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The Wild Tea Trees of Nan Nuo Shan The most notable thing that morning is that it wasn’t raining. It rains a lot in Yunnan in July. Cloudy and wet are not considered good conditions for tea picking. Neither is summer (usually), but I was told they chase the weather, not the calendar, and some farmers are finally getting the weather conditions they want. As we were sitting with Ms. Wang in her tea shop, we observed evidence of this. The spring was too cold and dry. The resulting tea was muted of its potential. Her summer sheng puer, just made, was already fuller and more vital with a warm, oily character.
Hanging out in Ms. Wang’s tea shop drinking the 2019 lot of our 2018 Yiwu Sheng Puer tea Mr. Yang Xiuhai is the maker of these teas and an acquaintance of my travel companion, Daniel. He had to leave unexpectedly before we got there, so Ms. Wang Xiyan (whom none of us had ever met), his business partner, hosted us instead. It is common to hang out, drink tea, and march off into the woods with complete strangers in China. Mr. Yang makes the tea. Ms. Wang runs the business. The shop is gorgeous, but completely comfortable. Their giant tea table had an island surrounded by water with goldfish, live plants, a Plecostomus “suckerfish” (to keep it clean), and topped with dry ice.
Buy Raw (Sheng) Puer Tea HERE
Ms. Wang and her tea table. Without a doubt I would have dropped the cup in the water. The next day we left Ms. Wang’s shop in Jinghong to visit the wild tea trees of Nan Nuo Shan (“shan” means “mountain”) in the Menghai area of Xishuangbanna. On the way up we made an unannounced stop (at least unannounced in English) to meet Mr. Zhao Tian, whose family owns tea fields on the mountain and used to help out Ms. Wang in her tea shop (I would piece together all this information later. At that moment and for many hours to come, I had no idea what was going on, which was typical).
Left: The King of Puer Tea Trees. Not very photogenic, but you don’t have to be at 800 years old.
Right: Me & Mr. ZhaoThe first stop was a visit to the “King of Puer tea trees”, an 800-year-old giant that has been “retired” and is now just here to remind us of the length of time that passes in a place like this. The fields are well taken care of with a few boardwalks and paved walkways, because in China there is such a thing as tea tourists (that would be me on this occasion).
Mr. Zhao Tian We met a tea farmer dressed in camouflage with a small market stand in the middle of the tea fields. We drank tea, ate candy he made from the fruits of the tea plant, and tea eggs. He says that the farmers are no longer growing rice and vegetables on the mountain anymore and are going into town to buy such things. He considers this a good situation and a sign of prosperity. I bought some tea from him.
The tea farmer in camo. It is somehow not considered rude to take over a complete stranger’s tea table and drink his tea. We then traveled to Mr. Zhao’s home in the village of Bama on the same mountain. Let’s just say the conditions are modest by American standards. A one room flat that includes the fire pit where he cooks his food, eats, sleeps, and stays out of the rain or sun. An outdoor patio-like area is attached for washing (clothes/utensils) and an Asian toilet that is not hooked up to running water. His vegetable garden is just off to the side and below this area. His tea drying and processing rooms is on the opposite side of the house. The accommodations may not be fancy, but the material from their tea field is in demand. He plans to build a new house in the village. Modern instead of traditional style, but the fire pit will stay.
Mr. Zhao cooking for us. The traditional fire pit is the most important part of the house and they will retain it even in a modern home. He cooked us a six-course lunch while we drank his tea out on the patio area. He made greens and onions from his garden, bamboo, pickled vegetables, two kinds of smoked pork, and soup. Upon learning how much I love spicy food, he insisted I take home a jar of his homemade hot pepper blend, along with some of his tea. I just met this guy this morning.
Mr. Zhao's tea fields After lunch we hiked up (mostly vertical) into his family’s tea fields on the side of the mountain near his home. There were wild tea trees of a range of ages intermixed with pruned, terraced tea bushes for easier picking. It was all woven through a largely untouched ecosystem that will keep the plants healthy (and bite Mr. Zhao’s foot at one point).
Mr. Zhao’s mother and Ms. Wang picking tea. His mother was out there picking tea for summer material that was still in demand. From here I could see down over the village in what for me was an exotic landscape, but for them could not be more mundane. This place is not a carefully messaged brand, it is just life – as important and regular as anywhere else. Their tea will arrive at TeaSource in late September if all goes well. A transaction that will hopefully warrant a return visit someday.
