December 2025 Tea Subscription

Kanaya (金谷町, Kanaya-chō) was a town located in Haibara District, Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan. At the Kanaya tea tasting site, Forestry and Fisheries of the Ministry of Agriculture, several seeds of Asatsuyu - known as natural Gyokuro - were grown. In 1949, the best seed was selected and given the new name of Y-2 - a selected natural hybrid of Asatsuyu. It was until 1996 when this cultivar was registered in the Shizuoka Prefecture and was given the name Yutaka Midori  (ゆたかみどり).

Yutaka Midori is known to provide a better yield than Yabukita - the most grown tea variety in Japan chosen for its yield - and that is why it sees 30% large scale cultivation in Kagoshima. Its warmer climate has been much more suitable to grow, cultivate, and harvest Yutaka Midori. Although so, its good cultivation outpaces its flavour profile. When this green tea cultivar was first processed as a sencha, it possessed extreme astringency and the liquor acquired an undesirable reddish color. Researchers ultimately found resolution in 2 ways. They shaded the plant a week prior to the harvest, giving it a deep, bright color. Sun loving Yutaka Midori grows to its full capacity under full exposure to the sun. To grow it under shade, it first have to be exposed to 6 hours of full sun. Next, they processed it as fukamushi (deep steaming) which is a long steaming process of 1 to 3 minute, as compared to asamushi which is a short steaming style of 20 to 40 seconds. (Visually, fukamushi is easily breakable as the leaves become softer.) Additionally, it has strong resistance to diseases and pests, and can be harvested 5 days earlier than Yabukita. With these strengths, it is now the second most widely grown cultivar (about 5%) beside Yabukita (about 75%).

Our tea today is grown in Sayama, which is outside the cultivar's comfort zone. Sayama is about 3°C lower than Shizuoka all year round, and is very much drier than Shizuoka. Expectedly, Yukata Midori grows slower and at lesser quantity up north. The leaves are thicker to withstand the colder weather. Because sunlight hours are lesser in Sayama, the teas are not shaded like down south. As a green tea, it has slight astringency and a pale greenish tone - a result of its higher catechin content. Because of this characteristic, Takano En was creative enough to exploit these weakness in it being a green tea towards processing it as a red tea - where its higher astringency and colour tone fit right in. It also exhibit a distinctly rich and slightly sweet flavor, adding more depth as compared with the usual Japanese red tea style of thinner body. The cultivar is first picked for processing into a green tea, then picked a second time later spring (end April) to process into a red tea. This sequence takes advantage of the cooler climate with lesser sunlight hours for a less astringent green tea, and the increased catechin level as the climate warms up end spring.

We are brewing this tea in a Parchmen Glass Gaiwan, at 3.5g to 100ml of 80°C water for 30 sec. The shorter brew time allows up to 3 brews, with a smooth and soft texture on the 1st brew, higher strength with pleasant astringency in the 2nd brew, and more astringency and slight bitterness in the 3rd brew. As the brews proceed, each are interesting in themselves. The aroma develops from sweet peaches to malt. Sweetness is most pronounced in the 1st brew. The pale reddish colour lightens to pale yellow as you brew more times.


Tie Guan Yin varietal originates from Xi Ping Township of Anxi County, Quanzhou City, Fujian province of China (泉州市安溪县西坪镇), on the west of the county. Tie Guan Yin is harvested a total of 5 times in Anxi but recent years see only 4 harvests - spring, summer, early autumn, autumn and missing the winter tea. The farms we work with only harvest Tie Guan Yin twice a year - the 2 more valued harvests of spring and autumn. The farmer's adage rings loud: Spring water (i.e. a rounder tea body) and autumn aroma (春水秋香). After a long winter, the bush would have accumulated substantial nutrients to brew a thick tea. Through summer till autumn, the bush would have bathed in enough sunlight to create aromatic compounds to brew a tea of higher aroma with a longer aftertaste. The abundance of sunlight in the middle two harvests usually produce teas of lesser elegance and coarser mouthfeel, and are usually sold in the mass market to Chinese restaurants. In Tie Guan Yin making techniques, there are three styles - lightly roasted (清香型), heavily roasted (浓香型) and aged (陈香型). Ultimately, the tea drinker decides his preference.

