Tea

Not all mountains are equal. Not all Mao Feng is the same.Huangshan produces Mao Feng across many of its valleys and slopes. But within Huangshan, there is a...

Close your eyes. Breathe in. You are standing in a jasmine garden at dusk.There is a moment, just before the sun sets on a summer evening, when jasmine relea...

Most green teas whisper. This one speaks clearly.Taiping Houkui — 太平猴魁, "Peaceful Monkey King" — is unlike any other green tea in China. Where most greens ar...

Before the rains come, before the mountain warms — there is a window of perhaps ten days. This tea is from that window.Mingqian — 明前, "before Qingming" — is ...

The mountain keeps its secrets. The tea gives them away.Huangshan — Yellow Mountain — is one of the most painted, most photographed, most written-about lands...

The drums are beating. The dragon is awake. Pour the tea.Every year on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, China comes alive with the sound of drums. Dra...

Some people make the path smoother for everyone who walks behind them. This is for them.In Chinese, yi fan feng shun — 一帆风顺 — means "smooth sailing": the win...

You give so much. This tea gives back.In traditional Chinese medicine, qi — the vital energy that animates everything — is not infinite. It can be depleted b...

The desert remembers how to endure. This tea carries that memory.Cistanche — 肉苁蓉, the "Desert Ginseng" — grows in the harshest landscapes on earth: the Gobi,...

The best gift is one that asks the recipient to slow down.Tea has been China's language of care for five thousand years. Before flowers, before cards, before...