Flowering Tea
Colorful, Blooming with Taste

Did you know flowering tea is dried tea that is hand sewn along with flowers into a bundle?  It is done in such a way as to bloom when steeped in hot water.

It not only makes a delicious tea to drink, it is a work of art in the glass pot it is placed in.

As the bundle is steeping in the water it begins to open as the bloom of a flower does. These can be made from white, black, oolong or green teas.

Types of Flowers Used

The flowers that are normally added are chrysanthemum, globe amaranth, lily, jasmine, osmanthus and hibiscus.

How to Use

These are normally served in glass teapots to show off these magnificent blooms that happen. The bundles of tea can be reused several times.

This is definitely a conversation piece at a party. Use them as the centerpiece for your table once they bloom in your glass pot.

Variety of Flavor

Only premium hand-picked green tea leaves, white tea buds, black tea of the golden-tip variety and oolong leaves are used to combine with flowers.  

They are then used to be  sewn together into rosettes or bundles by Chinese artisans.

How Is Flowering Tea Picked

It is picked very early in the mornings in the Yunnan province of China in tea gardens located remotely.

The leaves are still damp while they get flattened so that they can then be stitched together with thread of cotton, adding flowers to create various bundles or shapes.

These leaves can have jasmine blossoms added, let's say, to give a floral flavor before the sewing is complete.

Depending on what shapes are being stitched they could take anywhere from one to ten minutes. The designs that are fancier and contain oesmanthus or lilies take the longest about of time.

While the tea is still in its moist condition the leaves are shaped into cones, mushrooms, balls and more. Then they still go through the normal processes of oxidizing.

These blooming teas can vary in quality. Some are mass produced while others are hand-crafted and high quality.

Pricing

The quantities and prices vary too. The quality like any other tea depends on what the  quality of the teas are that goes into the bundles or other shapes.

There are also some blooming teas that are just for show and not for flavor. These will not have the quality teas in them that the ones for drinking do. So make sure you know which you are buying before you try it out.

The ones designed for drinking not only give you something nice to look at but a unique flavor combination for your palette as well.

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