What is flowering tea?
Photo courtesy of aymlis
Have you ever heard of flowering tea?
… The name explains itself, doesn’t it?
Compare to green tea, black tea, and oolong tea, this kind of tea is one of the less common teas. One other less well-known tea is Yellow tea Flowering tea is simply tea that is scented with different kind of flower to give unique fragrance.
* Each is named after the flower it was scented with
* Each takes the fragrance of the flower such as rose, sunflower, jasmine…
* Balance ratio should be flower (3 parts) and tea (7 parts)
* The popular pair is Jasmine and green tea. This kind of tea is often named after the flower that it was scented with. Some popular names are Rose black tea, Jasmine tea, Dandelion tea, and Lapsang souchong. Beside flowers, tea is sometimes scented with natural oils, fruits, and spices.
Do you want to know the differences between high and low quality?
The flowers can be added into the tea leaves while they are processed. The tea leaves should contain a bit of moisture so they can absorb the fragrance from the flowers.
In order to get a strong and distinguished flowery fragrance, the leaves are steamed with the flowers 4-5 times. Flowering leaves that are scented once or twice often viewed as lower-quality. Even though it’s called flower tea, the tea’s fragrance and taste is still important. Thus, the quantity of tea and flowers during steaming must be controlled. The balanced ratio is about 7 parts of tea and 3 parts of flower.
Have you ever heard the phrase — like attracts like? This concept applies to the flower tea.
Stronger tea like black tea should be scented with strong-aroma flowers like rose. While weak tea like green tea should be paired up with weak-fragrant flowers like Jasmine.
Popular flower tea:
* Jasmine tea is green tea that is scented with jasmine flower. This tea has a nice and pleasant fragrance without addition of milk or lemon.
* Rose flowering tea is strong black tea that is steamed with rose petals or blossoms. This tea has strong flavor with a touch of rose’s fragrance.
* Lychee is black tea covered in lychee fruit. This pair gives a sweet taste.
* Lap sang souchong is black tea that is scented with fresh pine logs. This tea has strong and bold flavor.
Some other flowering teas include:
* Lemon is tea scented with lemon peels
* Mango scented tea has pleasant and fruity flavor
* Orange Blossom has subtle orange fragrance and tastes quite exotic
* Spice tea is tea scented with orange peel and cinnamon
There are many flower tea benefits. After all, this is still tea.
Green tea scented with flower provides the best health benefits.
Most of the natural chemicals in flower-scented green tea are preserved.
Health benefits of flower tea
* It strengthens immunity by enhancing the effects of vitamin C. Vitamin C is one of main vitamin in tea. It helps to destroy harmful substances that enter the blood stream.
* It has antioxidant properties to produces more antibodies to protect the cells.
* This tea plays an important role in preparing blood vessels.
* It can reduce the risk of forming plaques in the coronary arteries that can cause heart attack or stroke.
* Flower tea also contains fluoride.
* Fluoride is known to help prevents tooth decay and gum infection. Fluoride are often added in tooth pastes to provide better dental protection.
* It helps balancing chemicals in the brain. This provides mental clarity and concentration.