Bi Luo Chun (碧螺春)
archetype: Spring girl with fruits
A young girl with a basket of the first fruits: spiral leaves, a fruity tenderness, the scent of peaches from the orchard next door.
History
Bi Luo Chun — 'emerald spring spiral' — is one of the ten famous teas of China. It grows on Mount Dongtingshan above Lake Taihu (Jiangsu), shoulder to shoulder with fruit trees — peach, apricot, loquat. The tea bush's roots and the fruit trees' roots share the same soil, and the leaf gathers their pollen and fruity esters. Each leaf is rolled by hand into a tight half-centimetre spiral.
Terroir
The leaf is gathered exclusively by hand, before the Qingming festival (5 April). Some 60–80 thousand young buds go into 500 g of finished leaf.
Leaf
peach, apricot, floral pollen, a light nutty-sweet base; in the middle infusions a honeyed tenderness thin, sweet, long for a green tea; the aftertaste is a fruit trail in the throat
Properties
rich in catechins and the natural volatile esters of fruit trees; gentle stimulation light, rising, warm in the upper chest; felt as the first spring moderate (25–40 mg)
Brewing ritual
a glass of 200 ml — pour water first, leaf after; 75 °C, very soft; 4 g / 200 ml. 30s — the first opening — peach, floral pollen; 50s — the peak: apricot, light honey; 80s — a nutty base, a long soft note.
When to drink
morning and early day — for a fresh mood. early spring — when you want fruit to wake in the blood. when winter sits in the blood, after a long grey stretch