How Green Tea Is Made in Nepal

 Nepal’s total tea production amounts to 23,821 MT annually. Tea is primarily grown in five districts in Eastern Nepal namely, Jhapa, Ilam, Panchthar, Dhankuta, and Terathum. Jhapa is by far the largest producer of tea accounting for more than 75% of Nepal’s tea produced followed by Ilam with produces around one-sixth of Nepal’s total tea production. 

Harvesting Green Tea

The leaves that are harvested to make green tea are usually the terminal bud of the tea bush and the first one or two leaves below it. In India and Nepal, the best green teas are made with leaves harvested in the spring or early summer, before the plant has switched to the explosive growth of the late summer or the pre-hibernation maintenance of autumn. Some producers will crank out green tea during the monsoon season, but these teas typically lack character. That’s because during the strong rains, the plant grows so quickly that the leaf’s flavor compounds are less concentrated, and because the blanket of clouds that cloaks the processing facilities makes processing quite challenging.

That’s why the green teas we source are made during the spring and early summer. As the tea bush awakes from winter dormancy and sends out its first shoots of the year, tea farmers watch the new growth carefully and then use an expert hand to pluck select shoots. These shoots need to be very carefully handled to avoid bruising the fragile young leaves. Soft and flexible bamboo baskets are used for carrying the delicate leaf indoors where it will be processed.

Processing Green Tea

All processing happens within 24 hours of harvest, so the tea maker must move quickly. Depending on the style and region, sometimes the first step is to give the harvest a short, soft wither to allow the leaf to become more pliable and easy to shape. In India and Nepal, it’s more common to skip the wither and move straight to the next step, which is the defining one for green teas: heat treatment.

1-Heat Stops A Green Tea From Becoming A Black Tea

The application of heat to the fragile, unrolled and unoxidized leaf is crucial to making green tea. With black and oolong teas, the leaf is first rolled to break open the cell walls before any heat is applied, triggering an oxidation reaction that makes the leaf black. With green teas, hitting the leaf with heat turns off the enzyme that catalyzes the oxidation reaction, preserving the chlorophyll that gives green tea its name.

The type of heat used—dry versus hot—effectively divides the world of green teas in two. Dry heat leads to more floral, nutty, and sweet greens, while wet heat results in a briny, oceanic, vegetal tea with astringent depth and body.

Dry heat is the more common method globally, and it involves a hotter heat. Sometimes called roasting or pan-firing, the style was developed by Chinese tea makers and traditionally done in a wok, with someone continually stirring the leaf by hand or with a bamboo paddle to avoid burning. Today, a more common and efficient (though less picturesque) way of replicating the wok is to use a long rotating metal cylinder mounted horizontally, with the axis running parallel to the ground. Leaf is loaded into one end of the revolving heated chamber, which spins and slowly ushers the leaf to the exit at the far end. When the leaf is at the bottom of the cycle, it comes into direct contact with hot metal grates. Then, it eventually tumbles down to the bottom, cooling as it falls through the air to prevent burning. All of the green teas we source, including our popular Darjeeling Green, are created with a dry heat.

The other method of applying heat is to use a wet heat, typically through steam close to 100° C. This style of heat is a comparatively low temperature, which fires up a briny, oceanic, vegetal tea that has astringent depth and body. The Japanese perfected this method, and the steam is applied for a quick blast, no more than a few minutes.

2-Rolling The Leaf

After the initial heat, green teas are often rolled to break open the cells and coat the exterior of the leaf with the essential oils that give green tea its strength and vegetal flavor. In India and Nepal, this is often done with small versions of the same rolling tables that are used to make black teas, which allows for more precise and gentle rolling.

3-Shaping The Leaf

If the tea maker wants to further layer the tea with flavor and create an attractive visual, the next step in the process is shaping. There are a variety of tools that can result in different shapes, from flattening the leaf to make teas like the Nilgiri Green Dragon, or using heated pans to toss the rolled leaf as with the Nepali Green Pearl. In the case of pearl-shaped teas, the leaves first shrink and curl when in contact with the hot metal, and then they briefly expand when exposed to the cool air. After two to three hours of being tossed into the air, the tea emerges as tightly balls packed with flavors ready to explode into the cup.

4-Drying Green Tea

To finish the tea and prevent any further chemical changes from happening, the tea is run through a dryer. Comparing green tea vs. black tea, the drying is often more noticeable in greens because the unoxidized leaf acts as a sponge for any flavors that result from drying. This is where a roasted flavor enters the picture. These toasty notes can be desirable if well balanced, but they can also easily become overdone. In comparison, black tea’s flavor is less impacted (though still affected) by the drying step.

5-Sorting Green Tea

The last step in making green tea is to separate the finished tea by size. High-end green teas like the Nepali Green Peak need very little sorting because there is only one size made: the whole leaf! Elsewhere, green tea comes out of the dryer with a range of leaf particle sizes, often the result of a heavy roll to break open the more tough leaf in order to extract more flavor. This is the type of tea that ends up in tea bags.