Article / Pan Shungan Senior media person ShangFu Vitality Weekly Chief Writer
On the May Day holiday, I returned to my hometown, and on the night of arriving home, my father usually took out a bag of tea leaves. The bag was a cheap tea bag sold by the village commissary, and my mother used to use it to pack cooked vegetables such as plum meat and lees fish that I took away. The bag opens, and the aroma of tea fills the air.
This tea was picked by my father after the Qingming Dynasty and before the gu rain on his own long-abandoned tea mountain, and then hand-fried by himself, it is the standard wuyuan pre-rain organic farmhouse green tea, which is a good thing that I have been thinking about for several years.
< h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" >
</h1>
Many people mention Wuyuan only know canola flowers and Huipai architecture, but in fact, Wuyuan has many specialties and delicacies, among which there are famous "black, white, red and green" four-color specialties.
"Black" refers to the Dragon Tail Yan, a branch of the Sheyan, one of the four famous stones, because the stone used to make the stone is produced in longwei Mountain, so it is named. However, now the Longwei Mountain stone has long been excavated, but the process of making bricks has been passed down from generation to generation. In high school, under the leadership of a teacher, I visited the studio of a certain brick-making master in the county, and the yantai displayed was as large as a car tire and as small as a duck egg.
"White" refers to Jiangwan Sydney pear, which is known for its large thin skin, thick flesh and small core, and crunchy taste. However, because jiangwan is far from my home, and I am not very fond of eating pears, I can't remember whether I have eaten it or not, and I don't make evaluations.
"Red" refers to the poached red carp, which is bright red in color, has a short head and tail, and resembles a poache. This is a unique farmed fish in Wuyuan, because of its festive color, it is an indispensable dish for Wuyuan farmers to celebrate the New Year and various banquets. Every year, there will be one on the Chinese New Year's Eve rice in my family, either steamed or braised, which means "red and hot, more than every year". As for the taste, those who like it praise its sweetness and deliciousness, those who dislike it think that it is woody and prickly, and for me, there is food, and there is no and will not miss it much.
"Green" refers to green tea, which is called Wuyuan Green Tea, referred to as Wu green, and it is said that he once appeared in the "Tea Classic" of Tea Saint Lu Yu. Although the reputation is not as loud as the famous teas such as Longjing and Yunwu, it is better than the amount and is exported to home and abroad.
< h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > two</h1>
I remember when I was a child, almost every household in the village planted tea, and there was a large tea forest in front of and behind the village. The largest of these is the village collective, followed by the village primary school. Because there are large tea mountains, when I was in elementary school, every year the school would organize two collective labors for the participation of teachers and students of the whole school, going up the mountain to pick tea in the spring and weeding the tea mountains in the autumn. At that time, my hands and feet were slow, and I was the least in the class every time I picked tea, and I often felt inferior for this.
In addition to collective labor, at that time, the school would also take 7 days of agricultural busy leave every spring and autumn to facilitate teachers and students to help their families during the busy agricultural season. In the autumn, the farmer's holiday is to help the family harvest rice, and in the spring, it is to pick tea. I still remember that every spring during the agricultural holiday period, the children in the village would go to the collective tea mountain to pick tea, a few cents a pound, a day can pick three or four pounds, you can change some snacks for yourself.
In the year I went from elementary school to junior high school, some people in our township contracted to plant yellow ginger in the mountains, most of the tea mountains in the village were contracted out, and large areas of tea forests were dug up. Later, it seems that the cultivation of yellow ginger failed, and the original green tea mountain was only bare loess. And the farm holiday has also been cancelled, existing only in distant memories.
My family's tea mountain is lucky to survive due to its remote location, but it is rarely taken care of, but every year my parents go back to pick some for their own drinking needs for a year. Later, the economic conditions were better, and my father slowly did not bother to pick tea and stir-fry tea by himself, and he bought some at will, after all, hand-fried tea is indeed not an easy job.
< h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > three</h1>
Tea picking is generally selected in the morning, because the sunshine time is short, and the tea leaves are more "spiritual". The tea eaten at home is generally picked according to one bud and two leaves. After the tea leaves are picked, they should be dried on the dustpan for a while and dried in the shade. At the same time, the stove where the family cooked rice was burned, and the fire was vigorous.
After drying the tea leaves, quickly stir-fry by hand, occasionally copy and shake them off to ensure that the heat is even. This is a very technical job, and if you are not careful, you may have cooked the tea leaves first. After the tea leaves change color, fish out and put them into a large basin, and then rub vigorously while hot to squeeze out the water. On the one hand, this is to facilitate the subsequent tea rolling, on the other hand, it is also to avoid being too bitter after the tea is fried.
Next, turn the pot to a low heat, continue to stir-fry the kneaded tea leaves, continue to knead while frying, bring the tea leaves to shrink and dry, then fry well and put them in bags. Because there is a process of pouring out and kneading in the middle, the cost of frying will be relatively broken, and it is not as good as the machine frying.
The whole process takes more than an hour, and the continuous stir-frying is very physically demanding, and because of the height of the pot, the father needs to bend over all the time, which will be very difficult. Later, my mother told me that the reason why my father did not stir-fry tea over the years was mainly because he was old, his waist was not good, and he could not eat it. This year, because of my requirements for several years, I deliberately fried it.
<h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > four</h1>
After my mother told me, I was sad for a while. Because my father's original intention of hand-roasting tea was not because I liked tea myself. At that time, because of my work, I came into contact with some tea merchants and learned that natural organic tea began to be sought after in the tea circle, and at that time, micro-business was just emerging, so I wanted to do this "business".
Although I myself drink tea, I don't understand tea, let alone taste tea. When I was a child, I watched adults drink tea with a teacup, the lid was lifted and blown first, and then sucked lightly along the rim of the cup, and then smashed the bar mouth and savored it. Seeing that they drank so deliciously, they couldn't help but sneak two sips. Bitter, not very tasty, not as good as the store 2 cents a bottle of soda.
Later, I entered the society and began to work, slowly drank more tea, and gradually felt the taste of tea. The tea has 2 points of bitterness in the mouth, and 2 points of sweetness after entering the throat, and the remaining 6 points are the bland taste of water. Isn't that what life is like?