Green Gem Tea's own standard uses visible down (pekoe) as the specific feature distinguishing it from Gunpowder Tea's similar rolled-granule shape — not the granule shape itself.
Green Gem Tea (绿宝石绿茶) is a Guizhou green tea whose own provincial standard, DB52/T 997-2018, makes an explicit comparison worth repeating precisely: the finished tea is described as similar in granule form to Gunpowder Tea, but distinguished specifically by visible down (pekoe) on the leaf, which Gunpowder Tea’s standard doesn’t describe.
That comparison matters because rolled, granular shapes show up across several unrelated Chinese green teas — shape alone doesn’t identify a specific tea. Origin (Guizhou specifically) and the down detail are what the standard actually uses to define this one.
Worth being precise about the standard itself: DB52/T 997-2018 is a Guizhou provincial standard (the “DB” prefix), one tier below a national GB/T standard — a real, dedicated standard, just not a national one. It sets three grades (珍品, 特级, 一级) and physicochemical limits including a notably high water-extract minimum of 40.0% and a moisture ceiling of 6.5%.
The source material used for this page doesn’t document aroma, taste or liquor descriptors by grade the way it does for most other teas on this site — what’s shown here reflects the general character of pan-fired Chinese green tea rather than a Green-Gem-Tea-specific figure from the standard.
See the Green Tea guide for where Green Gem Tea sits among China’s other green teas, and Gunpowder Tea for the similarly-shaped tea its own standard explicitly distinguishes it from.
Look · Dry leaf
The standard describes the finished shape as coiled-flower-shaped granules (盘花状颗粒), with visible down noted as the specific feature distinguishing it from Gunpowder Tea's similar granule form.
Smell & taste
Typical aroma: grassy. Flavor tendencies: brisk. Body: medium. These vary by batch, storage and brewing.
Brew · A starting point
Try 3 g in 150 ml water at 85–90°C for 60–90 seconds. Fully decant before tasting.
Read the wet leaves
Not documented in the source material reviewed for this page beyond the general pan-fired green tea process it shares with other granular-style Chinese green teas.
Sources & review status
- 中国绿茶标准研究资料库_ChinaTea101_Research_Master_File.md — Section 6.7 (绿宝石绿茶/Green Gem Tea material card, citing DB52/T 997-2018) — ChinaTea101 owner-supplied Source Library. Source-to-Site Expansion Mode, Batch VI. Used for the provincial-standard profile, the down-vs-Gunpowder-Tea distinguishing detail explicitly stated in the source card, grading, and physicochemical limits. No sensory (aroma/taste/liquor) descriptors were found in the source card for any grade — this page's sensory fields use general pan-fired-green-tea category descriptors rather than a Green-Gem-Tea-specific figure, and the body text says so directly.
- SCNet (DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash-Event) extraction pass over the same material card, used to draft initial English prose from the raw standard citations — SCNet API (DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash-Event). SCNet's draft correctly flagged the absence of aroma/taste/liquor data and correctly noted the standard's provincial (not national) tier without being asked to make that distinction. Claude verified the draft against the source card directly before writing this file.
Imported from 中国绿茶标准研究资料库_ChinaTea101_Research_Master_File.md. Updated 2026-09-25. Last reviewed 2026-09-25
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