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Oxidation makes tea black

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11–20 of 79 posts

Re: Oxidation makes tea black

#11
"Contrary to popular belief, Red teas like Darjeeling actually have less caffeine than White or Green teas because they are so highly processed."

Is this actually true? I've never heard of green tea having more caffeine than red tea, besides maybe gunpowder green tea, which retains more caffeine due to less breakage from being rolled up.

Re: Oxidation makes tea black

#12
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

White tea is oxidized naturally for a while. The article is referring to freshly picked leaves.

That would be green tea no? You pick the green tea, cook it to denature the enzymes to arrest the oxidization (called the "killgreen" step in Chinese) and voila, green tea! Lots of green teas can be quite smooth and even more so with more careful brewing.

Yeah! Green tea gets fried or steamed right away to halt oxidation. That kills off some of the undesirable bitterness that masks some flavors that are even present in fresh leaves. It is not that Green doesn’t have any taste; it is that there are more guardrails over what flavors can appear and how distinct they can be.

Re: Oxidation makes tea black

#14

"Contrary to popular belief, Red teas like Darjeeling actually have less caffeine than White or Green teas because they are so highly processed." Is this actually true? I've never heard of green tea having more caffeine than red tea, besides maybe gunpowder green tea, which retains more caffeine due to less breakage from being rolled up.

I think lighter teas does have more caffeine per weight, but they're have much shorter infusion times (with the exception of Pu'er, which can go through15 infusions).

Re: Oxidation makes tea black

#15
post #10

Can anyone explain this sentence: "Because tannins weigh more than catechins, they do not taste bitter."

Higher weight polyphenols tend to taste less bitter than lower weight ones. Its more correlation than causation because I don’t think we precisely know why this is.

Re: Oxidation makes tea black

#16
post #14

"Contrary to popular belief, Red teas like Darjeeling actually have less caffeine than White or Green teas because they are so highly processed." Is this actually true? I've never heard of green tea having more caffeine than red tea, besides maybe gunpowder green tea, which retains more caffeine due to less breakage from being rolled up.

I think lighter teas does have more caffeine per weight, but they're have much shorter infusion times (with the exception of Pu'er, which can go through15 infusions).

Same thing with coffee, light roasts have more extractable caffeine than dark roasts.

Re: Oxidation makes tea black

#17
post #14

"Contrary to popular belief, Red teas like Darjeeling actually have less caffeine than White or Green teas because they are so highly processed." Is this actually true? I've never heard of green tea having more caffeine than red tea, besides maybe gunpowder green tea, which retains more caffeine due to less breakage from being rolled up.

I think lighter teas does have more caffeine per weight, but they're have much shorter infusion times (with the exception of Pu'er, which can go through15 infusions).

Ah that would make sense. And water temperature likely plays a vital role as well. But for properly brewed green tea, it will still result in less caffeine than red tea as expected.

Re: Oxidation makes tea black

#18

"Contrary to popular belief, Red teas like Darjeeling actually have less caffeine than White or Green teas because they are so highly processed." Is this actually true? I've never heard of green tea having more caffeine than red tea, besides maybe gunpowder green tea, which retains more caffeine due to less breakage from being rolled up.

Red tea from Darjeeling is in a category called CTC tea, which is distinct from what you'd expect from black tea. Easy mixup since they look similar, besides the packaging

Re: Oxidation makes tea black

#19
post #6
post #2

I had always understood that white tea had minimal processing, so I don't understand this assertion: "Without oxidation, tea would taste unbearably bitter." Perhaps white tea has not reached an adult phase with the associated bitterness. Contast to: "White tea may refer to... minimally processed leaves of the Camellia sinensis plant." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_tea

White tea is oxidized naturally for a while. The article is referring to freshly picked leaves.

The odd thing is that the range (and top end) of antioxidants in white tea is larger than in green.

"Total catechin content (TCC) for white teas ranged widely from 14.40 to 369.60 mg/g of dry plant material for water extracts and 47.16 to 163.94 mg/g for methanol extracts. TCC for green teas also ranged more than 10-fold, from 21.38 to 228.20 mg/g of dry plant material for water extracts and 32.23 to 141.24 mg/g for methanol extracts."

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20722909/

Re: Oxidation makes tea black

#20

"Contrary to popular belief, Red teas like Darjeeling actually have less caffeine than White or Green teas because they are so highly processed." Is this actually true? I've never heard of green tea having more caffeine than red tea, besides maybe gunpowder green tea, which retains more caffeine due to less breakage from being rolled up.

Red tea from Darjeeling is in a category called CTC tea, which is distinct from what you'd expect from black tea. Easy mixup since they look similar, besides the packaging

You can have loose leaf Darjeeling red tea as well. CTC is typically for bagged tea, which is unfortunately what's most popular in the USA/UK.
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