Although she doesn't have the look of a wizened old sage, she really is a flowering tea master. With her beautiful, delicate and skilled hands, she makes some of the finest flowering teas in China and also teaches all the flowering tea artists in the production house.
First, tea buds are picked from fields around Fuan from Da Bai tea trees.
Then, after withering they are taken to the hand-tying house to be individually selected and tied together in neat little stacks
Then flowers are tied onto the tea stack
Various flowers can be used including lily, red amaranth and jasmine flowers. These are grown in Anhui, Tibet and Yunnan provinces
Finally the stack of flowers and tea buds is carefully shaped into a ball and wrapped in muslin to keep the shape while it's dried over gentle heat. (Sorry, I forgot to get a photo of this and all the old ones I have look rubbish - we will put a video up soon though.)And this is what you are left with. Serving tip: watch your tea open and enjoy the light, sweet aromtic flavours, whilst thinking of the skilled tea master and imagining yourself in the mystic scene in the background to this photo.
