by Lea Miller

Created on: July 11, 2010

If you pick up a magazine or look at a health site on the web these days, you will probably see an article talking about the health benefits of green tea. But where does green tea come from and how long has it been in use as a beverage?

All teas come from the same plant, camellia sinensis. Green tea is differentiated from black or oolong teas by the methods used to prepare it for consumption. For green tea, once the tea leaves are picked and sorted, they are either steamed or pan fired. Green tea does not go through a fermentation process. This preserves more antioxidants and other phyto-nutrients than other tea types. In contrast, black teas are picked and left out to begin wilting. The wilted leaves are rolled to break the leaf structure, then are exposed to the air, where the inner chemical content of the leaves begins to react to oxygen in the air and ferments. Fermenting changes the color gradually from green to black. Finally, the leaves are dried and packaged.

There are many stories about the origin of tea consumption. Some say an emperor accidentally discovered it when a tea leaf fell into his boiling water. Others attribute its discovery to Buddha. Whatever the truth may be, teas have been consumed in Asia for thousands of years. References to tea in written records occur as early as two thousand years ago.

Tea drinking was originally reserved for the wealthy and elite. Tea was prepared by plucking the leaves from a tea plant and immersing them directly in hot water. This maximized the freshness, but it meant that tea could only be prepared from fresh leaves. In the eighth century, the Chinese began steaming tea leaves soon after picking to preserve color and freshness. The steamed leaves were then dried and could be stored. This process of steaming lasted for centuries. It was also in the eighth century that Lu Yu wrote his definitive work “The Classic of Tea,” all about cultivation, preparation, and drinking of tea.

During some periods the dried leaves were pressed into cakes, and later ground up to be whisked together with hot water, creating a richly colored beverage. Visiting monks took the ground tea process back to Japan, and it developed into the elaborate tea ceremony that Japanese still practice today.

In the seventeenth century, the Chinese began fermenting teas, resulting in the production of oolong and black teas. It was about this time that the Dutch East India Company brought the first green tea to Europe. From Holland,

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