Yellow Tea Craft (Junshan Yinzhen Technique)

Junshan Yinzhen is grown on Junshan island in Dongting Lake, famed from the Tang dynasty, a tribute tea from the Five Dynasties onward and prized in its silver-needle form under the Qing. Its craft is the core technique of yellow tea, one of China's six tea classes, entering the fifth national ICH list in 2021 as "Yellow Tea Craft (Junshan Yinzhen Technique)" and joining UNESCO's "Traditional Chinese tea processing techniques and associated practices" in 2022.

Junshan Yinzhen is plucked as one bud with one leaf only in the seven to ten days around Qingming, under the strict "nine no-pluck" rules, then crafted through nine steps—spreading, kill-green, cooling, first firing, first wrapping, second firing, second wrapping, final firing and sorting. The "double menhuang" of first and second wrapping is the key technique that yields the yellow liquor and leaf, and the buds rise and fall three times in the cup, earning it the name "the dancing tea."

The Junshan Yinzhen craft is a living emblem of Chinese yellow-tea technique, carrying a millennium of Dongting tea culture and tribute-tea tradition, of major cultural and technical value for studying China's tea-class system and tea customs.

The related tea gardens and tasting can be experienced on Junshan island and at the tea estates of Junshan district, Yueyang.