Camellia sinensis - Common name Tea plant. An evergreen shrub growing to 2.5m at a slow rate. It is hardy to zone 8. Tea plant can be easily grown as a greenhouse plant or a porch plant that you bring in during the winter, or if your local weather permits, grow it under a tree in dappled light. It tolerates temperatures down to between 15 and 20 degrees if protected. It prefers a wet humid summer and a cool but not very frosty dry winter. This very ornamental plant is usually kept pruned to a spreading shrub 2 to 5 feet in height and it's shoots (the bud and two tender leaves) can be plucked each 7 to 14 days, 4 pounds of which yield 1 pound of dried or "made" tea. It is in leaf all year, and in flower from March to May. The flowers are pollinated by bees and are very fragrant. Tea plants requires well-drained, light sandy or medium loamy soils. The plant prefers acid and neutral soils and can grow in very acid soil. If you grow this as a container plant you can grow it in a sphagnum peat moss potting soil or well composted pine bark with vermiculite and Greensand or compost added, and fertilize with Azalea plant food or Miracid plant food which will keep your soil acid, or use other organic techniques to keep the soil acid.
Harvest and dry only the very young leaves and leaf buds throughout the growing season from plants three years old and older. The tea leaves top two leaves and the bud leaf are plucked from the end of the branchlet and processes into Green Tea, Black Tea, Gunpowder Tea, Orange Pekoe Tea, Oolong Teas and other great tasting teas all coming from the same plant. What makes each tea different from another is mainly the way the leaf is processed.
Green Tea is made from Camellia sinensis steamed and dried leaves.
Black Tea is made from Camellia sinensis leaves that have been oxidized then dried.
Oolong Tea is made from partially oxidized Camellia sinensis leaves.

Is Tea Good For You?

Tea contains polyphenols, these are antioxidants that help to protect the body against heart diseases, stroke and cancer. The leaves are cardiotonic, diuretic, stimulant and astringent. Tea has even been shown to prevent tooth decay due to it's high fluoride content. Tea has a decided influence over the nervous system, giving a feeling of comfort and exhilaration, but also producing an unnatural wakefulness when taken in large doses.

Here are three simple recipes you can make at home.

GREEN TEA

1. Tender young growth is picked by hand from Camellia sinensis. Young shoots with 2 - 3 leaves are recommended. Any surface water on the leaves and shoots is allowed to dry in the shade for up to a few hours.

2. In preparing green tea, the oxidizing enzymes are killed by steaming the freshly plucked leaf in a vegetable steamer on your stove for less than one minute, or by roasting in a hot pan (cast iron skillet) for a few minutes. This process is called "sha qing" killing out in Chinese.

3. The leaves are finally dried in an oven set at 250 degrees Fahrenheit for 20 minutes. This step is necessary to remove any moisture in the leaf so it won't mold and it stops any fermentation.

4. You may add dried Jasmine, dried blackberry leaf or other fine tasting leaf teas to this tea to give it a fruity flavor

OOLONG TEA

1. The freshly plucked shoots from Camellia sinensis are spread out thinly over a cleared area of flat ground, which is usually covered with a mat or a towel to keep the leaves from contact with the earth. The shoots are wilted under the sun for 30 min. to one hour, depending on the temperature.

2. The leaves are then taken indoors, where they are left to wither at room temperature for a number of hours. During this period the leaves are gently agitated by hand every hour. This process causes the edge of the leaf to turn red, and the moisture content drops about 20%. These controlled actions cause the biochemical reactions and enzymatic processes in the leaf, which in turn produce the unique aroma and colors found in oolong teas.

3. After withering, the leaves are then dried in an oven set at 250 degrees Fahrenheit for 15 - 20 minutes. This stops the enzymatic process.

BLACK TEA

There are many different strains of tea plants and many ways of processing the tea leaf to make your own special tea. Experiment and have fun and feel pride in drinking your own home recipes of your own home grown teas.
Tea production has been tried here in the USA (there is still one active and productive Tea Estate here) but commercial production did not prove practical since tea manufacture of high quality tea requires a great deal of tea professionalism and that did not exist in the USA. Furthermore, tea produced in the USA, because of the higher pay scale, cost anywhere from 4 to 9 times more than that produced in traditional tea-producing countries.