Courtesy: Organic certification for tea In 1907, American tea merchant Thomas Sullivan began distributing samples of his tea in small bags of silk with a drawstring. Consumers noticed they could simply leave the tea in the bag and reuse it with fresh tea. However, the potential of this distribution and packaging method would not be […]
Courtesy: Organic certification for tea After basic processing, teas may be altered through additional processing steps before being sold and is often consumed with additions to the basic tea leaf and water added during preparation or drinking. Examples of additional processing steps that occur before tea is sold are blending, flavouring, scenting, and decaffeination of teas. […]
Courtesy: Organic certification for tea Pests that can afflict tea plants include mosquito bugs, genus Helopeltis, which are true bugs and not to be confused with dipterous insects of family Culicidae (‘mosquitos’). Mosquito bugs can damage leaves both by sucking plant materials, and by the laying of eggs (oviposition) within the plant. Spraying with synthetic insecticides may be deemed appropriate. Other pests are Lepidopteran leaf […]
Courtesy: Organic certification for tea Camellia sinensis is an evergreen plant that grows mainly in tropical and subtropical climates. Some varieties can also tolerate marine climates and are cultivated as far north as Cornwall in England, Perthshire in Scotland, Washington in the United States, and Vancouver Island in Canada. In the Southern Hemisphere, tea is grown as far south as Hobart in Tasmania and Waikato in New Zealand. Tea plants are propagated from seed and cuttings; about […]
Courtesy: Organic certification for tea Physically speaking, tea has properties of both a solution and a suspension. It is a solution of all the water-soluble compounds that have been extracted from the tea leaves, such as the polyphenols and amino acids, but is a suspension when all of the insoluble components are considered, such as the cellulose in […]
Courtesy: Organic certification for tea Tea was first introduced to Western priests and merchants in China during the 16th century, at which time it was termed chá. The earliest European reference to tea, written as chiai, came from Delle navigationi e viaggi written by Venetian Giambattista Ramusio in 1545. The first recorded shipment of tea by a European nation was in 1607 when […]
Courtesy: Organic certification for tea The earliest known physical evidence of tea was discovered in 2016 in the mausoleum of Emperor Jing of Han in Xi’an, indicating that tea from the genus Camellia was drunk by Han dynasty emperors as early as the second century BC. The Han dynasty work, “The Contract for a Youth”, written by Wang Bao in 59 BC, contains the first known reference […]
Courtesy: Organic certification for tea Botanical origin Tea plant (Camellia sinensis) from Köhler’s Medicinal Plants, 1897 Tea plants are native to East Asia and probably originated in the borderlands of southwestern China and northern Myanmar. Chinese (small-leaf) type tea (C. sinensis var. sinensis) may have originated in southern China possibly with hybridization of unknown wild tea relatives. However, […]
Courtesy: Organic certification for tea ea is an aromatic beverage prepared by pouring hot or boiling water over cured or fresh leaves of Camellia sinensis, an evergreen shrub native to East Asia which probably originated in the borderlands of southwestern China and northern Myanmar. Tea is also rarely made from the leaves of Camellia taliensis. After plain water, tea is the most widely consumed drink in […]
Courtesy: Organic certification for tea Numi Organic Tea is a privately owned triple bottom line social enterprise based in Oakland, California. Numi is known for its assortment of organic and fair trade certified teas and herbal “teasans”. The company was founded in 1999 by brother and sister, Ahmed Rahim and Reem Hassani. The founders named the company “Numi” after the citrusy, Middle Eastern dried lime tea they […]