The spring rain fell on my hair and shoulders, and it was a little cold. Kechun breath or swept over to break in. Green is the theme of this season. Tea trees that have experienced sunshine and rain have undoubtedly become the messengers of spring.
Tea has a history of thousands of years in China. According to historical records, tea was recorded as a tribute in the Western Zhou Dynasty. The history of growing tea in Jiangnan can be traced back to the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties. In the Tang Dynasty, Gongyuan was located in Changxing, Huzhou, Zhejiang Province, showing the richness of tea in the south of the Yangtze River.
Fried tea originated in the Ming Dynasty. Pursuing the original special aroma and taste of tea is one of the characteristics of Ming people. For example, in the Tang Dynasty, they simply cooked tea: put tea powder into boiling water, boil it like jiaozi, and drink the pot of tea soup. And after that? We can see from the TV series "Know No" that the so-called tea drinking in the Northern Song Dynasty is actually to order tea, that is, to pour boiling water into tea powder and stir it quickly. Therefore, in the Ming Dynasty, they questioned the previous methods of making and drinking tea, thinking that all these lost the natural and pure taste of tea, so they criticized that in the Tang and Song Dynasties, the more refined the paste was, the less fragrant the tea was. So, how can we be good at frying without destroying the truth? It is improved on the basis of steaming green in Ming Dynasty, and it is a more perfect "frying green method".
The story of "tea" in Nanbei Lake can be started from fried green. The original fried tea was made by hand. Boiling pots and clear tea leaves fly from left hand to right hand, and then gently overflow from fingers. It sounds as beautiful as poetry, but it is a boring and monotonous skill. The temperature is not high or low, and the time is not long or short. Moreover, like other skills, tea frying is mostly handed down by ancestors, and the first stop of wok may be a lifetime. And a pair of hands, because often burned by steam at low temperature, become rough.
In my childhood memory, the smell of being fried is always infiltrating quietly.
On summer afternoons, grandpa likes to lie on a cane chair. On the left is an old radio, which contains endless Peking Opera. The radio often goes on strike. Grandpa picked it up and knocked it on the stool, and then Beijing Opera continued. On the right is an old teapot that hasn't changed. Grandpa squinted, snorted and took a sip of tea. Grandpa drinks tea loudly and snores like thunder, like the best nectar in the world. I came back sweating, and I couldn't pour any more water. I picked up grandpa's teapot and poured it into my mouth. It was very strong and especially thirsty. I drank it all at once, playfully grabbed the tea and threw it in. Grandpa's eyebrows are thick and black. I looked at the crooked tea at the bottom of the pot and once suspected that it was my grandfather's eyebrows that fell in. Grandpa smiled and looked at me affectionately, then got up and went to the yard to help me pick a bunch of grapes or a tender cucumber with flowers at the base. Later, I have been looking for the simple taste in grandpa's teapot, the thick fragrance, and I miss the old tea with a strong smell of infiltrating soil.
Not only we, but also celebrities like to eat fried green in Nanbei Lake. It is said that when Huang Yuan returned to his hometown, he carefully packed some newly fried vegetables for Lu Xun. Lu Xun was full of praise after drinking, and he didn't want to share it with himself. He treasured it and shared it with precious guests when they visited. I just don't know whether Mr. Lu Xun is drinking the taste of tea or the feelings of his hometown.
Nowadays, I seldom drink fried green, but mostly drink Longjing.
Mr. Cao from Nanbei Lake told me that the process of frying green and Longjing is different. Mr. Cao is a tea-frying man who inherits his father's generation. Personally, I think it might be more appropriate to call him a tea maker. Stir-fried tea also needs spirit.
In the early 1990s, 25-year-old Mr. Cao began to learn how to stir-fry tea. It has been 30 years now. He practiced the manuscript and made great efforts to stir-fry tea. His eyes, ears and nose functions have been fully exerted, and he can hear whether the temperature of the fried tea is in place only with his ears. With a beep, the palm of your hand quickly pressed the tea and slowly caressed it into a flat Longjing.
Of course, the current tea factory is not making Longjing by hand, but a modern machine that is convenient to use. After the tea leaves are picked, they can be packed after the trilogy of fixing, unhairing and steaming. But it still sounds complicated: picking tea requires a lot of workers, and making 1 kg Longjing requires 4.5 kg per leaf; It takes another 3 hours to make 1 kg of tea. In the production process, it is necessary to adjust the tea frying process in time. For example, the tea picked in sunny days and cloudy days is different, the tea picked in the morning and afternoon is different, and the tea picked in the north and south is different. This technique is a bit like what Chinese medicine has heard and asked, so it can't be recorded and described in detail. It depends entirely on the feeling of the production process. I don't think this method will get in the way if it is not a basic skill for several years or even decades.
