Best Green Tea Brands - The Best Brands to Buy Green Tea From

There are hundreds of different tea companies, and most of them sell at least some green tea. Green tea varies widely in both price and quality, and even among the better teas, there are many different varieties with radically different flavors and aromas. How do you know what to buy? This article offers a few simple tips that will help you locate a quality product at a reasonable price.

Buy Loose Green Tea:

There are numerous reasons that loose leaf is superior to tea bags. When you buy tea bags, you are paying in large part for packaging, whereas when you buy loose leaf, you are paying for the quality of the leaf. Furthermore, tea bags not always but usually contain low grade products, fannings or dust left over after the choicest leaf has already been sold loose. The best teas are only available in loose leaf form, and you can also find the best bargains among loose leaf. Although loose teas are not widely available in stores in many parts of the U.S., the prevalence and convenience of online retailers will make this option available to almost everyone.

Buy From Companies Specializing in Green Tea:

Different companies have different strengths and areas of focus. Green teas have historically been most popular in China, Japan, and other areas of southeast Asia, and have been less popular in the UK and other western countries. Similarly, countries like India, Sri Lanka (Ceylon), and Kenya have historically produced almost exclusively black tea. Although a few companies that specialize in British-style teas and teas from India, Sri Lanka, or Kenya carry quality greens, these companies are in the minority. Companies focusing on Chinese and Japanese teas tend to be the best sources of green teas.

Know Your Varieties:

Tea comes in many different varieties. Products marketed as generic "green tea" are usually of inferior quality: the best teas are going to be named varieties. Japanese green teas include bancha, sencha, gyokuro, kukicha (made from twigs and stems), hojicha (a roasted tea), and numerous others. Chinese green teas include dragon well (long jing), chun mee, bi luo chun (green snail spring), gunpowder, and many others. Learning a little bit about these different varieties, and sampling a few from different companies can give you a sense of what varieties you like the most. This will ultimately greatly improve your tea-drinking experience.

Experiment:

Many online retailers offer sample sizes so that you can try a number of different teas without expending much money. You may also want to check out blogs and review websites to get a sense of what companies and teas other people prefer. But the most important thing is to try new teas--this will ultimately help you locate the teas you enjoy most more than any amount of reading ever could.

Alex Zorach has an M.A. in statistics from Yale University, and is an avid tea drinker and the founder and editor-in-chief of RateTea, a website for rating and reviewing teas, with a wealth of information about different tea companies, styles of tea, and tea producing regions. Browse green tea reviews and learn about different varieties of green tea on this site.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/5185792

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