There are too many different cultivars of Wuyi Wulong, and with a similar appearance, sometimes it is really no easy for Wuyi beginners to tell out which cultivars they are drinking.
According to the documents, there are more than 200 different cultivars in Wuyi rock tea.
They are mainly divided into two big systems:
Ming cong & Pinzhong
Ming Cong:
Ming Cong means they are all with long histories, and most of them were named with some special kinds of stories like Dahongpao is a story with a student wearing the scarlet robe, Tieluohan is the story of a strong man.
The most popular Ming Cong in Wuyishan now are :
Qidan(奇丹）, Beidou（北斗）, Tieluohan（铁罗汉）, Shuijingui(水金龟 ）, Baijiguan （白鸡冠）, Bantianyao(半天腰）, Rougui（肉桂） and Laocongshuixian (老枞水仙）
For this Ming cong, except their own features, they always with very strong tea energy, we always bake them to medium or high-level degree. Through the baking can force their essence to come out and this kind of baking style is quite good to be drunk in the second year or third year. After keeping the charcoal smoke gone, the essence of the tea will come out.
Pinzhong:
Most of the Pinzhong were imported from other tea growing places or through Hybridization in the 90s.
Now the most popular Pinzhong in Wuyi like Qilan (奇兰）, Meizhan （梅占）, Foshou （佛手））, huangmeigui（黄玫瑰）, huang guanyin (黄观音）, huang dan （黄旦）, jin mudan （金牡丹）, jin yaoshi（金钥匙）, jin qian(金钱）, queshe(雀舌）, Bairuixaing(白瑞香）baxian(八仙）and so on, too many different Pinzhong.
Like Meizhan is from Anxi tieguanyin growing area, Baxian is from Taiwan Wulong cultivars. Huang guanyin is from Hybridization of huang dan and Tie guanyin. Different pinzhong, they are with different kinds of aroma, but one same common thing is that they all do not have very strong body comparing to the Ming Cong. So for the baking, we always use bake them light style or medium style to keep their special aroma.
