Tea also follows the seasons. There's a saying: "Drink green in summer, red in winter, and oolong all year round." For us tea lovers, besides green tea, what other good choices are there?

Spring Flower, Summer Green, Autumn Oolong, Winter Red

Refreshing Green Tea in Hot Summer to Nourish the Heart

As early as the Tang Dynasty, Sun Simiao advocated for "often consuming light, clear, sweet, and bland things" in summer, and green tea is an excellent choice.

From the perspective of the Five Elements, summer belongs to fire, and the corresponding organ is the heart, which also belongs to fire. Therefore, the primary focus of summer health preservation is nourishing the heart. Green tea is unfermented, thus retaining more of the natural substances from the fresh leaves. It contains more nutritional components such as tea polyphenols, catechins, chlorophyll, caffeine, amino acids, and vitamins. These natural nutrients in green tea have special effects in combating aging, preventing cancer, fighting cancer, sterilizing, and reducing inflammation. Of course, there are also taboos when drinking green tea: do not drink on an empty stomach, avoid drinking overnight tea, and do not take medicine with green tea water, as tea can counteract medicinal properties.

From early March when it warms up, various premium green teas begin to hit the market. The earliest is usually Zhuyeqing, followed by the more familiar Biluochun and West Lake Longjing. By the end of the month, it's time for Anji White Tea to appear. In April, teas like Emei Xueya, Xinyang Maojian, Liuan Guapian, and Taiping Houkui become available. Currently, in major tea shops, green teas have already made their full appearance.

After "Grain in Ear", the Climate is Damp and Hot

Robust Aroma Tieguanyin to Drive Away Lethargy

The solar term "Grain in Ear" has just passed, and "Summer Solstice" is approaching soon. During the Grain in Ear period, the air is humid, and the weather is hot and damp. At this time, attention should be paid to avoiding seasonal diseases and infectious diseases, such as heatstroke, mumps, and chickenpox. Digestive function is relatively weak during this solar term.

Did you know? Tieguanyin is also a good beverage for preventing heatstroke and cooling down. Li Shizhen's "Compendium of Materia Medica" records: "Tea is bitter and cold in nature... most effective in lowering fire. Fire is the root of all diseases; when fire descends, the upper body becomes clear... Drinking it warm causes fire to descend due to the cold nature, while drinking it hot helps disperse it through the rising qi of fire."

During the transition between spring and summer, drinking a cup of robust aroma Tieguanyin or aged Tieguanyin tea has a good effect on promoting salivation and quenching thirst. This is mainly because components like tea polyphenols, sugars, amino acids, pectin, and vitamins in the tea soup undergo a chemical reaction with saliva in the mouth, moisturizing the oral cavity. Simultaneously, due to the action of caffeine in Tieguanyin, a large amount of heat is dissipated from the body's skin pores. Scientific research shows that the heat dissipated through sweating from drinking a cup of hot tea is equivalent to 50 times the heat of that cup of tea, thus making one feel cool and relieved from summer heat.

If outdoors without the conditions to brew Gongfu tea, trying cold-brewed tea is also a good option. Buy a bottle of mineral water, add 3-5 grams of granular Tieguanyin tea inside, and the leaves will gradually unfurl, offering a decent taste.

For Elderly to Lower Blood Sugar, Drinking White Tea is Good

And No Need to Worry About Sleeplessness at Night

In 2014, the price of Fuding White Tea fresh leaves increased significantly, also letting many tea drinkers get to know this "dark horse" in the tea market.

White tea is a lightly fermented tea. Its production process is particularly simple and most natural. It is not fried or rolled but naturally withered, sun-dried until 70-80% dry, and then slowly baked over a gentle fire. Therefore, white tea largely retains the nutritional components of the tea leaves. Moreover, Fuding White Tea has the effect of clearing heat and removing fire. White tea extract can prevent the growth of bacteria that cause staphylococcus infections, streptococcus infections, pneumonia, etc. Drinking more white tea clears heat, reduces inflammation, and is the best companion for summer.

As is widely known, Fuding White Tea has the saying "one year tea, three years medicine, seven years treasure." Besides the raw materials affecting the tea price, the most significant factor influencing white tea price is its age. Tests show that for each year Fuding White Tea is stored, its flavonoid content increases by 0.5% to 1%. Flavonoids are the best tea biochemical components for antioxidant effects, possessing functions like beautifying, protecting cardiovascular health, lowering the three highs (blood pressure, lipids, sugar), and anti-mutation.

White tea also has remarkably good effects on lowering blood sugar. There is an effective brewing method: in the early morning, take a small pinch of white tea, put it in 40°C~50°C hot water, steep for 4-5 hours, and drink half an hour after lunch and dinner. Tea polysaccharides easily decompose at high temperatures, so the water temperature should not be too high. The magical thing about white tea is that after drinking it, one doesn't need to worry about sleeplessness, so the elderly can drink it with peace of mind.

However, nowadays, Fuding White Tea aged over ten years is rarely seen on the market. The price of ten-year-old Baihao Yinzhen aged tea can be tens of thousands of RMB per jin, Baimudan twenty to thirty thousand, and Shoumei ten to twenty thousand. Some very old teas have even been auctioned for sky-high prices of several hundred thousand or millions. Lü Zhouke, founder of Kongge Tea, also said that currently, it's difficult to distinguish between real and fake aged white tea on the market. If you want to drink genuine aged white tea, it's recommended to collect it yourself. Collect some every year, and in the future, you'll have aged white tea of different years to drink. This is the most reliable approach.