Flower tea can be subdivided into herbal tea and flower and fruit tea. Drinking leaves or flowers is called herbal tea, such as lotus leaves and stevia leaves. Drinking its fruit is called flower and fruit tea, and the reprocessed flower tea has a fragrant smell and has a health effect. In general, the history of flower tea originated from the Song Dynasty, began in the Ming Dynasty, and became in the Qing Dynasty.
Originated in the Song Dynasty:
In the Song Dynasty (960 AD), China added dragon brain incense to the finest green tea as a tribute, which indicates that in the Song Dynasty, spices were already available for lavender tea. By the late Song Dynasty, there was a fear of affecting the true taste of tea, and it was not advocated to use spices to lavender tea. Cai Xiang's "Tea Record" in the cloud: "Tea has a real fragrance and the tribute, micro dragon brain, want to help its incense, Jian'an folk tea tasting is not incense, afraid to rob its true ... Just don't use it. "But this is already the precursor to the production of Chinese flower tea, and it is also the beginning of Chinese flower tea."
It began in the Ming Dynasty:
The Ming Dynasty was a period of great development of Chinese tea, and the discarded tuan tea was used as loose tea, and a large number of roasted green, roasted green, and sun-dried green tea were produced, laying the foundation for the production of flower tea. At the same time, the method of flower tea kiln has also developed greatly, and the preparation method of "tea attracts flower fragrance and benefits tea flavor" has appeared. According to the Ming Dynasty Gu Yuanqing's "Tea Recipes" in the "Tea Laws" of the "Tea Method" on the flower tea kiln technology record is more detailed, it can be seen that the flower tea kiln method, raw material selection, flower intake, kilning, drying and other primitive tea method, began to gradually mature, and the current process principle is the same, then the flower tea is called the real flower tea. But its quantity is rare. The great pharmacologist Li Shizhen's book "Compendium of Materia Medica" has a record of "jasmine lavender tea", which confirms that jasmine tea was produced in the Ming Dynasty.
Formed in the Qing Dynasty:
During the Xianfeng period of the Qing Dynasty (1851 to 1961 AD), Fuzhou in Fujian province has become the center of flower tea, mass production of flower tea, there are more than a dozen tea estates made of flower tea sold well in North China, by the end of the Qing Dynasty there were dozens of tea estates engaged in jasmine tea business. According to statistics, in 1900, Fuzhou's flower tea production has reached 1500t. Since 1939, Suzhou in Jiangsu has developed into another flower tea manufacturing center. After 1949, the production of flower tea in the mainland has developed greatly, and the production and sales volume have increased year by year, mainly selling to Northeast China, North China, Shandong and other places, exporting to Southeast Asian countries, and marketing in Hong Kong and Macao. People in Japan, the United States and some countries in Western Europe also like mainland chinese tea. They believe, "In Chinese flower tea, you can smell the smell of spring."
A cup of small world, mountains and rivers flowers and trees. Perhaps knowing the historical origin and evolution of flower tea and its cultural connotation, when we taste flower tea again, will we have more taste? Our ancients are so clever, "tea is sexually lascivious, touching things is stained with its qi", but the floral fragrance is introduced into tea, tea and flowers complement each other, and it is interesting. I hope that this floral tea flavor can be understood, loved by more people, and more flower tea will be formed.