Huangtang "Yellow Broth" 2021

This is a lesser known tea that went extinct in the 1930s, as its method for craftsmanship had solely been passed down orally, within tea-making families that lived in Pingyang, a small county of Zhejiang Province.

In the 1980s local technicians from the Department of Cultural History attempted to make Pingyang Yellow Broth again and have been supporting tea growers in the region reviving this historical tea since.

This one comes from Mr. Huang, whose father used to craft small batches of "Yellow Broth." Mr. Huang's heritage tea garden is situated in the central region of Pingyang, at 1300 ft elevation. The trees are an indigenous heirloom varietal, some more than a century old.

Following the strict picking standard of one-bud-one-leaf, the freshly harvested leaves are pan fried and roasted over charcoal, before being wrapped in rice paper for the "meng huang," or "smothering," stage, essential to the making of a yellow tea. The tea stays in these rice paper parcels for 2 hours, after which it is roasted over charcoal again. This Pingyang Yellow Broth goes through five rounds of the "smothering" process, resulting in a rich and viscous tea with distinct, reductive characteristics.

There is nothing quite like a traditional yellow tea. This one, now aged for about 5 years, has a mouthfeel as weighty as gyokuro, the cleansing quality of a green tea, and the mineral complexity of an oolong. The tea cake is stunning: broad, thin, and gently domed. For those of us accustomed to seeing pu'erh cakes it looks pixelated, because the leaves and stems are so delicate and fine.

Its impressive broth-like density feels nutritive, while its delicate aromatic notes of sourdough and cinnamon are very comforting. The aging has softened its fresher, vegetal notes and brought out a spiced sweetness. This is a tea that gets better and better with age, and that we believe everyone, at some point, must try.