Our autumn tea is from the tea fields northeast of Anxi county, on the tea mountains about 45 min's drive from Anxi urban centre. The tea farm is around 400m, located right on the ridgeline formed by Chinese eucalyptus trees (桉树) used for paper making. Growing amongst wild flora and fauna, osmanthus trees are planted with the tea shrubs to encourage cross-fertilisation between them for a more floral tea. The processing factory is right in the tea farm, allowing prompt processing and avoiding the uncontrolled oxidation experienced by leaves harvested a long distance away from factory. The farm does not use any chemical fertilizer but the tea shrubs benefit from the dung from cows which move through the farm. For speed to market, recent years see spring Tie Guan Yin being harvested before optimum maturity of the tea buds. Our tea avoids this commercial trend and is harvested on time. Autumn Tie Guan Yin is usually harvested end Sept for 1 month. Our autumn leaves are harvested mid October 2025. Comparing spring and autumn weather in Anxi, the daily temperature range is similar at around 20-28°C, with a diurnal range of around 8-9°C. However, it is wetter in spring than autumn, with about 50% lesser precipitation, allowing less dilution of aromatic compounds in the leaves of an autumn Tie Guan Yin. The autumn tea benefits from the hotter and wetter summer prior to its harvest and grows at a much faster rate than the spring tea. Surely, production yield is higher in autumn but its faster growth rate limits the accumulation of nutritional compounds as compared to the spring harvest.

Every year, Parchmen & Co makes spring Tie Guan Yin in the farm. We have yet to make an autumn Tie Guan Yin as the end of the year is often flushed with coffee activities - our other focus. This autumn tea is made by Xu Liang Hu (许良虎), who is the Chinese government appointed custodian of the intangible heritage of Tie Guan Yin making techniques (非物质文化遗产铁观音制作传承人). In 22nd May 2023, Tie Guan Yin technique was recognised by United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (UN FAO) as a globally important agricultural heritage system.

We are also brewing this tea in our Parchmen Glass Gaiwan, using 3g of leaves to 150ml of 95°C water, for 45 sec - same like how we brew a spring Tie Guan Yin. We can also use the gongfu tea method, by brewing 6g of leaves to 120ml of 95-100°C water, for 15 sec. The latter method allows a more obvious changing profile for each brew. The good stamina of Tie Guan Yin allows it to be rebrewed multiple times, living up to another adage that there is residual aroma even after seven brews. For the light roasted tea, the dry leaves are in its classic dark green tone for both spring and autumn harvests. It can be simply said that the first impression of an autumn tea is reversed to the spring tea. One first recognises the smooth and soft body in a spring tea. The strong magnolia and spinach aromas are what define the autumn harvest. Brew colour is cinnamon and it gets darker with more brews. Aftertaste is floral and sweet, turning sweeter as it cools. Its strong aroma lingers in the nose.


Our last tea today is a black tea from An Hua. The first mention of a black tea was in a Ming dynasty tea chronicle discussing a tea from An Hua. It is no wonder that An Hua black tea is often touted as the symbol of Chinese black teas. The Chinese black tea is also known as a dark tea in the western world. Based on the colour change in tea processing, the standard Chinese tea nomenclature was based on the 1971 research paper of Prof Chen Chuan (陈椽, 《茶叶分类理论与实践》). The Western nomenclature arose from 200 years of tea trading between tea merchants and Western trading ships arriving at the southern Chinese ports, mainly Amoy (Xiamen today). Naturally, the local Fujian vernacular for teas with black leaves was adopted for the Fujian teas made that way - a red tea in today's nomenclature. The retention of this term in the Western tea vocabulary today underscores the deep impression that the long history of Chinese tea has made on the western collective memory.

