Báipénzhū Héngkēng chá

Báipénzhū Héngkēng chá (白盆珠横坑茶) is a green tea of Hengkeng village (横坑村), Baipenzhu town (白盆珠镇), Huidong County (惠东县), Huizhou prefecture-level city, Guangdong Province. The village is surrounded on all sides by the Lianhuashan range (莲花山), and its tea — Héngkēng chá (横坑茶) — is included by a tourist reference page (2023) in a selection of the county’s teas. The name is not yet protected: in March 2025 Huizhou Ribao reported that the China National Intellectual Property Administration had accepted for examination an application for the geographical indication certification mark “白盆珠横坑茶”. There is no mark and no zone; the article takes the class from this page, which directly classifies Hengkeng tea as green.

1. Classification and Origin

Type: Green tea (绿茶, lǜchá). The tourist reference page (2023) says directly: “横坑茶属绿茶系” — Hengkeng tea belongs to the green teas. I have not seen the application document with the class: the class is established from the description, not from the document.
Category: A village mountain green tea of the Lianhuashan range; an application for a geographical indication certification mark, accepted for examination.
Origin: China, Guangdong Province (广东, Guǎngdōng), Huizhou prefecture-level city (惠州, Huìzhōu), Huidong County (惠东, Huìdōng), Baipenzhu town (白盆珠, Báipénzhū), Hengkeng village (横坑, Héngkēng).
Zone: The protected zone has not been published. According to the tourist reference page, the tea grows within the Lianhuashan provincial nature reserve.
Status: The application has been accepted; the name is not registered (2026 register).

2. History and Cultural Significance

History:
- The Lai clan genealogy. The local press retells the Genealogy of the Lai Clan (《赖氏族谱》) of Hengkeng village: at the beginning of the Qing, the ancestors of the Lai clan settled in Hengkeng and in the Kangxi (康熙) years began growing green tea. I have not seen the original of the genealogy, so this is a family tradition as retold, not a verified date.
- Fame in Lingnan. According to the same retelling, Hengkeng tea spread along the old post roads and became known in Lingnan. No documents on the trade in this tea found in the sources consulted.
- The modern economy. No verified data on the area of the gardens, cooperatives or the village’s revenue found in the sources consulted.
- 2025 — application accepted. According to Huizhou Ribao (March 2025), the county marks “惠东马铃薯” and “惠东仙人茶” are already registered, while the applications for “白盆珠横坑茶”, “惠东南山茶”, “惠州岩茶” and two more non-tea products have been accepted for examination.
Name: “Baipenzhu” (白盆珠) is the name of the town; “Hengkeng” (横坑) is the name of the village; “cha” (茶) means tea.
Cultural significance: The local press cites a village song about rain beyond Lianhuashan and about the tea that in Hengkeng is picked before the Qingming festival (清明, qīngmíng). The tourist reference page names two local products under this name — 新庵横坑茶 and 五指嶂三里路横坑茶.

3. Botanical Description and Raw Material

Variety / Population: The variety declared for the mark has not been published. Baipenzhu town is one of the areas where wild xianren cha (仙人茶), the county’s local population, grows in the mountains. The tourist reference page (2023) lists the main varieties of the county as a whole — xianren cha (also known as “shanzi cha”, 山子茶), 金萱 (jīnxuān), 梅占 (méizhàn), shuixian (水仙) and population bushes. Nothing is said directly about the raw material of Hengkeng tea in the sources consulted.
Raw material: No harvest standard found in the sources consulted.
Seasons: According to the local press retelling, Hengkeng tea has three harvests:
- Spring tea (春茶): picked before the Qingming festival.
- Summer tea — liùyuèzi (六月子, “tea of the sixth month”).
- Autumn tea — báilùzi (白露子): in the Bailu (白露) season; when brewed, it reveals a floral aroma.

