Look at a piece of BiLuoChun and get a pyrotechnic gas

Source: Liberation Daily

Gong is flat

I went to the east side of Dongting in Suzhou to see the newly harvested Biluochun this year. The owner of the tea factory is called Yan Jielong, and 3 years ago, the first batch was rated as a "tea master". He now took on more of the work of ushering in the delivery, stir-frying tea only in the evening, three or five pots a day, into a special mahogany box.

Biluo spring tea trees are planted without rules. Standing in the distance, looking at the mountains, there are no tea trees, only fruit trees, citrus, loquat, bayberry and so on. "If there is a place next to a fruit tree, plant one." Yan Jielong described, "Like a sky full of stars." "Because of this, the pollen is sprinkled and the fruit falls, which nourishes the tea tree." Even the sunlight, after passing through the fruit tree, becomes a diffuse light, and then falls on the tea leaves, becoming the "flower sun" that the tea tree likes. The tea tree also knows "retribution", the tea leaves are picked, and when they are brewed, a burst of flowers and fruits is fragrant.

Spring is getting stronger, and the tea picker carries the bamboo basket up the mountain, does not pay attention to the shape or size, and picks the most tender bud tips. When you arrive at the tea factory, the tea leaves collected must be selected twice. Remove overwintering leaves and non-standard buds, leaving one bud and one leaf. This is an extremely labor-intensive process.

In recent years, Taihu Lake can no longer raise crabs, and women at home in the fishermen's village in the past have been picking tea leaves in the village's auditorium in recent days. The scene is spectacular. Most of the tea pickers are about 50 years old, in front of them are full of spread tea leaves, one person occupies half a table, wears reading glasses, eyes and tea leaves are close together, one by one filtered, hands are finely broken.

Biluochun should be picked early, tenderly picked, and picked clean. This is "heart tea". 1 pound 3 two fresh leaves fried 3 two bi snail spring, fried 1 pound roughly requires 70,000 tea buds, which means 70,000 times of picking and 70,000 times of picking. "Seeing tea is like seeing people." Yan Jielong said that if the picking is not clean, the small yellow leaves float a layer, that is, the workmanship is not fine; if it smells like smoke and burnt, the tea leaves are turbid, and the tea soup is not fresh, it is not good at stir-frying.

Let's talk about stir-fried tea. Yan Jielong said that there is a word for making tea, called "stew".

Obviously it was only March, and it rained, but there was still some meaning of steep spring cold. The tea chefs have changed into short sleeves, shorts and slippers, and from time to time wipe the sweat from their foreheads with a towel. There were 6 of them, lined up in a row, one guarding a large iron pot, and his hands were busy. The masters are thin and weak, the strength is not small, a moment can not rest, tea up and down, hands do not leave the tea, tea does not leave the pot, a pot to the end, out of the pot into a biluochun.

The stir-frying pantry is indeed hot. The smell is only found in the countryside when every household raises cooking smoke in the evening. Yan Jielong was still insisting on burning fruit wood pine needles. The fruit wood is solid wood, the wood is tight and can withstand burning; the pine needles are ignited, the flames are sufficient, and they are prosperous at once. The stove wall is separated, inside is the fire master, outside is the roast tea master, between each two pots, there is a sound hole, in order to cooperate inside and outside, the masters shout trumpets, return firewood, or add fire. They speak dialects, not Suzhou dialects, but Zhejiang Lishui dialects — they have been here for more than ten years, and they are all Yan Jielong's apprentices.

Sauté a pot of tea for 40 minutes. If there is not enough time, the outside is scorched and the inside is crisp, the tail is dry, the middle is still soft, put aside, 10 days, yellow, and then 10 days, red. 10 minutes before the roasting tea, the maximum temperature of the pot is 350 degrees, the roasting tea room foggy, the tea leaves are pulled high and scattered, remove the water vapor, miscellaneous gas, to the tea leaves in the chlorophyll stereotype, this is called killing; then, the heat is reduced, the tea leaves are kneaded, so that the tea green is quickly rubbed with the iron pot noodles, continuously into clumps, and then scattered, the technique is like Bagua Taiji; then, add pine needles, the fire is strong, the tea leaves are soft, immediately mentioned, the iron pot sounds, the tea leaves meet up, the inner layer of buds roll out, slowly become the shape of the nail snails in the Taihu Lake, It was also covered with a layer of white hair; finally, relying on the residual temperature of the charcoal fire, the dried tea leaves would not explode, let alone scorch.

"Curled into snails, steel wires, bee legs, full of clothing, a look in the light, a layer of fur on the tea leaves, blowing can not blow off", is the standard appearance of Biluochun.

Yan Jielong took the apprentice and practiced "one shake" and "one scatter". When there is no tea, Yan Jielong will send a pound of sunflower seeds to one person, spread on the dustpan, to shake evenly; and another person will send an egg, wrapped in the palm of his hand and rubbed, to be open. Stir-fry biluochun without the help of tools, and the masters stir-fry with their bare hands. Several times, I tried to reach the bottom of the pot and try the temperature, and as soon as I touched the tea leaves, I hurried back. The stir-fried tea masters all have nails about 1 cm long, the nails touch the bottom of the pot, can pick up the lowest layer of tea leaves, but also the protection of the fingers; their hands, stained by tea stains, the fingers are calluses, very hard, only when the pot temperature is the highest, wear a pair of gloves, gloves a week burned out of the hole, or worn out, and then replaced with a new one.

After a pot of stir-frying, the masters put BiLuochun on a white paper, waiting for the residual temperature to dissipate, each to cool, Yan Jielong can recognize whose hand each bunch of tea leaves came from. Biluochun was picked on the same day, fried on the same day, and after the Qingming, it was called "fried green" and was no longer classified into the biluochun column.

Yan Jielong entered the tea factory at the age of 16, and now, the scale of tea cultivation and the number of production have doubled. Biluochun must be hand-fried to make tea. Many tea farmers choose to use gas and electricity to make a fire, "fruit wood pine needles burn, a pot costs 12 yuan, replaced by gas and electricity, the cost is 1 yuan." Yan Jielong said that Biluochun was only out in Dongting Mountain, the supply was in short supply every year, the price was naturally high, if the cost of roasting tea fell, the tea was naturally better to sell, but "there are smoke and fire that people eat, and the things passed down by the ancestors must also be kept."

When I walked out of the tea factory and looked around, I was stained with a lot of stove ash - I didn't pay attention, and I was covered in spring fireworks.