Guānshān liánqiào chá

Guānshān liánqiào chá (冠山连翘茶) is “Guanshan forsythia tea”, a drink made from the young buds and leaves of forsythia (连翘, liánqiào) from Pingding County (平定县) of Yangquan prefecture-level city in Shanxi Province. There is no tea bush in it: it is a tea substitute (代用茶, dàiyòng chá) from the family of “Shanxi medicinal teas” (山西药茶). The name Yánnián qiào (延年翘), “forsythia of longevity”, was, according to legend, bestowed by an emperor; today it is also the producer’s trademark. The leaf is processed in the manner of tea in three types — “red”, “green” and “blue-green” (青茶). The name has been protected as an agricultural product geographical indication (AGI) since 2021 and as a geographical indication product since 2025.

1. Classification and Origin

Type: A tea substitute (代用茶), not tea from Camellia sinensis. “Red”, “green” and “blue-green” are ways of processing the leaf, not tea classes.
Category: Shanxi medicinal tea; a geographical indication product.
Origin: China, Shanxi Province (山西, Shānxī), Yangquan prefecture-level city (阳泉, Yángquán), Pingding County (平定, Píngdìng).
Protection zone: The towns of Guanshan (冠山镇) and Yexi (冶西镇) in Pingding County — 78 administrative villages and residential communities. The applicant is the Pingding Specialty Products Association (平定特产协会).
Geographic coordinates: 113°28′15″–113°35′35″ E, 37°45′30″–38°06′30″ N.

2. History and Cultural Significance

History:
- Qing legends. The producer and an intangible heritage page write that the name 延年翘 was given to the drink by the Kangxi Emperor and that under the Qing it was sent as tribute to the court. The version of the Yangquan county authorities is different: the name was given and the tribute assigned by the Qianlong Emperor. The sources disagree, and no documents on this were found in the materials consulted.
- The tribute legend. According to a legend retold by a traditional medicine website, under Qianlong the tribute amounted to fifty dan a year, gatherers died on the cliffs, and the emperor, on learning of the victims, abolished the tribute.
- Revival. According to the local press, the technique almost died out; it was revived by a company founded in 2011 in Hougou Village (后沟村) of Guanshan Town.
- 2017. The traditional production technique was entered on the Shanxi provincial list of intangible cultural heritage.
- 2020. In March the provincial public brand “山西药茶” was announced; the province has been developing medicinal teas as a key industry since 2018.
- 2021. Registration as an agricultural product geographical indication by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs; according to the Baidu reference — on 4 June.
- 2025. Announcement No. 640 of the China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) of 16 July 2025 (on the website — 13 August) recognized the drink as a geographical indication product, in a batch of 1,409 names.
Name: Guanshan (冠山) — a mountain and the town of the same name in Pingding County; 连翘 — forsythia; 茶 — tea.
Cultural significance: The producer writes that it built a development base and a craft transmission workshop at the foot of Guanshan, and switched its brewing and drinking ware to Pingding 紫砂.

3. Botanical Description and Raw Material

Plant: Forsythia (连翘, Forsythia suspensa) — a medicinal shrub, popularly called 黄金条 (“golden rods”). In early spring it flowers yellow, then puts out young shoots.
Variety: The protection requirements give the product’s own name in the “variety” field; bred forms were not found in the sources consulted.
Wild and planted: The press emphasizes wild forsythia (about 2,500 mu of wild thickets under the producer’s protection, 2022). But the protection requirements also describe cultivation — sowing, propagation by cuttings, planting at 2 × 1.5 m, cutting back the main shoot at a height of 70–80 cm, fertilizing — and a 2025 report already speaks of “planted and wild-growing” forsythia.
Raw material and harvest: Young buds and leaves; according to the protection requirements — hand picking in early April. The producer considers leaf picked before the Guyu season (谷雨, around 20 April) the best; in 2025 it named April — July as the production season.

4. Terroir and Cultivation Features

Region: The foothills of the Taihang Mountains (太行山) in eastern Shanxi.
Growing altitude: 600–1,200 m — according to the protection requirements.
Soils and topography: Deep, fertile, loose, well-drained sandy loam soils (砂质壤土); semi-shaded or wind-sheltered sunny mountain slopes and gentle slopes.
Climate: Not described in the protection text; no data were found in the sources consulted.
Scale: According to the Baidu reference, as of 2020 the protection zone accounted for 500 ha and 100 t a year; in 2025 the producer expected about 50 t for the year.