The village of Bama as witnessed from the tea fields. Tea on Mr. Zhao's Patio. -Michael Lannier, Operations Manager
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In 2013, TeaSource was part of a U.S. trade mission to Puer, Yunnan, China. During this trip, Bill met Ms. Zhao Yu Jie and she has been one of our direct sources for black tea and puer ever since. She and her husband Mr. Pan make up the Hanming Xuan Tea Company in Kunming, China.
TeaSource Operations Manager Michael will be visiting Ms. Zhao in Yunnan this July. Stay tuned for more exciting teas and travelogues!
Bill having tea with Ms. Zhao for the first time
puer tea" rel="noopener noreferrer">SHOP MS. ZHAO'S TEAS
Ms. Zhao’s teas are entirely handmade from wild tea trees grown at a 6000' elevation. Each tree is between 80 to 100 years old, which requires them to climb high into the branches to pluck the young leaves at the tips of the branches. During plucking season Ms. Zhao will call on her extended family to help pluck leaves.
Ms. Zhao (yellow jacket) and her extended family
Ms. Zhao has been producing puers and black teas for over ten years, having learned the tea business from her father who worked for old Chinese state-owned tea companies. This is a full-time family business through and through. Ms. Zhao’s teas are truly exquisite with depth and variety in color, aroma, and texture. Teas like this are not commodities; they are works of art.
Ms. Zhao's Wild Mountain Yunnan
Buy it HERE
An old wild tree in Chang Ning County of Menghai City, Yunnan
Ms. Zhao high up in a tea tree plucking the youngest tea leaves and buds to make one of her fabulous teas.
Ms. Zhao with a basket full freshly plucked wild tea leaves.
Ms. Zhao and her husband Mr. Pan
Mr. Pan hand-rolling the leaves, the second step toward making a wonderful finished tea.
Ms. Zhao sun-withers the leaves which imparts a nuance to the finished tea, unattainable by factory withering.
Raw material
puer tea" rel="noopener noreferrer">SHOP MS. ZHAO'S TEAS
Pan firing tea leaves for making Puer at about 200°C. This step takes 30-45 minutes per batch.
Ripe Puer that was just made.
When the leaf turns brownish-red and the bud becomes a gold/yellow color, that means the taste is soft and the bitterness decreased. That's the visual cue to stop post fermentation and move to drying.
Ms. Zhao's 2014 Sheng Puer Pearl - Limited quantity
Buy it HERE
Ms. Zhao's Golden Needle black tea
Buy it HERE
View from Ms. Zhao's tea fields
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Travelogues and stories about sourcing tea all over the world.
A cool part of owning a tea company, given the fact that tea wasn’t grown in the U.S. until recently - is that you have to go where the tea is. Since the beginning, that has always been part of the plan: go to tea country, walk the fields with the growers, be in the factory as they make the tea, choose the teas I want to buy right there as they are being finished, and bring those teas directly back to the U.S.
We started doing that in 2001, and every year since we have tried to move further in this direction. In 2001 this was a little unheard of; in 2018 it is called Direct Sourcing.
One of the best parts of direct sourcing is meeting and building relationships with the people. Tea folk are linked by a love of tea. And this love of tea bridges all barriers: language, culture, and generational.
Here is a quick overview of some of our tea travels and Direct Sourcing we have done over the last 20 years. At this point, I have visited all of these locales numerous times and built relationships and friendships that are as strong as a hearty Assam.
Taiwan
There have been numerous trips to Taiwan over the last 20 years. The first was in 2001. This was my first trip to tea country.
Taiwan 2001, with 3 gentlemen who know a lot more about tea than I do: left to right Mr. Hsieh (we are at his tea packing factory), me, Mr. Fong (the patriarch of Bao Zhong production in Pingling village in northern Taiwan), and Mr. Jackson Huang, one of the great tea masters in Taiwan.
Jackson Huang and Mr. Fong have been continuing sources of inspiration and education to me for the past 17 years. They also got me drunker than a skunk one afternoon at Mr. Fong’s great grand-daughter’s restaurant on his “home-made wine.” But that is a different blog post.
