There are many friends who like to drink tea in life, but not many people can store tea correctly. Many people buy green tea or give it as a gift and throw it away at home. After a while, they open it and find that it has turned yellow and smelly. They think they bought old tea. In fact, it is more likely that they have stored it improperly.

Green tea is non-fermented tea, which will slowly oxidize when it comes into contact with air in a normal temperature environment. The higher the temperature, the greater the humidity, and the faster the oxidation rate. Fresh green tea will change color and taste if left at room temperature for half a month during the hot summer months. Therefore, green tea generally needs to be refrigerated to slow down the oxidation rate and maintain its freshness by lowering the temperature.

But do all tea need to be refrigerated after they are purchased? A lot of people are probably doing it wrong. Today we will take a look at how to store the six major tea types.

1. Tea that needs to be kept in a refrigerator or cold storage

Scientific experiments have shown that when the storage temperature is lower than 5 degrees, tea oxidizes at the slowest rate and can be stored for the longest time. Therefore, if you want to achieve long-term storage and preservation effects, you need refrigerators and professional cold storage.

However, not all tea needs to be stored in refrigeration equipment. Generally speaking, only unfermented and lightly fermented teas need to be refrigerated. Such as green tea, yellow tea and part of oolong tea.

To store these teas at home, they generally need to be placed in the cold room of the refrigerator and maintained at a temperature of 0~5°C. If the tea is stored for a long time, such as more than one year, a quick freezing room is required.

What you need to pay attention to when refrigerating tea at home is that it must be sealed and separated from other foods as much as possible to prevent the tea from absorbing odors and changing color and taste.

If you are a tea merchant, you will usually choose a dedicated cold storage to store green tea and Tieguanyin. The storage effect of these special cold rooms is even better than the refrigerator in the home, because they are only used to store tea, not other food and odorous debris. Moreover, the dry humidity in the refrigerator is better controlled than that in the refrigerator, the storage time is longer, and the quality assurance is more complete.

2.Tea stored at room temperature

If you store tea at home, except for the aforementioned green tea, yellow tea and Tieguanyin, most other teas can be stored at room temperature. Whether it is white tea, black tea, or dark tea or oolong tea, they are all fermented teas. They have undergone a certain degree of oxidative fermentation during or after the production process. It can be stored for a longer period of time in a room temperature environment without discoloration or odor.

As long as these tea leaves are sealed, moisture-proof and odor-proof when stored, they can be consumed normally within their shelf life, and there is no need to use special refrigerator low-temperature storage.

For example, black tea and oolong tea, after fermentation, the polyphenols are decomposed into theaflavins and thearubigins, and the aging speed is very slow. Even in normal temperature environment, they can maintain a relatively stable state, and the quality will not be greatly affected.

Pu'er tea has the characteristics of getting more fragrant as it ages, and needs to be aged in a certain temperature and humidity environment, under the action of microorganisms, or to better transform the quality. If placed in the refrigerator, the low temperature environment cannot meet the needs and cannot allow normal activity and reproduction of microorganisms.

Therefore, during the storage process at home, these teas can be stored at room temperature, as long as they are kept away from odors, sealed properly, protected from direct sunlight, and paid attention to the ventilation of the environment.

3.Professional tea storage

In fact, this kind of professional tea soup is not something that anyone can own, and it has nothing to do with ordinary families storing tea.

In the storage process of Pu'er tea, after a long period of research, analysis and demonstration, a set of scientific storage methods have been formed. Different storage methods are designed for different tea leaves, and various aspects such as temperature, humidity, and ventilation environment of each tea warehouse are comprehensively scientifically designed to ensure that Pu'er tea can achieve optimal storage effects.

This professional tea warehousing method has spread from Pu'er tea to the white tea field. After all, white tea is also an old tea that can be stored for a long time and undergoes good transformation. However, these professional institutions invest huge amounts of money and have little to do with individuals. They are very different from the way families store tea.

4.The shelf life of the six major tea categories

After talking about the methods of storing tea at home, we will add to you the shelf life of various tea types. Only if the tea is properly stored, you can drink it with confidence within the shelf life. If it exceeds the shelf life, try not to drink it again.

Generally speaking, green tea and yellow tea are basically similar, and their shelf life is roughly the same. Normally, it is 18 months to 24 months, which is one and a half to two years. Because green tea is mainly fresh, no matter how you store it after two years, it actually doesn’t have much fresh flavor anymore.

Oolong tea and black tea are semi-fermented tea and fully fermented tea. Their shelf life is longer than that of green tea, usually about three years. However, if stored well, black tea within 5 years can be consumed normally. If it is more than 5 years old, it is generally not recommended to continue drinking.

Both white tea and dark tea are teas that can be stored and transformed for a long time. As long as conditions permit and the environment is suitable, they have the characteristics of becoming more fragrant with age. The shelf life of both of them is long-term. However, during long-term storage of tea, after a certain period of time, the quality will not continue to improve, but will slowly decline. This needs to be noted.

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