Green Leaf Cicadas

A couple of weeks ago I tried a new sample from Aura Teas called Formosa Natural Wuhe Honey Black Tea. The honey flavor in this tea really stuck with me and I've been thinking about it a great deal since. After I sampled the tea, I dropped a note to Fionna Du, Aura's owner, to ask if this tea was infused with something or scented. She said that it wasn't, that the flavor was because of the "tea bugs."

It made me think of trolls or leprechauns. What were these magical little "tea bugs" and how did they create this flavor?

Aura's website mentioned that the bugs are green leaf cicadas and that they have been used to produce a couple of varieties of oolongs, including the well-known Oriental Beauty. I did a little digging and this is what I found.

According to the East Rift Valley National Scenic Area (which includes the Wuhe Tourist Tea Plantation) website, coffee was planted on the Wuhe Terrace, Hualien County, Taiwan during the Japanese occupation (1895 - 1945). After the Japanese left, the area was no longer cultivated and sat fallow. In the early 1970s, Taiwan's Provincial Department of Agriculture and Forestry assessed that it could be a useful tea growing region. Great care and attention improved the tea's production and quality over time.

Farmers began to discover that if they eliminated the use of pesticides, green leaf cicadas (also known as "leaf hoppers"), began to feast on the tea leaves. Previously these insects had focused on rice plants. To everyone's amazement it was discovered that the leaves eaten by the cicadas developed a honey flavor and aroma when dried. Apparently, when the bugs bite the leaf, the breaking of the cells cause oxidation to begin, while the leaf is still attached to the bush. The tea can only be produced in late June and early July when the cicada come out to do their work.

Jane Pettigrew notes in an article that the original name of Oriental Beauty (one famous oolong made through this process) was "Pin Fong," meaning "liar." When the first farmer created these teas and tried to explain the process, everyone called him a liar.

You have to love tea lore.

I found that there was a write up of this tea and the process on the Insani-Tea blog back in 2007 also. Jane Pettigrew did a detailed piece in Tea & Coffee Asia in late 2008. Nothing like being late to the party. At least I got here before they turned the lights out. :)