Pre-Qingming Tea gets its name from the time of its harvest, which is before the Qingming Festival. As each Qingming approaches, tea plants, after a long winter of rest and rejuvenation, have absorbed the essence of heaven and earth. The buds are delicate and beautiful, their flavor pure, evoking the sentiment that “fine tea is like a fine woman.”

Furthermore, due to the cold weather during the picking period, the tea leaves are largely free from insect damage and do not require pesticides, making pre-Qingming tea more naturally pure and highly cherished.

The pre-Qingming tea begins to sprout between the Awakening of Insects and the Spring Equinox, reaching the stage of harvest before the Qingming Festival. At this time, the buds and leaves are delicate, rich in aromatic compounds and flavor components, resulting in exceptional quality.

However, because temperatures are generally low before Qingming, the number of sprouts is limited, and their growth rate is slow, leading to a small quantity of tea that meets the harvesting standards. Thus, scarcity makes pre-Qingming tea particularly precious.

The timing of the pre-Qingming tea harvest has strict geographical requirements. Green Tea produced in provinces such as Hainan, Yunnan, Guangxi, Guangdong, and Fujian can only be called early Spring Tea, not pre-Qingming tea. Pre-Qingming tea must be the first flush of green tea harvested between the Spring Equinox and the Qingming Festival.

In provinces like Hainan, where the climate is warm, tea sprouts early and can be harvested around the Great Cold period. However, due to a shorter dormancy period, the taste and other aspects differ significantly from pre-Qingming tea. By the time Qingming approaches, these teas have already undergone multiple rounds of harvest, greatly reducing their quality.

Pre-Qingming tea, on the other hand, has gone through a five-month-long dormant period, emerging as the first new shoots of spring. Its content of tea polyphenols, alkaloids, amino acids, catechins, and other components is higher, thus it boasts a better taste, greater durability when steeped, and richer nutrition.

How to Distinguish Pre-Qingming Tea

Observe: Dry Tea Appearance: Black Tea with tightly twisted strands, round and compact beads for pearl tea, and green tea with a lustrous green color. The tea is robust and substantial, often covered with downy hair, and exudes a rich fragrance.

Infused Tea Liquor: Green tea with a yellowish-green hue, black tea with a reddish-bright liquor displaying a golden rim.

Leaf Base: Soft and thick, mostly comprised of normal buds and leaves, with fine veins and inconspicuous serrated edges.

Taste: Aroma: Intense and lasting.

Flavor: Rich and full-bodied.

In summary, pre-Qingming tea is a tea with excellent taste and rich nutrition. Due to strict requirements on the harvest time and location, its production volume is low, hence the relatively high price. When purchasing pre-Qingming tea, it's important to discern authenticity and buy from reputable sources.