Cancer causing teas.

Mydnight · 2007-01-22T05:48:27+00:00

Recently, there has been an outcry in the media about tea factoriesadding various chemicals to nearly every type of food that one canconsume here in China. It's especially hit headlines over in HK, wherethey actually take this very seriously. Vegetables, meats, fish,fruit, and various teas have been called into question about whether itcauses more harm than good to consume.The most notable accounts of tea being tampered with comes from theFujian province; the home of various WuYi Mountain teas and the famousTie Guan Yin. Here in Dongguan, the locals have basically turned theirbacks on TieGuanYin completely and have switched to Pu'er. Why? Asquoted to me by a merchant friend of mine, [translated] "Most TGY thatpeople drink [here] has very little REAL TGY flavor because of how muchchemicals are added to make it more valuable." Pu'er tea has also beenin the news in HK because of how dirty the process is to produce theactual tea. The mostly were talking about Shu Pu which is fine by mebecause I only drink big-leaf Sheng now from a private source.Last night after a lengthy, 3 hour session of tea drinking, I broughtout some decent grade Nong Xiang High Mountain (NXHM) for my Taiwanesefriend to try. He is over 50, and most older people from Taiwan preferthe strong, earthy sweetness and excellent "hui gan" (residual,recurring flavor) that the heavily roasted tea can produce. After Itold him what we were going to drink, he turned the tea down flatciting that fully roasted teas are bad for your health because they usecharcoal in the roasting process. He then also said that nearly ALLNong Xiang teas were subjected to charcoal roasting; he especially isafraid to drink any Dan Cong teas from Guangdong.This whole thing has saddened me quite a bit. Perhaps these years inChina drinking good teas has been more harmful to my health thenbeneficial. The usual criticism against my argument is "oh, well Iknow where I get MY teas from; it just must be your low quality teasthat...

Jan 22, 2007 20 Replies

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ostaz 19 years ago

So, if I stick with Japanese or Sri Lankan/Indian/Persian teas I should be ok? Is this poisoning of the tea leaves exclusive to China?

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Cancer causing teas.

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