the tea garden is about 1700m. Tea is not grown in the modern style, but in the form of independent bushes. It is grown in natural farming style; the farmer uses no fertilizer and no pesticide. Due to the remote location, people up there still practice the ancient agricultural method till today.