A man who loves tea, Mr. Fong is the recognized Bao Zhong tea master in Pingling village in northern Taiwan.
SHOP TAIWANESE TEAS
Taiwan is beautiful, but arable land is scarce so they squeeze in tea fields whereever they can. Above are a couple of tiny tea fields shoe-horned under a small hillside containing ancestral burial tombs.
Ceylon (Sri Lanka)
The next country I visited was Ceylon in 2003. I have since made a number of trips to Ceylon. This island nation is located off the SE tip of India. When Europeans first “discovered” Ceylon (people had been living there for centuries), they thought they had discovered the literal Garden of Eden because they couldn’t imagine any other place being so beautiful.
The only thing that surpasses the beauty of Ceylon is the friendliness and hospitality of its people.
Tea pluckers at the Rothschild Estate in central Ceylon.
Some much less skilled tea pluckers at the Lumbini Estate (that's me on the left and my wife Liz on the right).
TeaSource has a special relationship with the Lumbini Tea Estate. They have helped us and we have helped them many, many times over the years. They are friends first and foremost and business partners second. That happens a lot in the tea industry. And they just happen to make the best tea in Ceylon.
While we were exploring the entire Lumbini Valley, we ran into children of employees of the Lumbini Tea Factory. The owner and director of Lumbini, Chaminda Jayawardana, is in the background-center in the green shirt.
SHOP LUMBINI TEAS
In 2017, we were honored to be part of the ground-breaking ceremony for a new crèche and school for children of tea workers at Lumbini. TeaSource is proud to provide financial support to this crèche and school for the foreseeable future.
China
China is the birthplace of tea, despite what certain Anglophiles might say.
At least 15 of China’s provinces make tea. They all make different teas, have different tea cultures, and all think their tea is the best tea in China. So this is a very brief overview of the many tea trips to China that TeaSource has made. The people we meet and the teas we source are inexorably linked.
In 2005, I was invited to speak at the World Tea Forum in Beijing. This surprised the heck out of me. My first thought was that they just wanted a white guy, so I typed “Tea guy in America” into Google and my name came up.
Giving my speech with a simultaneous translator was a very interesting experience, especially for someone like me who talks with my hands and tends to stray from the script a lot.
In 2013, I was part of a U.S. trade mission to Puer, Yunnan, China. Ms. Zhao Yu Jie of Yunnan, China (above) has become one of our absolute favorite tea suppliers. She and her husband make the most incredible puers and black tea.
SHOP MS. ZHAO'S TEAS
People who say “wine country is so beautiful’ clearly have never visited tea country. Just look at the rolling tea fields in the mountains of Sichuan province in south central China.
Japan
Japan is the second nation to have adopted tea in the 8th century. I made my first visit to Japan in 2005 and have been back a few times since.
Mt. Fuji in the background with many tea fields (and gigantic fans) in the foreground.
In 2012 I was invited by Japan’s Dept. of Trade to visit and meet with tea growers. It was a wonderful experience and allowed me to develop new relationships with old family-owned tea companies. One of them was the Otsuka Green Tea Co., who have since visited us in Minnesota. They are one of our favorite Direct Sources for green tea.
SHOP OTSUKA TEAS
Women plucking leaves for Otsuka Tea Co. Karigane is one of my favorite teas from Otsuka.
The Japanese are probably the most innovative of all the tea producing tea nations. This is a tea plucking machine I saw being used near Shizuoka, Japan. Most good tea is still hand-plucked, but finding the labor for that is getting more difficult. This machine can pluck tea almost to the level of quality and care of a human tea plucker. It reminds me a little of R2D2.
India
India has been making tea since the 1830’s. TeaSource has imported teas directly from India since around 2006. I’m embarrassed that I didn’t visit India until 2012; but I’ve made up for it ever since.
Dawn in Assam at the Nya Gogra Estate.
Plucking on Darjeeling mountain sides.
SHOP INDIAN TEAS
I've said it before and I'll say it again: one of the best parts of going to tea country to find tea is the people you meet along the way. Dilma saw me and my friend walking down the dirt road in a tiny village on the Darjeeling/Nepal border and invited us in for tea.
