No. 023 — Lapsang Souchong

Smoked tea

When fire enters the leaf

15 to 18 min read • Level: discovery & deepening • Cap Sur Le Thé

There are teas that we almost recognize before tasting them.

Open a box of smoked tea and the world immediately changes. The nose encounters wood, fire, sometimes resin, the chimney, cold ash or dried fruit. The impression can be so powerful that one might think that the tea leaf naturally has this smell.

However, the tea plant does not grow with a firewood scent.

The smoky character is the result of a transformation. Among the most famous teas associated with this technique is Lapsang Souchong, or Zhengshan Xiaozhong, a black tea historically linked to the Wuyi Mountains region, in Chinese Fujian.

However, many claims circulate around it: it was born by accident, soldiers interrupted its production, pine was used in an emergency, all Lapsang Souchong teas are extremely smoky, and their aromatic power is even a sign of quality.

Some of these claims rest on technical realities. Others are simplifications. And the story of the soldiers belongs above all to the realm of traditional narrative.

« How can a tea leaf retain in the cup the memory of a wood fire? »

From the tea plant to fire: the smoky character is born during processing, not on the plant.

Black tea before smoking

Let's start by removing the smoke.

Before being smoked, Lapsang Souchong belongs to the family of black teas. Its leaves therefore come, like all true teas, from Camellia sinensis.

This point seems elementary, but it completely changes our way of understanding the product. There is no "smoked tea plant" whose leaves naturally possess a pine flavor. This character is born from the work done after harvesting.

In the production of a black tea, the leaves are generally withered, rolled or worked to damage their tissues, then left in conditions favoring significant enzymatic oxidation. They are then dried to stabilize the product.

The precise methods vary depending on the producers and the styles sought. It would therefore be misleading to transform this general succession into a universal recipe down to the degree and minute.

What matters here is to understand that smoking occurs in an already complex processing chain.

When wood becomes aroma

Burning wood does not only produce heat.

Under the effect of temperature, its constituents decompose and release many volatile substances. It is a part of this mixture that our nose interprets as a smoke smell.

When the tea leaves are placed in this environment, they are exposed to these compounds. Some molecules coming from the wood and its thermal degradation then directly contribute to the aromatic profile of the tea.

Analyses carried out on Lapsang Souchong teas have shown that smoking clearly changes their volatile composition. Compounds associated with pine and wood pyrolysis products increase, while the aromatic profile inherent to the leaves also evolves.

This means that the expression "smoked tea" is not just a sensory comparison.

In a truly smoked tea, the process leaves a measurable chemical trace.

Why pine?

Pine is inseparable from the image of smoked Lapsang Souchong.

In the traditional methods described in the Wuyi region, different local pine woods are associated with the drying and smoking of the leaves. The nature of the fuel matters because not all smokes have exactly the same composition.

Works comparing different smoking materials also show that the choice of wood influences the obtained aromatic profile.

But we must avoid a new simplification: pine does not alone make a good Lapsang Souchong.

We must also consider the quality of the leaf, its harvest, its withering, its rolling, its oxidation, the mastery of heat, the duration of exposure to smoke and the final drying.

Two producers both using pine can therefore produce very different teas.

The wood gives a part of its imprint to the tea. The know-how decides how this imprint integrates into the leaf.

In the smoking house

The traditional image is spectacular: a wooden building, a hearth fueled by pine, the smoke and heat circulating, and the leaves arranged higher up on racks.

This organization allows the simultaneous use of heat and smoke without simply placing the leaves in the flames.

The distance from the source, the draft, the temperature and the time then become manufacturing parameters.

Strong exposure can produce a very marked character. A more measured exposure allows the characteristics inherent to black tea to appear more.

This is one reason why the expression "smoky taste" actually covers very different profiles.

Some immediately evoke a campfire. Others remind more of dry wood, resin, ripe or dried fruit. In the best balances, the smoke does not necessarily erase the tea: it becomes one of its layers.

Smoking is only one step in a longer processing chain.

