The fairest of them all: white tea

When you hold a single bud of a Silver Needles white tea between your thumb and index finger and stroke its slender body, the soft, delicate sensation gives you a clue to the beautiful, sensory experience in store for you, once that bud releases its flavour into hot water.


妙香过而掠 “A wonderous fragrance passes – lightly brushing by.”

Renowned for its subtle aroma and light-bodied infusion, white tea is the most gentle and delicate category of tea. As the least-processed of all the six types of tea, it can arguably be described as tea in its purest form – closest to its natural state.

White tea has been crafted in China for around 500 years. It’s thought to originate in the Ming dynasty (1368 – 1644) where written instructions in the text, Grading of Springs for Boiling Tea, recommended tea buds be dried in the sun instead of by fire (1).

What defines a white tea?

The six types of tea – white, green, yellow, oolong, black and dark tea - are defined by their processing steps; with white tea being the first, least-processed category of tea.

To create white tea, the leaves are simply plucked – almost always by hand – then dried.

Traditionally, after plucking, the leaves are laid out on mats to dry in the sun for a few hours. These days, they’re often dried on bamboo racks indoors instead, or dried in the sun first, then finished inside. A drying fan or drying tunnel is sometimes used to speed up the process. The duration of drying depends on the weather conditions (temperature and humidity) but is typically 12 – 24 hours.  

The four types of white tea 

There are two broad categories of white tea: 1) those made solely with buds, and, 2) those with leaves: but these can be divided further into four types:

Silver Needle
Known in China as: Bai Hao Yin Zen
Pluck: Made solely with buds (the newest leaf shoot which is yet to unfurl). Bai Hao means ‘white fuzz’, representing the soft down found on the leaf buds.

White Peony
Known in China as: Bai Mu Dan
Pluck: Bud and one or two leaves

Royal Tribute Eyebrow
Known in China as: Gong Mei
Pluck: Bud and two or three leaves

Longevous Eyebrow
Known in China as: Shou Mei
Pluck: Bud and larger, more mature leaves (from larger leaf tea plant varietals)

The soft, subtle, sweet flavour of white tea

A Silver Needles tea yields the most delicate flavour with light, sweet vegetal and floral notes and a pale-coloured infusion. The more leaves the white tea includes, the deeper the colour of both the infusion and the flavour, and fruity notes often appear in addition to vegetal and floral notes.

Moving beyond its Chinese origins

White tea has traditionally been made in Fuding and Zhenghe in China: areas that still dominate white tea production. However, other regions in China, and other countries, such as Nepal, Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia and Thailand, are now producing beautiful white teas. 

Since white tea undergoes the least amount of processing, the flavour of the final tea represents the pure, natural flavour inside the leaf, rather than processing steps used to craft it - as is the case with the other five types of tea. So white teas best reflect the local terroir the tea plants grow in: the essence of the land they call home.

Caffeine hit

It’s a common misconception that lighter style teas such as white and green tea contain less caffeine than their darker counterparts; black tea in particular.  A study by the Camellia Sinensis tea house (2) found there is no relationship between the type of tea and the level of caffeine (apart from matcha).  Out of 31 different teas they tested, the 10 that had the highest caffeine levels were a range of green, white, black, oolong and fermented teas (3).

There is a relationship between leaf age and caffeine level with fresh buds having a high caffeine content than their older leaf siblings(4). So a tea with a large percentage of buds, such as Silver Needles, would likely have more caffeine than a tea without buds.

How to prepare white teas

Bud white teas such as Silver Needles generally work better with a slightly lower temperature than those with more leaves, so start with water around 85°c, moving up to 90°c/95°c for those with more leaves. Steep the leaves at least twice. 

I love using white teas – particularly White Peony or Gong Mei style teas - for a cold-brewed sparkling tea, as I find the floral and fruity notes are accentuated beautifully.  

White tea is more challenging to pair with food than the other types of tea due to its subtle, light flavour, which and can easily be overpowered. Choose lightly-flavoured foods such as mild soft cheeses, or plain sweet dishes such as shortbread, plain scones with cream and a light jam, or panna cotta, for example.

White tea is, quite simply, the art of restraint. A delicately plucked bud or leaf, gently dried, its flavour allowed to speak for itself. It rewards those that seek to appreciate and pay attention.  

~ Anna

> Shop my White Tea collection here.

1). Needles, Peonies and Moonlight, The Story of White Tea, Catherine Young. Eighty Degrees magazine, July 2021 edition.

2) and 3). The Camellia Sinensis Tea House. (2014) Tea, Histories, Terroirs, Varieties, New York. Print.

4) Chin, Jenna & Merves, Michele & Goldberger, Bruce & Sampson-Cone, Angela & Cone, Edward. (2008). Caffeine Content of Brewed Teas. Journal of analytical toxicology. 32. 702-4. 10.1093/jat/32.8.702.