White tea? From Mississippi?

Inside the operations of Longleaf Tea Company.

These batches go quick

The tea: Harmony white tea, sold by Longleaf Tea Company. $18.99 for 20g. Currently sold out; purchase other batches here.

There are about a dozen commercial tea growers in the United States that operate on a scale from “small” to “weekend project.” For the most part their productions are a curiosity, an experiment in what’s possible when you try to grow a crop half a world away from its origin, with none of the tradition and infrastructure that gives the tea business its life blood. I was drawn to Longleaf Tea Company in Laurel, Mississippi, because of the look of their tea leaves. Sometimes you can judge a book by its cover, and the pluck on Thomas and Hillary Steinwinder’s tea is careful, consistent, and well preserved in large, whole leaves that retain their integrity after steeping. The shaping of tea leaves can tell you a lot about a producer’s operation, and in this case we can see a neurotic attention to detail.

American-grown white tea is rare, and Longleaf’s batches sell out quickly. When I got the email that this white tea was briefly back in stock, I pounced right away. You’ll want to click that “notify me when available” button for future harvests, though a different white tea batch from 2023, called Melody, is currently up for grabs, along with some black tea in teabags. The Steinwinders tell me that they sold through their 2024 spring harvest green tea in 30 minutes.

The source: Longleaf is a marital agricultural project. Hillary’s family has raised shaggy-needled longleaf pines for timber across six generations in the fields where tea plants now grow. Thomas is the CEO of a civil engineering firm who got a taste for tea while studying Mandarin in Shanghai. A tea shop owner that he practiced with once asked where Americans grow their tea. He realized he had no idea, and the question revealed a rabbit hole of research that he’s still falling down. Upon returning to the US and settling down in their home town in 2018, the couple planted 1,200 tea saplings to see how they’d do in the acidic soil. They plucked their first harvest in 2020 and experimented with production styles in their kitchen. They began selling tea in 2021, and today pluck from 2,000 of a total 5,000 to 6,000 plants. Family, friends, and some hired help pick leaves on the weekends, which Thomas processes into green, black, and occasionally white styles.

To brew: Harmony tastes clean and bright with abundant white flower aromas. This batch is on the greener side of white teas, with a slightly spicy garden vegetable impression from the wet leaves. There’s a nice finishing sweetness carried by a moderate body that reminds me of chewing softened marshmallow. It feels like clean linens drying on laundry lines in summertime. To get this brew, I used 3 grams in a 150 milliliter pot (1g/50ml) with water that I cooled by repeated decanting. I poured boiling water into a cup, which reduced its temperature to 200°F (93°C). Then I dribbled the water from the cup into my pot, which brought the temperature down further to 180°. After 1 minute of steeping with the lid off, the water bottomed out at 155°. You can see how quickly water temperature drops during brewing. In the case of a delicate white tea, thermodynamics work in our favor.

Leafhopper is taking a break next week for Thanksgiving. See you on December 3rd!

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Hillary and Thomas Steinwinder. This and the following photos are courtesy of Longleaf Tea Company, shot by Randy Sherrill.

Inside an American tea producer: Longleaf Tea Company

Why grow tea in the United States at all? There are easier and more profitable crops. Western labor costs are so high that you’ll never be able to compete with overseas producers. And it’s not like there’s any homegrown tea heritage here to build on. The average tea drinker couldn’t care less if their brew comes from American soil.

As far as I can tell from my conversation with Thomas and Hillary Steinwinder, their answer boils down to the fact that they can. Sometimes you just want to grow something green on your own land with your own hands, and as family heirlooms go, a field of tea plants is a nice legacy to leave to the grandchildren.

The city of Laurel is a good place to make tea, Thomas tells me. His growing season runs from mid-May through October, allowing them about 20 weekend harvests of 40 pounds of fresh leaf. The acidic, silty soil retains moisture but drains well, which helps the plants draw in vital nutrients for strong growth. And the warm, humid climate mimics the low-lying tropical regions across Asia where tea thrives, such as Assam. (It’s around 80° in Laurel today.)