The story of the soldiers

Here is now the story that is almost systematically encountered when looking for the origin of Lapsang Souchong.

Soldiers supposedly crossed a producing region during a period of troubles. Their passage interrupted the tea work and delayed the drying of the leaves.

To save the harvest or make up for lost time, the producers supposedly used a pine fire to speed up the drying.

The leaves supposedly took a strong smoke smell.

The batch, initially considered unusual, supposedly finally met success with foreign buyers. The process was then reproduced.

The story has everything needed to become an excellent story: an emergency, a mistake, an involuntary invention and an unexpected success.

But there is a major documentary problem.

The versions do not all tell the same event. Some place the episode in the 17th century during the transition conflicts between the Ming and the Qing. Others associate it with much later military events, notably in the 19th century.

When several accounts claim to explain the same founding event with different chronologies, we cannot arbitrarily choose the most attractive version and present it as certain.

A legend is not an error

The fact that a story cannot be proven does not mean it should disappear.

Legends are part of the cultural history of tea. They show how the producers, merchants and drinkers gave meaning to the products they transmitted.

The problem only begins when a legend loses its label and artificially becomes a "historical fact".

In the Tsuru Collection, we prefer to keep both.

The beauty of the story and the documentary prudence.

Are all Lapsang Souchong teas smoked?

This is where the subject becomes even more interesting.

For many European consumers, "Lapsang Souchong" almost automatically means "very smoky black tea".

However, the productions associated with Zhengshan Xiaozhong are not limited to this caricature.

Today we find styles whose smoking is much more discreet, as well as unsmoked versions highlighting more the fruit, honey, sweetness or intrinsic qualities of black tea.

This evolution reminds an important rule: a historical name can cover several contemporary expressions.

It is therefore preferable to read the precise description of the product rather than buying only a name.

"Souchong", "Lapsang Souchong", "Zhengshan Xiaozhong" and "smoked black tea" should not be blindly considered as four perfectly interchangeable formulations in all commercial contexts.

Smoked or flavored?

Another distinction deserves all our attention.

A tea can have a smoke note because its leaves were truly exposed to smoke during their processing.

A product can also receive a smoke note thanks to the addition of a flavor.

Sensorially, both can remind of fire.

Technically, they are not the same processes.

In the first case, the smoke belongs to the manufacturing of the leaf. In the second, the aromatic character is brought to the product by another way.

This does not mean that we should automatically declare one "noble" and the other "bad".

Our role as a consumer begins before this judgment.

It consists first in knowing what we are buying.

The product designation, its description and its list of ingredients are therefore particularly useful.

Before asking if a smoked tea is "authentic", ask how its smoky taste was obtained.

Why the bag sometimes seems smokier than the cup

The contrast can be surprising.

Dry leaves sometimes give an almost brutal impression of chimney, while the infusion reveals itself more round and more nuanced.

This phenomenon is partly explained by the very different conditions of perception.

In the package, we breathe the concentrated volatile compounds around the dry leaves. In the cup, a part of the substances is extracted in the water and the entire aromatic ensemble is perceived in a much more diluted drink.

The heat of the infusion also makes other facets appear.

Behind the smoke can then emerge woody, fruity, resinous, malty or slightly sweet notes.

This is why a smoked tea should never be judged solely by smelling its bag.

The nose gives the opening.

The water reveals the rest.

Does smokier mean better?

No.

Intensity is easy to confuse with quality because it produces an immediate impression.

But a spectacular smell does not inform us, by itself, about the quality of the leaves, the precision of their processing or the balance of the cup.

An enthusiast can perfectly seek an extremely smoky tea. Another will prefer a light smoke leaving more the black tea appear.

Both preferences are legitimate.

To observe the cup beyond its power, several questions are more useful:

• Does the smoke remain uniform from beginning to end?
• Does the tea have an interesting texture?
• Do other aromas appear as it cools?
• Does the finish remain solely ashy or does it become more complex?
• Do you want to take another sip?

These questions do not assign a universal grade to the tea.

