“Only This Green and Blue” Yunnan Green Tea, Yunnan Oolong Tea

Yunnan is the source of world tea, especially the birthplace of large-leaf tea trees. Many people came to know Yunnan through Pu'er tea made from large-leaf tea, and here, the history of ethnic minorities growing, processing, and drinking tea has its own unique style, with a long and rich tradition.

However, before Pu'er tea became famous, Yunnan tea for a considerable period of time was outside the scope of Chinese Tea.

It has already been proven that Yunnan's large-leaf tea, besides being suitable for making Pu'er tea, is also appropriate for producing green tea, Black Tea, and White Tea, all with remarkable taste. Due to the uniqueness of the large-leaf tea tree species and the highland terrain, particularly with ancient tea trees, sprouting always occurs later than with small-leaf trees. Pu'er tea only speaks of “first spring,” not “before Ming.” When the first spring harvest has yet to begin, and the spring scenery outside the window is at its best, everything is verdant and green – this is the perfect season to savor Yunnan's “Only This Green and Blue” – green tea and oolong tea.

Green: Yunnan's Highland Oolong Tea

Mentioning the rise of “Yunnan Oolong Tea,” Taiwan is an unavoidable topic. These Taiwanese people introduced high-quality varieties from Taiwan and Fujian to the mountains of Simao District in Pu'er City, Yunnan Province as early as the 1990s, establishing premium highland oolong tea gardens and planting “Simao Oolong Tea.”

These tea growers had rich experience in cultivating and processing oolong tea, and gradually “Yunnan Oolong Tea” gained a reputation, becoming the most promising new category of Yunnan tea after green tea, black tea, and Pu'er tea. This attracted more and more people to plant it within the province's tea regions, including the oolong tea from the extreme border highlands of Tengchong, Yunnan, which has risen to prominence in recent years. People who have visited the Tengchong highland oolong tea scenic area in Yunnan would all feel like they are in a dreamlike setting, unable to distinguish whether they are in a park or a tea garden.

Li Xuemei, the sales manager of Extreme Border Tea Industry, has been working there since the company's establishment in 2005, a total of 16 years. Having been immersed in the industry for so long, she has a good understanding of the history, varieties, and craftsmanship of oolong tea.

“Our company's primary business was originally mountain wasabi, and we had a long-term cooperative relationship with Taiwanese businessmen. By chance, our boss transplanted oolong tea from Taiwan for cultivation in Tengchong.” As a native of Tengchong, Li Xuemei sees oolong tea as a relatively expensive type of tea, even in its original place of origin, Taiwan.

“In earlier times, when Taiwanese people were still quite poor, oolong tea was generally unaffordable for ordinary people. It was reserved as a precious item for the elderly to drink, hence it was called ‘elderly tea.'” Taiwan started planting oolong tea in the first half of the 19th century, with both the tea varieties and processing techniques originating from Fujian.

Later, during the 1970s and 1980s in Taiwan, oolong tea experienced a boom due to innovation movements, giving rise to many popular concepts such as highland tea, Qingxin Oolong, and eco-tea.

Oolong tea, also known as blue-green tea, belongs to the semi-fermented tea category. The basic process involves sun-withering, indoor-withering, shaking, fixation, rolling, and drying. “The traditional processing method of Taiwanese oolong tea in earlier years leaned more towards manual heavy charcoal roasting, but although this produced a charcoal aroma, it lost the natural fragrance of the tea.

Later, the Taiwanese oolong processing methods saw the emergence of the traditional school, which persisted with heavy roasting, and the innovative school, which experimented with light roasting. The innovative school named itself after highland tea, also known as the highland tea school.

The highland tea school believes that a good-tasting oolong tea must allow one to sense the authentic flavor of tea grown in the highlands. Our Extreme Border Oolong follows this approach, introducing the original Qingxin Soft-stem Oolong variety from Taiwan. Benefiting from the humid climate of the Tengchong highlands, we produce high-quality oolong tea.” Li Xuemei explains. In her work, Li Xuemei often faces too many inquiries about how oolong tea can be cultivated in Yunnan?

Where does Yunnan oolong tea excel? “I almost have to answer this question hundreds of times every year. Although oolong tea is a unique category of tea in China, mainly produced in the northern and southern parts of Fujian Province, as well as Guangdong and Taiwan, in recent years, Sichuan, Hunan, and other provinces have also begun limited production.

How does Tengchong produce oolong tea? Actually, it benefits from Tengchong's unique natural conditions.” Tengchong has a subtropical climate, warm and humid, abundant water resources, high-quality volcanic ash soil, sufficient rainfall, and suitable temperatures – these natural advantages provide almost perfect growth conditions for “Extreme Border Oolong Tea.”

The tea plantation of Extreme Border Tea Industry on Mount Qingjing in Wulongba, Mingguang Town, Wuhetownship is adjacent to the Gaoligong Mountain Nature Reserve, 4 kilometers away from the China-Myanmar border, with an altitude reaching up to 2,500 meters, a forest coverage rate of over 80%, and an average altitude of 2,100 meters. It experiences snowfall every year and is one of the few high-altitude snow-covered tea gardens in the world.

In Li Xuemei's view, the ability to make a delicious cup of oolong tea in Yunnan is primarily due to its superior environment. The cold, high-altitude environment of the Tengchong highlands is not suitable for heat-loving, cold-intolerant Pu'er tea. Instead, the climate here is similar to that of Nantou County's Dongding and Alishan in Taiwan, making it very suitable for the growth of oolong tea trees. The high altitude and large temperature difference under highland climate are the fundamental reasons for the high fragrance of Tengchong oolong tea.

In oolong tea varieties, Qingxin Oolong is the preferred choice for high-altitude cultivation. Today, our oolong tea garden covers 31,000 mu (approx. 20,667 acres), with an annual production capacity of 1,200 tons.” High-yield and high-quality Qingxin Oolong tea has attracted numerous fast-moving consumer brands to seek cooperation. Despite ensuring quality, the price of Extreme Border Oolong tea remains relatively low.

To Li Xuemei, this is not surprising. After all, among the standards for a good cup of tea, affordability is also a crucial factor.

Originally published in Pu