4. Terroir and Cultivation Features

Region: The Lianhuashan range. According to the tourist reference page (2023), the tea grows within the Lianhuashan provincial nature reserve, and Hengkeng village is surrounded on all sides by its mountains.
Altitude: There are no verified data on the altitude of the gardens; the reference speaks only of “lush high mountains”.
Climate: According to the same page, moisture is brought by the monsoon from the South China Sea, the mountains are often in clouds and mist, the climate is warm, the light moderate, and the gardens are watered with running spring water. For the county as a whole it gives a southern subtropical monsoon climate, an average temperature of 22.0 °C and 1720.3 mm of precipitation a year.
Soils: No data found in the sources consulted.

5. Production Technology

No technology declared for the mark found in the sources consulted; the tourist reference page only classifies the tea as green.

Below is the general scheme for green tea, not a description of this particular tea:

Spreading (摊放, tānfàng): The fresh leaf gives off part of its moisture.
Fixation (杀青, shāqīng): Heating stops oxidation.
Rolling (揉捻, róuniǎn).
Drying (干燥, gānzào).

6. Organoleptic Characteristics

There is no document with requirements for the appearance; below is the description from the tourist reference page.

Dry leaf appearance: No data found in the sources consulted.
Dry leaf aroma: No data found in the sources consulted.
Liquor aroma: No data found in the sources consulted, except for a mention in the local press retelling that the autumn báilùzi gives a floral aroma.
Taste: According to the tourist page (2023) — sweet without bitterness, rich without astringency, with a strong honey note, a deep sensation in the throat and a long sweet aftertaste (甘而不苦，浓而不涩，蜜味浓，喉底足，回甘久).
Liquor color: According to the same page — clear (茶色清澈).
Spent leaves (wet leaves): No data found in the sources consulted.

7. Chemical Composition

No physicochemical data found in the sources consulted.

8. Brewing

Class practice for green tea.

Water temperature: 80–85 °C.
Tea amount: 3 g per 150 ml.
Teaware: A glass tumbler or a white gaiwan.
Process:
1. Warm the teaware.
2. Put in the tea and pour the water down the side.
3. First infusion — after 40–60 seconds.
4. Drink, leaving part of the liquor, and top up with water; two or three repeat infusions.

9. Storage

Class practice. In airtight packaging, in a refrigerator at 0–5 °C, away from light, moisture and odors. Spring tea is best drunk within a year.

10. Price and Counterfeits

No price data found in the sources consulted.

How to avoid counterfeits:
- Remember that there is no “白盆珠横坑茶” mark yet: the inscription on the packaging is a trade name, not a protected name.
- Check that the producer is from Baipenzhu town, Huidong County.
- Ask about the season: spring tea from before Qingming and the autumn báilùzi are different teas.
- Do not confuse it with the county’s registered mark “惠东仙人茶” — that is a different name.

11. Interesting Facts

According to the Lai clan genealogy, as the local press retells it, green tea began to be grown in Hengkeng under Kangxi.
The village gardens, according to the tourist reference page, are watered with running spring water.
In a local song, as the press retells it, Hengkeng tea is the one picked before Qingming.

12. Comparison with Other Teas

Huidong Xianren Cha (惠东仙人茶): A registered mark of the same county for tea from the local xianren cha population, which also grows in the Baipenzhu mountains.
Huizhou Yancha (惠州岩茶): A Wuyishan-type oolong from the danxia hills of the same town; the application for its mark was accepted together with the Hengkeng one.
Huidong Nanshan Cha (惠东南山茶): An applied-for name of the Jiulongfeng mountain area of the same county; the class has not been established.
Huidong Lü Cha (惠东绿茶): The corpus article on the green teas of the county as a whole, in which Hengkeng tea is one of the components.
Baitang Shancha (柏塘山茶): A mountain green tea of Boluo County in the same prefecture-level city — already protected, with a standard.

In Conclusion:

Báipénzhū Héngkēng chá is a village green tea from the Lianhuashan mountains that so far has an application but no mark. Local texts depict it in more detail than the documents do: the Lai clan genealogy, as retold by the press, dates the beginning of tea growing to the Kangxi years, the tourist reference page classifies the tea as green and promises sweetness without bitterness and a honey note in the cup, and in the village they distinguish spring, summer and autumn harvests. What the protected product will be like, only the registration of the mark will show.