Taiping Houkui
Taiping Houkui (monkey chief from Taiping) is one of the most visually striking green teas in the world: enormous flat, pressed leaves, usually two leaves around a bud, several centimeters long and sometimes bearing a faint net pattern from the press. From Anhui, it brews a surprisingly smooth, mellow, orchid-scented cup despite the imposing leaf, with a long sweet finish and almost no bitterness.
Large, flat, deep-green leaves, ideally two leaves enclosing a bud, pressed straight and often showing a faint grid pattern from the traditional press cloth; uniform, intact, hand-pressed leaves signal the top grade (Houkui proper, versus the rougher Kuijian and Jian Cha grades). The aroma is orchid-like and the cup smooth and sweet. Broken or unevenly colored leaves are lower grade.
Produced around Taiping (now part of Huangshan City) in Anhui, from the Shidacha cultivar grown in a small core area near Hou Keng and Hou Gang villages, which give the highest grades their name. The dramatic leaf size and flat pressing are a regional craft tradition. As with other famous greens, the name is widely borrowed, so core-village provenance and hand-pressed grade are the markers of the real thing.
Western or glass: 80-85°C, 3-4 g per 250 ml, 2-3 minutes; a tall glass lets the long leaves stand. The large leaf releases flavor slowly, so steep a touch longer than a small-leaf green. Gongfu: 85°C, 4 g per 150 ml, 30-45 seconds, 3-4 infusions.
Taiping Houkui style green runs €20-45 (about $22-49) per 100 g. Hand-pressed core-village (Hou Keng) early-spring material reaches €60-150 (about $65-162) per 100 g, reflecting the labor and small production.
Prices reviewed June 2026
Taiping Houkui's giant leaves come from a specific large-leaf local cultivar and a hand-pressing step that flattens each leaf, sometimes between cloth that leaves a faint net imprint. It is among the most labor-intensive green teas to make, which is why genuine hand-pressed grades are expensive despite the style being widely imitated.
The steps overlap in practice; this is a reading order, not a set of separate stages.
Longjing (Dragon Well)
The pan-flattened benchmark, far smaller leaf and nuttier than Houkui's giant orchid-scented leaves.
Mao Feng
The other famous Anhui green, downy and orchid-scented but tiny by comparison.
Bi Luo Chun
Spiral-rolled and fruity, the visual and stylistic opposite of Houkui's flat giant leaves.