2 Kg Formosa Pinhead Gunpowder Green Tea, China

A green tea with surprising body and captivating almost nutty green tea taste.

Luxury Ingredients: Green tea

Small Batch Blended and Packed in: Canada

Tea(s) From: China

Region(s): Zhejiang Province

Antioxidant Level: Very High 

Caffeine Content: Low 

Legend has it that the name Gunpowder was given by a young English  clerk who thought the tiny rolled green balls looked like gunpowder.  The tealeaves are specially selected for quality, size and style. They  are then rolled into very small tight nuggets. Gunpowder tea keeps a lot  longer than other green teas and is favored because of this  characteristic. Chinese exporters recommend gunpowder for iced tea  flavored with lemon and sugar. Gunpowder tea is also very popular in  Morocco where the leaves are boiled and mint and sugar are added.

Pinhead  Gunpowder Pingshui tea comes from the province of Zhejiang across  Hangzhou Bay from Shanghai. It was in Hangzhou that Mao Tse Tung  (China's first leader on modern times) first met with Richard Nixon  (President of the United States). This 1973 meeting, which included  gunpowder tea, was the beginning of normalized relations between China  and the United States.

The leaves for Pinhead Gunpowder are only  plucked during April and May when the quality of the green leaf is at  it's highest.  The leaves are steamed and tightly rolled in a  time-honored process.  When preparing this tea, part of the ritual is to  take two pinches of Pinhead Gunpowder and drop them into a porcelain  cup so you hear the jingle and tinkle of the leaves hitting the sides.  Boiling water causes them to open up like flowers and sink slowly to the  bottom in graceful patterns, which add a dimension of visual pleasure  to tea drinking. This gunpowder produces a reasonably strong dark-green  brew with a memorable fragrance, a slightly bitter but not unpleasant  flavor and a long lasting finish. Gunpowder is more dense than other  teas so if you are making a teapot full you only require one or two  teaspoons for a teapot.

Chinese researchers have found that  gunpowder tea is high in fluoride and known to reduce cavities. They say  that a human body requires 1-2 milligrams of fluoride a day. Ten grams  of gunpowder tea  (enough to make 3 cups of strong tea) can supply this  amount.