Nánjiàn Wúliàngshān hóngchá (南涧无量山红茶) is a red tea of Nanjian Yi Autonomous County (南涧彝族自治县) of Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan Province. The name joins the county and the Wuliangshan mountains (无量山), in which its gardens lie, and is protected by geographical indication mark No. 26450753. The mark’s reference entry describes the tea as follows: tight golden strands, a bright red liquor with a noticeable golden ring, a rich and full taste in which bitterness turns into a sweet aftertaste, a fruity aroma and staying power over many infusions. The county has two tea geographical indication marks: the second is the green Nanjian Lücha.
1. Classification and Origin
- Type: Red tea (红茶, hóngchá), fully oxidized. The class is stated in the very name of the mark, and the description of the appearance — golden strands, a red liquor — agrees with it. I have not seen a document describing the technology.
- Category: Yunnan red tea; geographical indication certification mark or collective mark.
- Origin: China, Yunnan Province (云南, Yúnnán), Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture (大理, Dàlǐ), Nanjian Yi Autonomous County (南涧, Nánjiàn), the Wuliangshan mountains.
- Mark zone: According to the reference entry on the GI platform — the present administrative territory of Nanjian County (南涧县现辖行政区域内). The provincial list also gives the county as the holder’s location.
- Geographic coordinates: The county seat — about 25.0° N and 100.5° E.
2. History and Cultural Significance
- History:
- Tang roots. According to Yunnan Ribao (2019), the recorded history of tea growing in the Wuliangshan mountains goes back to the Tang era: the Tang treatise Manshu (蛮书) describes how tea was grown and drunk in the Nanzhao kingdom (南诏).
- The Wuliangshan mountains. According to the same newspaper, the Nanzhao kingdom bestowed on the Wuliangshan mountains the title of “Southern Peak” (南岳).
- Trade route. According to a 2022 publication, Nanjian tea traveled along the old Tea Horse Road to Tibet and to the countries of Southeast Asia.
- Mark. Mark No. 26450753 is included in Yunnan’s provincial list of geographical indication marks as of December 28, 2019. The year of registration and the holder are not found in the sources consulted. Yunnan Ribao wrote in the same year, 2019, that the county has two products with geographical indication marks.
- Name: 南涧 (Nánjiàn) is the name of the county; 无量山 (Wúliàngshān) is the Wuliangshan mountains, 无量 means “immeasurable”; 红茶 (hóngchá) means red tea.
- Cultural significance: Tea is one of the county’s main industries. According to Yunnan Ribao (2019), tea is grown by 26,000 farm households, the county has 56 tea enterprises and 35 cooperatives, and the annual output value of the industry has reached 1 billion yuan. Yunnan Wang (2021) gives the same 26,000 households — that is 110,000 people — and an output value of more than 5800 yuan per mu of garden (亩产值).
3. Botanical Description and Raw Material
- Variety / Cultivar: The variety is not named in the sources consulted.
- Old trees: According to Yunnan Ribao (2019), the county has more than 30,000 old tea trees, and data have been collected on 11,700 of them. Yunnan Wang (2021) names 37,000 century-old trees and a database covering 11,700; in the Wuliangshan mountains, according to the same publication, there are many old trees of both the wild and the cultivated type. The figures diverge, and the sources do not say what share of the raw material for the red tea comes from old trees.
- Harvest standard: No data in the sources consulted.
- Harvest time: No data in the sources consulted.
4. Terroir and Cultivation Features
- Region: The county lies at the junction of the Dali, Lincang and Pu’er prefectures, in the Wuliangshan mountains; the valley of the Lancang River (澜沧江) runs through the county. The county’s area is about 1,700 km².
- Growing altitude: According to Yunnan Ribao (2019), the county’s high-mountain gardens lie at 1800–2500 m. The description of the green tea of the same county gives 1700–2500 m. There are no separate data for the red tea.
- Climate: Humid subtropical with a dry winter. For the county seat at an altitude of 1377 m, the mean temperature ranges from 12.3 °C in January to 24.8 °C in June, with about 740 mm of precipitation a year. The gardens lie higher, so these figures are only a guide.
- Soils: No data in the sources consulted.
- Gardens: Yunnan Ribao (2019) names 110,000 mu of high-mountain gardens (1 mu is about 667 m²), of which 31,000 mu are certified as “green” or organic. Yunnan Wang (2021) gives 120,000 mu of high-mountain gardens, 100,000 mu of old tea mountains and about 72,000 mu of “green” and organic gardens; output in 2020 was about 7,500 tonnes of tea of all kinds.
