West Lake Dragon Well Longjing

Brief

West Lake Longjing is a stir-fried green tea produced in the Longjing area of the West Lake. Its tea leaves are emerald green or brown beige and the shape of it is flat and smooth. It tastes mellow and sweet.

Origin

West Lake Longjing is divided into primary production area and secondary production area. The primary production area includes the traditional four core production areas of “Lion, Dragon, Yun and Tiger”. The secondary production area is produced in the West Lake area except for the primary production area of Longjing.

Lion is located in the area of ​​Lion Peak in LongjingVillage, the tea which produced here is called ShifengLongjing.

Dragon is based in Wengjiashan, the production here is called ShiwuSishanLongjing, of which Wengjiashan can be compared to Shifeng longing.

Yun is called Yunqi. It’s in the Wuyun Mountain. And it is the areas with the largest production in West Lake Longjing. The tea which produced here is called MeiwuLongjing, with emerald color and beautiful appearance.

Tiger is in Santaishan area, and later included some other tea gardens on the lakeside and flat land.

Culture

• According to the research of tea culture experts, the history of West Lake Longjing is about 1500 years old. In the 19^th, people listed more than 90 kinds of famous teas from all over china, of which Longjing ranked 21^st. This shows that West Lake longjing already has a certain popularity.
• Once Qianlong(1736-1795) who was the emperor of Qing Dynastycame to Longjing four times to watch tea and taste tea, and wrote the “Eight Sceneries of Longjing” for Longjing Village, and even sealed eighteen of the tea trees as imperial tea, and then Longjing has been a tribute to the Qing Dynasty royal family.
• Since the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, the cultivation of Longjing tea has spread all over the West Lake, Huxi and Hunan, forming four main production bases of “lion, dragon, cloud and tiger”.

Processing 

Step one-drying

After picking, the West Lake Longjing needs to be dried on a bamboo sieve, which usually takes about half a day.

Step two-frying

The frying of West Lake Longjing needs to be done by hand, and the usual crafts include “shaking, belting, squeezing, throwing, pressing, expanding, buttoning, grasping, pressing and grinding”.

Efficacy

West Lake Longjing tea contains more amino acids, catechins, chlorophyll, and vitamin C than other tea leaves. It is rich in nutrients and is known as the “Queen of Green Tea”. Since it is unfermented tea with cold properties, the more significant effects of Longjing tea are heat-clearing and diuresis. At the same time, Longjing tea can eliminate fatigue, produce body fluid and quench thirst, reduce neutral fat and cholesterol in the blood; it has the functions of anti-oxidation, anti-aging, weight loss and beauty.

The price of it

There are some areas also can produce longjing, but it’s not as famous as the West Lake longjing, the customers all prefer drinking West Lake longjing. Also as we mentioned before the areas that can be used to produced West Lake longjing are very limited, so the price of it is  high.