Tang Jia Raw Pu-erh Tea is made from the tea leaves collected from old tea trees of a small village located at the south west of Lincang, Yunnan. The tea garden is located 2000-2100m of high mountain.
Tang Jia means Tang Family in Chinese. This name comes from the family who owns the tea garden. Tang Jia tea garden is ancient tea garden with a vast number of huge tea trees, yet nobody pluck tea at all until 2018. The tea garden has been left unattended over the past 30 years.
The 2022 batch of Tang Jia was produced in April, utilizing a plucking standard of one bud and two to three leaves. This tea offers a well-balanced drinking experience, with a smooth and creamy texture and a lingering aftertaste that endures through multiple brews.
Ancient Tea Garden left unattended for the past 30 years
Long ago Tang family was making a living on tea. However, ever since the present Mr. Tang succeeded the family, he has shifted his job into goat and cattle grazing. In Yunnan, the cattle and goats grazed with wild grass on high mountain area is in very high demand. In high mountain village, even the cattle grown in the cage is popular too. It can be as high as RMB10,000. We can easily imagine that grazed cattle in the wild field is much more expensive. Hence, the grazing business is very popular among the villagers. We noticed that quite a number of tea garden owners have left their tea garden and started to live on grazing cattle and goats.
In the beginning, Mr. Tang was expecting his wife to look after the tea farming and he concentrates in grazing. However, his wife was unwilling to go to tea garden since she has got sufficient income. Eventually, the tea gardens have been left for many years. A few years ago, Mr. Tang has divorced with his wife.
It is me trying to touch the baby goat. Now Mr. Tang is now about 50 years old. He married a new wife. The new wife was a refugee who came from Guo Gan, Myanmar. Guo Gan is only about 50km away from Yunnan, and it was at civil war for quite some time. The battle was taking place between minorities and government forces. Due to the war, many villagers fled to Yunnan as refugee. In Zhenkang county where the border is directly connecting to Myanmar, we often run into them. Nowadays, it is quite common that villagers in Lincang get married with Myanmar ladies.
To everyone’s surprise, Mr. Tang’s new wife (above photo) was the person who works extremely hard. She was willing to go to the tea garden and clear the under-bush one by one. When other villagers realized, she has refresh Tang Jia tea garden within half a year. Because she worked so effectively, she became very famous among the neighbors. Nowadays, neighbors like to call Tang Jia Tea garden as Myanmar wife’s tea garden. She has started to pluck tea since 2018. However, there were too many people who were interested in the teas from her garden. Since it has been left unattended for 30 years, all knows that her tea gives excellent taste. Due to the high popularity, I only managed to purchase very little quantity in 2018 and I introduced it in Malaysia. In 2019, I decided to rent her garden to secure the quality material for making our tea. My tea manufacturer happens to be the relative of Tang family. So, we speak to them through our manufacturer and succeeded to rent Tang Jia garden. Sadly, they only agree for one-year contract. Following the local customs, if anyone rent a garden, they pay in one lump sum as the rental for a year. In addition, the tea plucking fee is also paid to tea pluckers according to the market rate. So basically, the rental fee will be the extra income for the owner of tea garden.
Tang Jia Tea Garden after Myanmar wife has taken care.
Ancient Tea Tree in Tang Jia Garden