Yellow tea: Meng Ding Huang Ya

Makes me very happy. Better than Long Jing.
Yellow tea » Bud tea, ★★★★★
Also known as: 蒙頂黃芽, Mountain Snow Buds.

Picking up these juicy leaves feels like handling a flock of miniature pigeons. They look adorable, and the wet leaves are even plumper once they’ve been brewed. So cute!

Yellow tea differs from all other tea types in that it’s undergone “闷黄”, or ‘yellowing’ during production. During ‘yellowing’, warm, damp tea leaves are sweltered in a closed container. The resulting brew will taste more mellow than green tea, and the liquor (technical name from ‘tea-water’) will appear pale yellow.

That said, the roasted, nutty taste of Meng Ding Huang Ya very much resembles that of Long Jing (a green tea). Yet, it’s sweeter and smoother than Long Jing, and mellower to the point that it completely lacks astringency.

To demonstrate how sweet this tea is, I did an experiment. I brewed Meng Ding Huang Ya repeatedly in 100 °C boiling water. To my surprise, this exaggerated the sweetness of the tea—it still tasted like dew! After eight scalding brews, absolutely no bitterness or astringency was present. Magical!

Meng Ding Huang Ya is a gem—one tea I could drink every day. The best free sample I ever tasted. Love it. ★★★★★