Dilma offered us black tea or milk tea. I chose milk tea. She ran outside, milked her cow, brought in the milk, and made one of the most marvelous drinks I have ever had.
Tea isn’t just about an amazing beverage; it is about the amazing people and cultures that are intertwined with that beverage. I am incredibly blessed to be a witness to and a tiny part of that.
Bill Waddington
Tea Merchant
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When I travel to tea country I am searching for teas; but the most memorable thing is always the people. Sometimes it’s the beginning of lifelong friendships, sometimes it’s a just a chance encounter on a dusty road. But I remember the people and keep them in my heart, long after I’ve sold out of the teas.
Since March is Darjeeling month I wanted to show some of the wonderful people of Darjeeling I encountered on my last trip to India.
In the offices of Darjeeling tea master and exporter, Rajiv Gupta, receiving a book on Darjeeling he helped produce.
Sudhanshu Kumar Shaw and his manager by the rolling machine at Giddapahar Estate. This is one of our favorite Darjeeling tea gardens.
At Goomtee Tea Estate, they also have a small greenhouse. Here is the assistant manager of the Goomtee factory making sure I have some fresh flowers when it is time to hit the road.
I took a long walk near the Goomtee Estate, these four teenage girls asked me to take their picture.
Immediately after which, they cracked themselves up.
Tea pluckers at the Rohini Estate. One of the few spots where the Darjeeling tea fields are not scaling up a mountainside.
Enjoying tea at a road-side café in the mountains of Darjeeling.
Watching Indian milk tea being made at a stall in Darjeeling near the Nepalese border.
Kids hanging out, while Mom (see above) makes milk tea, and dad laughs in the background.
Cupping teas at the Castleton Estate with one of the assistant managers of the factory making the tea. You can tell they are first flush teas by light golden/yellow color.
Having way too much fun tasting teas, with the manager of the Belgachi Estate, on the outskirts of the Darjeeling district. As we were standing for our formal photo, he suddenly leaped and shoved that bag of tea into my hands.
Siliguri (the largest town in Darjeeling District); two ladies out and about.
A vendor greeting his customer in the Siliguri market area.
A chai wallah selling her chai on the streets of Siliguri.
Kids, on their way home from school near Kuresong, Darjeeling.
Lots of school kids hitching a ride home at the end of the day.
A retired veteran of the India Gurkha Rifles, living the good life on the Nepal/Darjeeling border. One of the most interesting men I’ve ever met.
Walking down the road in this same Darjeeling/Nepal village, Dilma graciously invited me into her home for tea; milk tea it turns out—she had to run out and milk the cow and get some fresh milk.
Dilma, in the living room of her lovely home; with home-made fried sweet bread to go with the tea. She was incredibly gracious and hospitable to a couple of strangers walking down the road.
Rajah Banerjee, the first organic planter in Darjeeling, and the patriarch of Makaibari Tea Estate.
Planting some new tea plants at Margaret’s Hope Estate.
These guys were playing soccer on the dirt road separating two fields of tea plants in lower Darjeeling. Most of them had family working on the tea estates.
Wherever you go, whatever you do, it’s the people that matter the most.
(although a good cup of Darjeeling can be amazing).-Bill Waddington
All photos property of TeaSource, and may not be used for commercial purposes without express permission.
Copyright TeaSource © 2015 -
The Gateway Arch as seen across a downtown traffic jam
Over the last weekend of May, the World Tea and Coffee Fest descended on Long Beach, CA and St. Louis, MO respectively. TeaSource exhibited at both, an exhausting but thrilling experience that we’re still recovering from. Bill, Michael, and warehouse specialist Ryan were in Long Beach while manager Sarah and I went to St. Louis.
Our pallet of supplies and samples arriving at our booth in St. Louis (in this photo, the bottom of the pallet is about 10’ off the ground)
Coffee Fest is a fun show to be at, especially as a tea person. I learned a ton about coffee, especially coffee importing, and got to spread the word about how easy it is to make a quality cup of loose tea. I even got to teach a class on the subject on the very first day of the show.
Our booth, moments before the show opened
Over the course of the weekend we met with dozens of people in the coffee industry, from people opening new shops to people who have been importing and roasting for a decade or more. While talking with everyone was great, my favorite conversations were the ones that started with someone saying they didn’t like tea and ended with them taking samples because they loved our tea.