The best time to drink Longjing is from mid-March to early April. At that time, the climate was excellent, with dew in the morning and sunshine in the afternoon. Nutrient accumulation in spring, summer, autumn and winter broke out in the call of spring rain, making tea fragrant without frying. Naturally, the bud shape at this time is also good-looking, with one leaf and one core, which is as delicate as a touch and water can be sprayed out. At this time, if you can get some tea before the Ming Dynasty, it will be extremely precious. Tea leaves are green, and the fragrance escapes when the box is opened. Put a pinch in a glass-it takes a glass to drink Longjing, and watching the slender tea leaves stretch and sway in the water, and the tea soup slowly changes from light color to dark color, which is also an indispensable pleasure to drink green tea. In a short time, a few pieces of tea that were still lazily floating on the cup surface were blown away, and the refreshing and slightly astringent fragrance could not wait to swim into the nose. In addition to tea, there is a faint layer of fluff floating on the teacup, which needs to be reflected in the sun to see clearly.
After Qingming Festival, it will be two leaves and one core, or later, it will be four leaves and one core in mass production. Spring and summer is a good time to drink Longjing. After drinking three mouthfuls of Longjing in Nanbei Lake, you will smack your lips like an alcoholic and have a sweet aftertaste. But one day when I was drinking tea in Hulushan, I tasted a little fresh and salty, which was very refreshing. I guess Hulu Mountain is by the sea.
In autumn and winter, the bleak north wind blows, and I like to drink black tea for a while. I used to drink the race of Masayama, Jin Junmei. In winter, they generously bloom with warm fragrance. Occasionally, drink the wild black tea on the top of Ying Chao. It is mellow and silky, and the aftertaste is actually rich in coffee and soft in milk tea. Suddenly realized that the original delicious black tea was also in Nanbei Lake. No wonder the literati in Ming Dynasty lamented that "tea leaves Ying Chao like Wuyi".
My good friend Wo is from Zhangpu. Knowing that I love tea, one day she brought me black tea made by herself. She said shyly, I may not do well, but the tea tree is an old one.
I can't wait to take out the tea set, brew it, filter it and put it in the cup. The brown color is crystal clear, the taste is deep and rich, and the fragrance is profound. It is very appropriate to think of a sentence "the call of distant mountains"
Wo said: I picked this tea, my husband rubbed it and my mother-in-law steamed it. When she said this, her eyes were bright, clear and soft. I am a simple woman. She has never seen fashion, but she loves reading and writing, and likes to make tea and taste tea. Her unique temperament dripping from her bones makes her beautiful beyond compare.
There is no limit to what you can drink. Can have such a good tea to comfort the flustered years, life will restore peace and beauty in an instant.
Nanbei Lake and Tea Tree can write a long and intertwined historical story. According to the record of falling into the water, there has been a culture of tea in Ganpu since the Song Dynasty, so I decided to visit the oldest tea tree in Nanbei Lake.
I have been to Baiyun Pavilion when I just poked my head out in spring. There are tea trees all over the mountain, showing new buds timidly in the thin spring rain. At first, the tea trees planted in Jiukeng were gradually replaced by Longjing 43. Later, the imported black cattle were favored by tea farmers because they were picked earlier.
Some old tea trees in Ganpu are behind the ridge of a black cow. Unlike what I expected, the old tea tree is not as tall and straight as the hawthorn tree in the wilderness, but has the same branches, many of which come out directly from the roots, just like the untouched Vitex negundo trees in front of my old house.
These old tea trees are said to have a history of more than 50 years, but I think we may find an older tea tree, or a more vigorous old tea tree. So in early summer, the four of us, led by local tea farmer Tang, set out from Nanmu Mountain and went to Levin Mountain with great interest.
The road was quiet, with birds singing from time to time, and the crisp sound spread from one end of the mountain to the other. The mountains are green, the trees are green, and the moss on the stones is green. Different from the light green in spring, its green is calm and atmospheric, wrapped in such green, as if living in all beautiful possibilities.
However, we didn't find the old tea tree until Gaoyang Mountain. The large tea forest on the roadside has been trimmed by tea farmers, leaving only one, which has become a low clump. Tang said that this kind of tea is usually pruned after spring harvest, so that the picked noodles will be bigger and germinate more and more. I asked, and then wait for spring to sprout? Soup stock smiled, and the lines on his face were as full as tea trees: we picked spring tea, summer tea and autumn tea three times a year, and the last time was autumn, so it was also called autumn dew.
Seen from the mountain, the mountains are continuous and green in the distance. Like a cup of green tea, it is thick and faint, quietly hiding in this mountain forest, but it is clearly a pot of black tea, so it means a long time.
Take another road down the hill. Turning a path, Tang suddenly shouted excitedly, there is an old tea tree here, which is still wild. Sure enough, a tea tree was wrapped in messy bushes. At first glance, you can't tell the difference between this green and another green. Looking closely, it is similar to the old tea tree in Baiyun Pavilion, with a branch that is trying to extend outward. Tang carefully tore off the fine vines attached to the old tea tree: it will take about 60 years, maybe longer.
Suddenly it doesn't matter how many years the tea tree is. Not as important as the old trees I thought. The top grade of Nanbeihu tea is made from the buds of these old tea trees, just like the tea made by my friend He himself, which makes people feel the breath of Shan Ye. These old tea trees, with their life's greenery, bear the power of Shan Ye, and bring the feelings of the two lakes to all parts of the world, leaving us with a heavy heritage, which is even more memorable.
The old tea tree in early summer is still flourishing, even without the core and leaves that can be picked, it still has a fragrance that floats with the wind. It quietly waits for the next spring.