“Taipei Ancient Tea Road Space ” is an old tea farm without much modern equipment, founded by Chang Yue-dan in 1969…
Introduction
“Taipei Ancient Tea Road Space ” is an old tea farm without much modern equipment, founded by Chang Yue-dan in 1969. He used a word from the names of his grandfather Chang Nai-hong and father Chang Rui-zhi as the name of the farm to commemorate them. ” Taipei Ancient Tea Road Space (Hongzhi)” became a tourism tea garden under the hard work of Chang Yue-dan, and has become part of the first wave of the “Taipei Muzha Tourism Tea Garden Show Farm”. Chang Zhao-hui officially took over the family business in 2006, along with his wife Wu Lihui. The only change they made was that the farm is now pesticide-free and herbicide-free, to restore the land to its purest appearance.
Chang En-pei, the third generation of the tea farm, also returned to his hometown in 2014 to work as a farmer, injecting youth and creativity into the traditional Taipei Ancient Tea Road Space. Using a more intelligent, scientific and data-based approach, tea growing, roasting, and tasting has been elevated to new heights. The tea soup produced has a unique aroma of fermented fruit and roasted fire. The experience activities of Taipei Ancient Tea Road Space involve the procedure of kneading tea with a cloth bag, and 15 catties of tea leaves are wrapped in a cloth towel to form a spherical shape. Repeated kneading is done with both hands, roasting, and separation, and the process is repeated 3 to 5 times to allow the tea leaves to take shape.
Features of Agricultural Tourism
Tea
The tea banquet experience at Taipei Ancient Tea Road Space allows people to slow down their pace, put down their phones and have a chat. Wu LiHui says that the tea banquets at Taipei Ancient Tea Road Space are more informal and don’t have strict rules, one needs only pick a piece of clean, naturally-grown TieGuangYin. The traditional method of pouring out the first brew is ignored, conversely the first brew is deemed most important and is reserved for guests, as the first brew contains the most minerals, nutrients, and aroma derived from the ground.
“Taipei Ancient Tea Road Space” reproduces the brewing method of competitive tea evaluation, using 3 grams of tea leaves to 150 grams water to brew Baozhong tea, oolong tea, Tieguanyin and black tea. The spherical oolong tea and Tieguanyin is boiled for 6 minutes while the elongated baozhong tea and black tea is boiled for 5 minutes. The tea soup is left to stand for 1 minute, then observed, smelled, and tasted. During the process of blind tasting, the different varieties of tea are allowed to simmer in the throat, allowing the tongue to find its preference.
