The Great Emperor of China loved the scent of jasmine. Yet the life of these flowers is fleeting! So he decided to go summon the wise tea master Lao Cha:
— Tell me, sensei, how can I enjoy the wonderful aroma of jasmine year-round?
The wise master had an answer:
— As usual, pick the tea leaves in Spring. Save them until summertime when the jasmine in Fujian province starts to bloom. Await nightfall, when the gentle jasmine flower blossoms, and leave it alone with the tea leaves. Allow for them to seep into one another. Year-round, you will be able to rejoice in the scent of jasmine while enjoying the tea. In addition, your body will be grateful for the tea’s wonderful healing qualities.
What Kind of Tea is Jasmine Tea?
Jasmine tea is scented with jasmine flowers or jasmine flavor. The most common type of jasmine tea is jasmine green tea. If you ever see a label that says “jasmine tea”, chances are it’s jasmine green tea and not solely the actual jasmine flowers. Although rare, jasmine black, white, dark, and oolong teas also exist.
Our Award Winning Jasmine Dragon Pearls Green Tea
This enthralling tea has a sheer scale of quality. Jasmine, in and of itself, is a flower with a particularly mesmerizing, strong aroma. Have you ever smelled wild jasmine? If you have, then you probably know that the smell of a small jasmine bush can effortlessly envelop an entire area in its sweet sap.
Albeit, sometimes we’ve come across jasmine teas that smell nearly nauseating. These teas are often flavored with jasmine rather than infused through the delicate process that true jasmine tea requires.
When buying jasmine tea, make sure the ingredients include nothing but the tea leaf, and in some cases, the flowers. No flavoring should be present.
How is Jasmine Tea Made
The process of making jasmine tea is quite laborious and requires many moons of sophisticated technique.
First, the tea leaves are harvested in early spring and kept until late summer when the fresh jasmine flowers start to bloom. The flowers get picked at dawn while the small petals are tightly closed. During the night, the jasmine flowers begin to open up, releasing their sublime fragrance. At this time, the tea gets scented.
Our Award Winning Jasmine (Jin Ya) Black Tea
The flowers are mixed with the dry tea leaves and left to infuse for about five hours. Afterwards, the flowers are removed, and the tea is left to dry for a few days.
This process is repeated 4 to 6 times, each time using fresh jasmine flowers.
Overall it takes several weeks, sometimes a month, to produce a high-quality jasmine tea, and just one pound of it requires four pounds of jasmine flowers and a significant amount of labor.
For lower-quality jasmine teas, the leftover flowers from the above method are used to scent the tea leaves. Although this tea is not as exquisite as the one mentioned above, it is still far better than purchasing artificially flavored tea.
Fujian province is known for its high-quality jasmine and for being the birthplace of fine jasmine teas. Walking into a home in Fujian province, one will often be greeted with a hot cup of this aromatic beverage. We are proud to source our jasmine teas from Fujian.
Jasmine Tea Benefits
Jasmine tea is favored for its health benefits. The health benefits of jasmine tea come largely from the benefits of the tea leaf itself. However, those who have smelled jasmine before know of this flower’s unique ability to put us in an elevated mood and relax our nerves.