Far and away the most popular tea was Iced Red Berries. People were glad of a refreshing, caffeine-free option after all of the coffee samples! Iced Green Tea Mango was another one that people couldn’t stop raving about. The weather was hot and muggy while we were in St. Louis, so people gravitated toward cold teas. Even though iced teas were popular, we got many questions about how we make our house chai. Making a fresh and delicious chai is an easy way to impress your customers (or your friends!) and can be very easy to do! You can find our recipe here.
Prohibition began in 1920 and ended in 1933. The Thaxton Speakeasy was established in 1927.
Being in St. Louis wasn’t all work, however. Sarah and I got a chance to sample beverages of another kind, including sake, and drinks at a real, password protected speakeasy founded a few years before Prohibition ended in the U.S. Trade shows are an opportunity for us to learn from other in the beverage industry and bring our passion and knowledge to new people who are thinking about taking the plunge and opening their own tea or coffee shop. All the work of planning a trip of this kind leads up to being able to do one thing: have conversations with others about how great tea is. It's challenging, but handing a sample to a new tea drinker makes it all worthwhile.
-Timothy Otte
Wholesale ManagerView Post About Going Out for Drinks: Coffee Fest in St. Louis
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In Kolkata I ended up staying in a very cheap, barebones, locals-only hotel, in a neighborhood where I was the only westerner for miles; because it was the closest hotel to the convention center, only 3 km away. I could walk to the convention. All other hotels (re: higher rated and more expensive) were all 6-10 km away from the convention center. The moral here is never trust the pictures you see on internet travel sites. I certainly got a chance to see “authentic” Kolkata, not just the touristy parts, although I saw some of that too. The most annoying thing about clichés is that they are often true. Kolkata, a teaming mass of humanity … Lots of people, noisy crowded streets, mullahs chanting, music constantly being played over public loudspeakers, public ablutions, the poorest poor-the richest rich, friendly/helpful people-lots of stares 'what's he doing here.' Smells: spices-people-industry-motor fumes-trash and litter. Hot-dusty-dry, mosquitoes, livestock all over the roads (not just cows), dirt roads, CRAZY drivers, push carts, stalls with all manner of goods, lively, thriving, throbbing, pulsing ... Kolkata - City of Joy.
View from my hotel room, toward the back of the hotel.
View from my hotel room, toward the back, doing the laundry.
View from my hotel: toward the front- the street the hotel is located on.
For the record, this was not the roughest hotel room I have ever stayed in - that would have been in Guthrie Center, Iowa.
Near my hotel room and the convention center: fishing and washing seem to go together.
Shopping near my hotel room
More shopping near my hotel.
Kolkata, street scenes: near Chowinghee Road
Kolkata street scenes, more shopping
Kolkata street scene: yet more shopping
Kolkata street scene: it’s starting to get crazy.
To make the shopping easier.
Fruit and vegetable stands were all over India, this was a larger one. These are in lieu of what we call traditional grocery stores-the product looked great and was very fresh-think of our farmer’s markets.
Hogg Market: more fresh groceries; those are chickens running around in those cages.
Hogg Market: you can get the exact cut of meat you want.
Carrying product to the market
Sisters making bracelets to sell at the market.
It took a long time, but I finally found some tea in Kolkata. I hadn’t even seen a chaiwallah. The Cha Bar was located inside Oxford Books, the best book store in Kolkata, of course in the touristy section of town.
It actually was a pretty neat layout. A pretty good selection of 50 or 60 teas. And they offered food, not a full blown restaurant, but sort of like a café or diner. I was going to order some Indian food, but then I noticed this which unfortunately really reminded me of something back in the States.
I figured I had to try the India version of a McDonalds knock off.
This, along with a pretty good Assam black tea from the Khobong Tea Garden (of course with the assumption that sugar will be used), actually wasn’t bad. Later on I did run across a real McDonalds, but they don’t serve hamburgers (this is India after all; cows are wandering around the streets-not residing between two pieces of bread). Why are the most ubiquitous American exports those things that we are kind of embarrassed about?Kolkata is very cool, a little unsettling, and definitely can make you feel like a stranger in a strange land.Up next, the hills of Darjeeling.
-Bill