In the pristine, remote hills of An Hua county, wild tea trees share the forest land with the other flora of the primary forest. Probably untouched for centuries, these tea trees were first discovered by villagers in 1950-60s after which tea picking and making started on an organised scale. Despite this good start, the nascent tea industry ground to a halt shortly under a confluence of factors - remoteness of the county, lack of supporting logistics and infrastructure out from the tea hills, poor market support and interest, and the national policy then to "return farmland to nature". It was not until the late 1970s that the market reform in China opened new doors for it. By then, the abandoned tea farms two decades ago have turned wild. With renewed interest in this lost tea art and its associated lost farmlands, Gao Jia Shan company was founded in 2007 and started making tea from such farmlands and other wild tea forests hidden deep within the hills of An Hua. Well rested for a few decades, these wild teas offer tremendous potential in becoming quality teas. The company's foresight has propelled itself to become one of the largest tea company in An Hua today, with a massive land area of 98 mu (亩 = 666.7m²). The founder was also awarded the honorary title of Black Tea Master 

The tea is from the natural wild tea forest of Five Dragon Mountain (五龙山). At 1,050m, the wild arbor tea trees grow slowly under an average temperature of 16.1°C and develop deep roots into the granite soil in search for water. The tea variety in An Hua are of smaller and medium sized leaves, as compared to the bigger leaf assamica variety in Yunnan pu'er. For a deeper and bolder flavour in An Hua black teas, older and thicker leaves are needed. A routine similar to green tea processing culminates in a fermentation stage. In the making of "golden flowers" tea, stems are included so as to allow aeration of the interior of the brick and promoting the formation of "golden flowers" during fermentation. Subsequently, the brick is loosely compressed to retain the "golden flowers", which also allow easy fragmenting for brewing. In fact, the 'golden flowers' are a form of yellow molds which are harmless and yet beneficial to human health. The unique moist and cool environment in An Hua promotes the propagation of this natural mold which builds a symbiotic relationship with the tea. Found in no other tea regions, the "golden flowers" are a unique feature in An Hua black teas. The lengthy fermentation mellows down the tea, such that there is no astringency even after long and repeated brewing. 

Noticeably different from the usual round shape of a pu'er black tea, An Hua black tea usually adopts the shape of a brick or a rod in specific multiples of 50g. (50g is denoted as 1 'liang (两), which is 10% of a 'jin' (斤).) The "golden flowers" often smell like a common Chinese herb called 'Fu Ling' (茯苓), which is a fungus by the name of China root), hence this tea is traditionally termed a 'Fu' brick. Harvested in the spring of 2017 April, the leaves are third grade, i.e. older leaves of a later harvest. 

We are brewing this tea without breaking it up (in compressed fragments) in a Parchmen Glass Gaiwan, at 3.5g to 130ml of 100°C water for 30 sec continuously for up to 6 brews. The brewed leaves smell clean, with a light woody undertone and a white floral and vanilla overtone. The brew colour is light golden on the initial brew and darkening to amber on the second brew as the fragments start to open up, then lightening to a pale yellow with more brews. Without breaking up the tea, the initial brew is impressively silky and smooth, with clean notes of China roots, in a interestingly monotonous way. It is very balanced, and there is no astringency or bitterness. The second brew is less silky when hot but becomes silky smooth like the initial brew when slightly cooler. The silkiness feels like cream coating the entire palate and the flavour notes open up to China root and white flowers. With more brews, the silkiness reduces slightly but the creamy sensation is still apparent. Curiously, notes of walnut and roasted coconuts come forward at the 4th brew, and the tea tastes sweeter from the 5th brew - there seem to be an acidic undertone that gives an impression of fruity sweetness. From the 6th brew onwards, the tea has diminished aroma but the creaminess and silkiness retain. Similar to the pu'er, this tea is good for digestion, and is perfect as an after-meal drink.


Enjoy your teas of Dec 2025!

Thank you for coming onboard Parchmen & Co and travel with us to savour our world in a cup!