Hei Meiren (Black Beauty)

Black Tea 2026

$20.00

Tea Origin

Yiwushan (Yiwu Mountain), Mengla County, Xishuangbanna, Yunnan Province, China

Tea Bush

Yunnan Dayezhong (Yunnan Large Leaf Heirloom Tea Tree)

Tea Maker

Gong Liping and Ran Yijun

Harvest Time

April

Plucking Standard

One bud, three leaves

This oddity among oddities is Black Beauty, a mountain-grown Yunnan black tea roasted for extra flavor. It gets its name from its lustrous dark leaves that infuse a deep and brilliant red liquor.

The raw tea material for Hei Meiren is harvested from the high-altitude tea gardens of Yiwu Mountain in Xishuangbanna, one of the most famous origins for puer tea. These leaves lend their characteristic lightness and complexity to black tea processing, presenting tangy and savory flavors of tamarind and tobacco chased with honey. Making these leaves into a black tea instead of a sheng puer involves oxidizing them until dark and kneading them into their tight, spindly shape. This smooths their flavor, before two rounds of roasting augment their aroma into something startlingly sweet, toasty, and malty milk chocolate-like.

Making Hei Meiren Black Tea

Hei Meiren begins with the harvest of a harvest of one bud with two or three leaves, giving a balance of both tenderness and fullness of the raw material.

Those freshly harvested leaves are spread thinly and evenly on bamboo mats for a natural 8–12 hour indoor withering. This step accomplishes several changes in the leaves: evening their temperature, reducing their water content, and softening the tea stems. This wither sets the stage for the rest of the process. If done well, it prevents damage and uneven curing during processing, and the leaves will preserve more complexity in their aroma and clarity in their liquor at the final brew.

As soon as they have reached just the right state of withering, Hei Meiren’s leaves are rolled for 40–70 minutes. The tea maker uses just enough pressure to curl the leaves and bring tea juices to their surface, while also staying gentle enough keep their fuzzy trichome down intact. The rolled leaves are then placed in clean bamboo baskets to control humidity as they oxidize and brown. Over the course of 5-8 hours, the leaf color shifts to a bronzey-red hue, their grassy smell dissipates, and floral, fruity, and honey-like aromas emerge.

So far, these steps are more or less the same as other black tea, but it’s the finishing stroke that sets Hei Meiren apart. This signature step comes as the oxidation of the leaves is halted with the heat of two separate rounds of firing. It begins with a hot 20 minute roast at 95–105°C, followed by cooling for half an hour, and then a final slow roasting at 65–75°C for 1.5–2 hours.

The final effect is a complex, layered cup of tea. Its flavor presents itself backwards, in terms of processing. Up front, it’s the leaves’ unique roasted aroma, then the tangy dried fruit and honey from their black tea processing, and finally the delicate, clear, and sweet character of their Yiwu terroir.