Lapsang souchong (AKA Zheng Shan Xiao Zhong) is a black tea modelled after the first ever black tea produced, legend has it a group of farmers were forced to leave their tea harvest in a hurry shortly after picking, they returned some time later to find it heavily oxidized, rather than take home to sell what they considered bad tea they decided to roast and drink it then and there, so with pine wood from the surrounding forest they fired this oxidized tea and found the taste had transformed and it was a wholly different sensation, thus black/red tea was born.

Grown and produced in Wuyi, Fujian, China,

Processing:

1. Withering: After picking the leaves (each picking is ideally 2 intact leaves and 1 bud) are transported to the factory where they’re placed on flat bamboo woven baskets in a smoking house known as a yan fang, this is a three story building with a fire burning pine wood on the bottom, an empty room serving as a tube in the middle, and a third room on the top where the tea is placed, the smoke from the pine wood travels upwards and fills the building causing the tea leaves to whither from the residual heat and release a lot of their water content, absorbing the smoke for 2-3 days.

2. Rolling: The leaves are next moved to rolling machines to first shape them, and secondly bruise the cells of the leaves improving the flavour, hastening oxidization, and drawing the tea’s oils out to the surface. This step takes about 20-30 minutes depending on the thickness of the leaves.

3. Oxidizing: The leaves are heaped in baskets to oxidize for an additional 16 hours in the yan fang, and continue to absorb the smoke, this is where the most profound chemical changes happen and where the black tea taste is really developed.

4. Drying: Finally the tea is spread out into 1 layer in the same room and left for 2-3 more days to fully dry out ready for packing and sale.