Black tea is the second most popular tea in the world. Called Qi Hong or Red Tea by the Chinese because of its coppery-red color, based on their system of naming tea by the color or the liquid, rather than the leaf. |
Black tea is the only one of the six main types of tea that is fully oxidized (sometimes erroneously termed fermented).The manufacturing methods and varieties of black tea vary enormously from country to country and sometimes even from region to region within the same country.But no matter the overall differences in manufac turing from one country to another, there are al ways four basic stages involved in the product- ion of black tea: withering, rolling, oxidation (sometimes erroneously referred to as ferment- ing or fermentation), and firing (drying). |
There are two major types of processing methods for manufacturing black tea-orthodox and CTC (cut-tear-curl). Orthodox black teas are loose leaf artisan made teas in a variety of different styles and types available from various countries around the world, including China, India, Sri Lanka, Kenya, and Indonesia, just to name a few.The CTC or cut-tear-curl manufacturing method is used in a number of countries, mainly for producing tea bagblends.The four basic stages of manufacture for orthodox teas begins with withering. This is meant to soften the leaves and reduce the moisture content inside, which starts out at between 78 to 80% after plucking. For this step the leaves are spread out in a thin layer in warm air for The rolling step starts the oxidation process After this first rolling, smaller pieces of leaf are Sometimes the leaf is put through a rotor- naming and grading page for more on whole leaf and flavor of black tea, darkening in color, and developing compounds green tea, but they do provide considerable health benefits as well.For this third step the leaves are broken up following rolling, and spread out in thin layers The fourth and final step is to stop the oxidation process and Another method of drying is to move the tea on a stream of
The CTC (cut-tear-curl) manufacturing method was developed in the 1950’s in response to Oxidation, the third stage of processing CTC teas, and the fourth stage, drying, is the Enjoy. |