The most ceremonial Chinese tea drinking - Gong Fu cha.
According to the ceremony of Gong Fu cha - you should use Oolong sorts of tea - semi-fermented Chinese sorts of tea, to say in short words - oolong tea is a borderland between green - not fermented tea - and black (red in Chinese classification ) - fermented tea. Leaves of this tea are not broken, but dried into little buds.
Except tea, for this Chinese ceremony you will need plenty of tea services: special tea-table, a cup for the dry brewing, set of tools for manipulations with tea and crockery, tea-pot for brewing, vessel for hot water, able to hold the temperature (a thermos or a tea-kettle with the burner), pitcher - if possible with the tea-strainer, special tea-pairs with the saucer, a serviette or a tea towel.
Technical part of the ceremony starts with the procedure, called "acquaintance with the Tea". It looks quite strange but quite simple - tea, selected for brewing is put from the tea-caddy into a special cup (you should not touch tea with our hands, use a chopsticks or a bamboo scoop for it). After it the dry tea in this cup is to be smelt, but not just smelt but in the sly Chinese manner - you should thrust your nose into the cup and take a deep breath and then - an outward breath exactly into the tea and now a new breath. This second inhalation is the main one. The trick is that after you make an exhalation into the tea, it changes its scent. The dry and delicate aroma turns into the rich, intensive, fresh, a bit sweetish and very warm flavour. The odour depends on the tea sort but this change with the second breath is an obligatory phenomenon. This procedure is thought to be an acquaintance with the tea because with the first breath drawing - the tea introduces itself to you, and with your exhalation - you introduce yourself to the tea. When you take a breath for the second time - you feel the aroma of already familiar to you tea - warm and pleasant.
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