Speaking of ZheJiang tea. I seem to have three types of gunpowder tea.
Could you maybe explain the difference?

I have from cheapest to most expensive: Special Gunpowder, Extra
Gunpowder, and Pinhead Gunpowder. They ranged in price from 4 dollars
a pound to 5.50 a pound.

I'm very curious as to what exactly the difference is.

And if you know also, what is the difference between Sencha and Hojicha?

I'm having trouble finding these data.

-S.


On 2006-01-23 08:18:42 -0800, "Space Cowboy" said:

Bi Luo Chun is from JiangSu province. One grade is oblong and snail
shape. Gunpowder tea from ZheJiang province is two grades pinhead and
pearl. The shinier the leaf the fresher which is a desired
characterisic of smaller pinhead while larger pearl is end of season
old leaf. The names for Chinese teas comes from the fog of history.
You can trace each name to a locale and way of processing.

Jim

S. Chancellor wrote:
On 2006-01-22 15:06:55 -0800, "
said:

S. Chancellor wrote:
Is bi luo chun considered a type of gunpowder tea? If not, what is it?

-S.

Bi Luo Chun (or Piluochun) is a green tea, it is a different tea to
Gunpowder, for sure. I have seen types that are curled gently rather
than compressed into pellets, which is because guess that for quality
tea it would be impossible to make pellets using just the bud and first
leaf. The quality of Bi Luo Chun (originally grown in Dong Ting,
Jiangsu?) is a lot higher than Gunpowder (originally grown in Anhui?)
in general.

From what I gather (correct me if I am wrong) there are so many subtle
differences in Chinese teas that to categorise something as part of
something else is rather difficult.


I thought that gunpowder only referred to the way the tea is processed?
As far as I can tell the bi luo chun and this gunpowder looks the
same? Speaking of which,
what is Extra Gunpowder and Special Gunpowder and what is it compared
to just regular ol' gunpowder? Are either of those the same as Pinhead
gunpowder?

-S.