Traditional Processing of Iranian Handmade Black Tea

Black tea is the most common and yet most popular hot beverage among Iranian.

The most important center of tea plant cultivation in Iran is a city called Lahijan, Guilan Province, in the north of Iran.

We used to go to my grandmother's house in the early spring when were children. Whenever I opened her room, I would see the tea leaves on a piece of cloth called “Chador Shab”, which was woven by my grandmother herself, while the pleasant smell of newly-harvested tea filled the room’s atmosphere.

I dry the tea leaves exactly in the same method, which is called “Dastpich”, It means handmade. In this method, the buds of the tea leaves are harvested and left on a piece of cloth for a few days until they wither. Then the withered tea leaves are kneaded on a wooden board; this process should be stopped before the leaves sweat or our hands get wet. The next step is to cover the kneaded leaves for a few hours to let them rest and ferment. After the fermentation process is completed, the tea leaves are put on very low heat to dry. The completely dried tea leaves are then ready to be brewed.

The aroma and taste of handmade black tea are greatly different from those of industrially processed tea because industrial methods fully remove the extract of tea leaves as well as their aroma.