What is the best way to harvest and process green tea (Camellia sinensis)?

Question

This is a bit of a multiple part question.

What stage of leaves do you harvest? I have heard that young leaves and stems are the tastiest, but medium and old aged leaves are the healthiest. Should you only harvest young? Should you harvest a mix of leaves?

Once the leaves are harvested, how do you prepare them? I am interested in green tea, not black tea or oolong. I have heard many opinions on how to best dry and prepare tea leaves, from oven baking, to letting sun dry, to roasting in a pan. What is the most effective way to dry the leaves, while maintaining the healthy-ness, and preparing them for tea?

Thanks!

Answer 1

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_process...

check that out.

Answer 2

I picked tea three times in low country South Carolina near Charleston. We picked the last few tender leaves at the end or the stem. We tried to get leaves that were all green. They should easily be pulled off. There may be some small spiders. Once you have your desired harvest they can be lightly rolled in a towel or in the hand. You just want to make the leaves softer before they wilt. We let the leaves dry on cotton tea towels in our home until they were all but dried out. We cut some medium green bamboo and drilled a hole the size of a quarter inch dowel in one end of the bamboo joint and tightly packed tea leaves with a quarter inch dowel. We forced the dowel in about an inch and glued it in place. We fire roasted a few of these "logs" and air dried others.

I suppose this tea is what is called pu-ehr. We keep our tea segregated by drying technique and year. I bought antique writing boxes to keep them in which are stored in a federal sideboard. They are not airtight which allows the tea to age.

I cut the logs in half with a fine backsaw and cut off the end. The bamboo splits from one end to the other.

I made my own silver tea strainers in a jewelry class. Just silver tubes with holes for water to pass through.

You can use the tea once or multiple times. If you use it multiple times the first brew will remove almost all the caffiene. Your subsequent brews will be "caffieneless"(like the word "stainless".

I don't know about using the older leaves. Yellow tea is considered the highest quality green tea. It is made from the newest fully unfurled leaves with no red veins. I have assumed that green tea was healthiest because of antioxidants that are preserved in the unheated leaves.

I also think that having a ritual like preparing and enjoying tea or any other thing which brings you peace is healthy in and of itself.