# Hui gan (回甘, huígān)

Hui gan (回甘, huígān) — "returning sweetness": an aftertaste in which, after a sip of tea, a growing sweetness emerges in the throat and at the root of the tongue. One of the main markers of quality tea.

Literally, hui gan means "the return of sweetness." It is not the sweetness of the liquor itself but the body's response: the tea may be astringent, even slightly bitter, in the mouth, yet a few seconds after the swallow a cool, almost fruity sweetness unfolds in the throat. The Chinese tasting tradition puts it this way: bitterness that turns into sweetness is the sign of a living tea; bitterness that stays bitter is the sign of a crude one.

The mechanism involves the polyphenols of the tea leaf: they momentarily "bind" the receptors, and the contrast of sensations is then read as sweetness. Hui gan shows most vividly in young sheng pu-erh, in Wuyishan oolongs such as Rou Gui, and in fine green teas — Taiping Houkui, for example. The older the trees and the cleaner the material, the longer this trail lingers.

For the practitioner, hui gan is a useful evaluation tool: when tasting an unfamiliar tea, pay attention not to the first taste but to what happens ten to twenty seconds after the swallow. A long, deep aftertaste almost always speaks of good raw material, even if the liquor itself seemed plain. The mistake is confusing hui gan with the simple sweetness of the brew: a sweet tea and a tea with a sweet return are different phenomena, and the second is prized far more highly.

Source: https://www.dao-cha.info/en/glossary/hui-gan