One plant, Camellia sinensis, made into white, green, oolong, black and dark tea entirely by how much its leaves are allowed to oxidise before the process is stopped.
Where it comes from
Tea is native to the borderlands of southwestern China, northern Myanmar and Assam, and was drunk in China for many centuries before it reached anywhere else. Its trade shaped a great deal of history — the East India Company, the opium trade with China, the plantations of Assam, Sri Lanka and Kenya, and the Boston Tea Party.
The whole distinction between tea types is oxidation. Green tea is heated early — steamed in Japan, pan-fired in China — to stop the enzymes; black tea is rolled and fully oxidised; oolong is stopped partway; white tea is simply withered and dried; and dark teas like pu-erh are genuinely fermented by microbes afterwards, which is a different process again.
Herbal infusions — rooibos, chamomile, mint, hibiscus — are not tea, and have nothing to do with the plant.
Varieties
- Green — Unoxidised. Grassy and vegetal; Japanese steamed teas are marine, Chinese pan-fired ones nuttier.
- White — Barely processed young leaves and buds. Delicate and faintly sweet.
- Oolong — Partly oxidised, across a wide range. Floral at the green end, roasted and honeyed at the dark end.
- Black — Fully oxidised. Assam malty, Darjeeling floral, Ceylon brisk, Keemun smooth.
- Pu-erh and dark tea — Microbially fermented and aged. Earthy, and it improves for decades.
- Matcha — Shade-grown green tea ground to powder and whisked, so the leaf is drunk rather than infused.
- Blended and scented — Earl Grey with bergamot, jasmine tea, masala chai, Moroccan mint.
In the kitchen
Water temperature is what separates good green tea from bitter green tea: around 70–80°C, not boiling. Black tea wants full boiling water. Using one temperature for everything is why green tea has a reputation for bitterness it does not deserve.
Over-steeping extracts tannins and turns any tea astringent. Green teas want a minute or two; most black teas three to four.
Masala chai is boiled, with milk and spices, which is a legitimately different method rather than a badly made infusion — the boiling is required to extract the spices.
Dishes with tea
Maramiya teablack tea steeped with wild sage and sweetened heavilyUnited KingdomEnglish breakfast teaStrong black tea with milk, the national brew.
MateBitter yerba infusion sipped through a bombilla, endlessly sharedMauritaniaAtaythree ritual rounds of foamy green mint tea, bitter to sweetSenegalAtayathree ceremonial rounds of strong minted green teaSri LankaCeylon TeaWorld-famous highland black tea, drunk plain or milky
Kenyan chaistrong milky tea boiled with sugar, drunk all daySomaliaShaah cadaysmilky spiced tea with cardamom and clovesTea is tagged on 73 dishes from 64 countries in the atlas. These notes are written from general knowledge and carry no per-fact citation — see About.