5. Production Technology
The technology of this particular tea and its parameters are not found in the sources consulted. For red tea the usual sequence is as follows:
- Withering (萎凋, wěidiāo): The leaf loses part of its moisture and becomes soft.
- Rolling (揉捻, róuniǎn): The leaf cells are broken, and the sap comes out onto the surface.
- Fermentation (发酵, fājiào): Oxidation, which turns the leaf and the liquor red.
- Drying (干燥, gānzào): Heating stops the oxidation and fixes the aroma.
This is the general scheme of the class, not a description of the technology of Nánjiàn Wúliàngshān hóngchá.
6. Organoleptic Characteristics
The description below is from the mark’s reference entry on the GI platform.
- Dry leaf appearance: Tight strands of golden color (条索紧结金黄).
- Dry leaf aroma: No data in the sources consulted.
- Liquor aroma: Fruity (闻有果香); the reference entry does not specify whether the dry leaf or the liquor is meant.
- Taste: Mellow and rich, abundant and full; bitterness turns into a sweet aftertaste (滋味醇厚，丰富饱满，苦有回甘). The tea withstands many infusions (经久耐泡).
- Liquor color: Red and bright, with a noticeable golden ring (汤色红亮，金圈突出).
- Spent leaves (wet leaves): No descriptions in the sources consulted.
7. Chemical Composition
Physicochemical data on the red tea of the mark are not found in the sources consulted. Yunnan Ribao (2019) writes about the tea of the Wuliangshan mountains in general: water extract is usually above 40%, polyphenols are usually more than 30%, amino acids more than 3%. The newspaper names neither the method nor the sample, nor whether raw material or finished tea is meant, so these figures do not apply directly to the red tea of the mark.
8. Brewing
Class practice for red tea.
- Water temperature: 90–95 °C.
- Tea amount: 3–5 g per 150 ml.
- Teaware: A white porcelain gaiwan or teapot — against white, the golden ring of the liquor is clearly visible.
- Process:
- Warm the teaware.
- Put in the tea.
- Briefly wet the leaf with hot water and pour it off.
- First infusion — 15–30 seconds in a gaiwan.
- Pour out completely.
- Repeat infusions, adding 10–15 seconds each time.
9. Storage
Class practice. In tight packaging, in a dry, cool, dark place, away from foreign odors. A refrigerator is not needed.
10. Price and Counterfeits
No price data in the sources consulted.
- How to avoid counterfeits:
- Look for the geographical indication mark “南涧无量山红茶” (No. 26450753).
- Check that the producer is from Nanjian County.
- The strands are tight and golden, the liquor is red and bright, with a golden ring.
- The Wuliangshan mountains extend beyond the county as well: the name of the mountains without the name of the county says nothing about the mark zone.
11. Interesting Facts
- The county holds two tea marks — red and green — and Yunnan Wang (2021) writes that five classes of tea are made here: green, pu-erh, oolong, red and white.
- The golden ring (金圈) — the ring at the edge of the liquor in the cup — is singled out in the mark’s reference entry as pronounced (金圈突出).
- According to a 2022 publication, in 2008 a pu-erh series from one of the Nanjian factories became a commemorative collectible tea of the Beijing Olympics.
- According to a 2022 publication, as part of the “无量山藏茶谷” project (the character 藏 here means both “to store” and “to hide”), a 38-kilometer scenic loop road through tea farms has been built near Gonglang Town (公郎).
12. Comparison with Other Yunnan Red Teas
- Nanjian Lücha (南涧绿茶): A green tea of the same county, Nanjian’s second geographical indication mark.
- Yunnan Wuliang Hongcha (云南无量红茶): A red tea of the Wuliangshan mountains; in the corpus it is described for neighboring Jingdong County and is not tied to the Nanjian mark.
- Dianhong Gongfu (滇红工夫): The classic Yunnan red tea with which all red teas of the province are usually compared.
- Changning Hongcha (昌宁红茶): A red tea with a geographical indication mark from Changning County of Baoshan prefecture-level city, also from the Lancang basin.
In Conclusion:
Nánjiàn Wúliàngshān hóngchá is a red tea of a mountain county at the junction of Dali, Lincang and Pu’er, where the gardens rise to 2500 m. The documents about it are sparse: the mark number, a zone within the county’s borders and a short description of the appearance — golden strands, a red liquor with a golden ring, a fruity aroma and bitterness that gives way to sweetness. The sources consulted do not name the variety, the harvest dates or the technology, so for details one should go to a producer from the county itself.
Sources
Geographical indication
Full list — on the Sources page