What is May Tea and Why is it Important?

For those born in May, for people who love spring, for honeybees, and of course for those kind-hearted tea-picking aunts, May is, as you might guess, their favorite month.

Symbol of May: Flowers and Rebirth

May is also known as the month of flowers. They say that a blind snake awakens in May, pokes its face out of the earth, and its first act is to sniff out fennel. Once it finds the fennel, the snake rubs its face against the plant, opens its eyes, and returns to its life above ground.

Fennel is to a tea lover what it is to a blind snake. Camellia Sinensis The plant expresses the same meaning. The blind snake awakens by rubbing its face against the fennel, and the flow of life begins anew for it. It emerges from the earth and returns to its life with the awakening of spring.

The Significance of the May Exiles

May is a month that symbolizes the return to the flow of life for living beings. Humans, because they don't hibernate, awaken anew every day, and the time they drink tea is essentially their May. The tea plants, which we consume year-round, are harvested 3-4 times a year before processing. The most special of these harvests is the May shoot.

The Flavor of Natural Tea

If tea brands specify "May harvest," the price is usually higher. We are absolutely against blogs that mix in advertisements, but we have to say this: all teas from Lazika are May harvest. The value of seasonal fruits and vegetables has increased proportionally with the rise of conscious people who yearn for natural and clean food.

The Unique Growing Conditions of Turkish Tea

Harvesting tea outside of May should not be equated with the concept of tomatoes grown in greenhouses. Of course, other harvests are also valuable. All tea harvests grown in Türkiye are valuable because Turkey is the only place in the world where tea plants are grown under snowfall. We can say we are fortunate in terms of climate.

Traditional Tea Harvesting and the Human Touch

Having shed the weariness and snow of winter, the tea plant sprouts fresher and stronger, ready for its first harvest in May. Nourished by the flavor of melted snow and aromatized by the freshness of spring, once you become accustomed to these May sprouts, the continuation of your culinary journey can even lead to becoming a tea connoisseur, along with accustomed to high-quality tea.

The likelihood of tea production becoming industrialized and turning into a loveless job is low, despite increasing consumption. Tea is the livelihood of many kind-hearted tea pickers. Since a delicate technology for harvesting the uppermost leaves has not yet been developed for the tea industry, the fresh upper leaves are picked by hand. In our opinion, this is still preferable.

Who knows, perhaps it's the feelings these people nurture that give it its flavor. Perhaps it's the spirit of May embodied in the tea leaves.