5. Production Technology

The protection requirements set out three schemes; the first steps are common to all — selection and sorting of the fresh leaf, shaking (摇青, yáoqīng), sun withering (晒青, shàiqīng), withering (萎凋, wěidiāo).

“Red” (连翘红茶): rolling (揉捻, róuniǎn) → fermentation (发酵, fājiào) → first drying → “aroma raising” (提香, tíxiāng).
“Green” (连翘绿茶): fixation (杀青, shāqīng) → rolling → shaping → drying.
“Blue-green” (连翘青茶): ninefold steaming (九次蒸青) → eightfold rolling → drying.

Local sources call the traditional method “nine steamings and nine dryings” (九蒸九晒, jiǔ zhēng jiǔ shài) and write that it has been handed down among the people for more than a hundred years. In 2021 the producer installed four lines: one for this method, of its own design, and three automatic ones from southern China.

6. Organoleptic Characteristics

The description is taken from the 2025 protection requirements; each type has its own.

Dry leaf appearance: “Green” — dark green (深绿); “red” — black and lustrous (乌润). There are no descriptions for “blue-green”.
Dry leaf aroma: No descriptions were found in the sources consulted.
Liquor aroma: “Green” — natural and pleasant (自然芬芳). There is no separate aroma description for “red” and “blue-green”.
Taste: “Blue-green” — fresh, mellow and distinctive (鲜醇独特), fresh and fragrant in the mouth (口感清新芳香), with a slight cooling and numbing feel (略有凉麻); “red” — full, with a sweet aftertaste (醇厚，回味甘甜).
Liquor color: “Green” — light green (浅绿); “red” — red and clear (红明); “blue-green” — clean and transparent (清亮).
Spent leaves (wet leaves): “Green” — bluish green (青绿); “red” — red and lustrous (红亮).

Dark green leaf, light green liquor and bluish-green spent leaves — the rule of the “three greens” (三绿).

7. Chemical Composition

Indicator	Protection norm
Moisture	no more than 10%
Ash	no more than 4.5 g per 100 g

Data on the active substances of the leaf were not found in the sources consulted.

8. Health Properties

There are no verified data on the effects of this particular drink. The word “medicinal” in the name of the industry is advertising; nothing has been clinically confirmed.

9. Brewing

Class practice. Parameters for this drink were not found in the sources consulted; below are the usual parameters for leaf processed in the manner of tea.

“Green” type: 80–85 °C, 3 g per 150 ml, first infusion 40–60 seconds, two or three further infusions.
“Red” and “blue-green”: 90–95 °C, 3 g per 150 ml, first infusion about a minute, several infusions with increasing steeping time.
Teaware: A gaiwan or a small teapot.

10. Storage

Class practice. In tight packaging, in a dry, dark place, away from odors; the “green” type — in a cool place and within a year.

11. Price and Counterfeits

No price data were found in the sources consulted.

How to avoid counterfeits:
- Look for the special geographical indication mark next to the name 冠山连翘茶.
- Check that the producer is from the towns of Guanshan or Yexi.
- The ingredients should be forsythia leaf, not tea leaf.
- The appearance should match the type: for “green” — the “three greens”, for “red” — black lustrous leaf and a red, clear liquor.

12. Interesting Facts

The “blue-green” type is steamed nine times and rolled eight; the number of steamings matches the old method of “nine steamings and nine dryings”.
The tribute legend ends not in glory but in abolition.
Announcement No. 640 also includes other Shanxi forsythias — Pingshun, Jiangxian, Qinyuan — but without the word “tea”: there the plant itself is protected.
According to the city newspaper, the province wants to make medicinal tea the “seventh tea system” of China.

13. Comparison with Other “Teas” Not from the Tea Bush

Maoyan Meicha (茅岩莓茶): A Hunan drink from the vine Ampelopsis grossedentata, also from Announcement No. 640.
Honghu Heye Cha (洪湖荷叶茶): Lotus leaf from Hubei, from the same announcement.
Kuding (苦丁茶): A bitter infusion from the leaves of evergreen plants.
Jiaogulan (绞股蓝): Gynostemma, a herbaceous vine.

In Conclusion:

Guānshān liánqiào chá is not tea but forsythia leaf from the foothills of the Taihang Mountains, processed in the manner of tea in three types: “green” with its “three greens”, “red” with fermentation, and “blue-green”, which is steamed nine times. The imperial glory rests on legends, while the documents are modern: provincial heritage since 2017, protection of the name since 2021.