They simply force us to look behind the first effect.

The Tsuru Tribunal

What the Laboratory Sees Behind the Smoke

Our nose perceives a whole.

The laboratory can try to break it down.

As early as 2005, researchers compared several Lapsang and Souchong-style teas by analyzing their volatile compounds using gas chromatography and mass spectrometry.

They identified significant differences between smoked teas and the compared samples, notably the presence or increased concentration of molecules associated with pine smoke.

More recently published research has looked at how the aroma evolves throughout the entire manufacturing process. It shows that fresh leaves initially contain compounds associated with green and floral profiles, and that this composition changes as they are processed and smoked.

Smoked tea thus becomes an excellent example of what the word transformation really means.

The producer does not simply preserve a leaf.

They change its sensory future.

The Ritual of Breath

Fire as a Gesture of Transformation

Smoked tea ultimately has an unexpected educational value.

It makes visible—or rather perceptible—the role of human labor.

A fresh leaf of Camellia sinensis does not spontaneously taste like the black tea we drink.

Nor does it taste like roasted green tea, heavily oxidized oolong, or smoked black tea.

After harvesting, every decision opens a different path.

Withering more or less, or for less time.

Rolling.

Oxidizing.

Heating.

Roasting.

Drying.

Smoking.

These gestures gradually transform the plant material into a finished product.

In the case of smoked Lapsang Souchong, one of these steps leaves a particularly recognizable signature.

We can almost feel the producer's gesture months after it was performed.

So, What Is Smoked Tea?

First, it is a tea.

A leaf from Camellia sinensis, harvested and then processed.

Next, it is a product in which smoke becomes a manufacturing tool.

Heated and burning wood releases compounds that meet the leaves and change their aromatic landscape.

In the case of smoked Lapsang Souchong, this technique has become permanently associated with pine, the Wuyi Mountains, and an aromatic identity that has become famous far beyond China.

But its history must remain more nuanced than its legend.

We know that smoking produces real aromatic changes.

We can document manufacturing methods.

We can identify certain compounds introduced or enhanced by smoke.

However, we cannot arbitrarily turn a story about soldiers into a perfectly established historical event.

This boundary does not detract from the tea's charm.

On the contrary, it restores its full depth.

A legend can accompany a cup. It must simply never pass itself off as proof.

And when the hot water finally meets the leaves, the technical story takes over.

The smoke leaves the memory of the hearth.

It enters the cup.

Key Takeaways

• Lapsang Souchong is a black tea historically associated with Fujian and the Wuyi Mountains.
• The smoky taste does not grow naturally in the leaf: it results from the processing method.
• Wood smoke really changes the profile of the tea's aromatic compounds.
• Pine is traditionally associated with smoking this style of tea.
• The choice of fuel and smoking conditions influence the result.
• A Lapsang Souchong is not necessarily extremely smoky.
• There are also lightly smoked or unsmoked expressions of teas from the Souchong tradition.
• A truly smoked tea and a tea to which a smoky aroma is added are not technically identical.
• More smoky does not automatically mean better.
• The story attributing the origin of the process to the passage of soldiers should be considered a tradition whose details are not historically established with certainty.

A leaf. A fire. A transformation.

And behind the smoke, always the tea.

Sources and References

The following references were used to verify the technical claims of the manuscript. Accounts of soldiers' involvement have deliberately been kept in the category of historical traditions.

Yao S. S., Guo W. F., Lu Y., Jiang Y. X., 2005 — Flavor Characteristics of Lapsang Souchong and Smoked Lapsang Souchong, a Special Chinese Black Tea with Pine Smoking Process. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 53, 8688–8693. DOI: 10.1021/jf058059i.

Su W. et al., 2025 — Insight into aroma dynamic changes during the whole manufacturing process of smoked Lapsang Souchong tea. Food Chemistry, DOI: 10.1016/j.foodchem.2024.141498.

Tian W. et al., 2024 — study on the influence of smoking materials on the aroma of Souchong black tea and the contribution of different woods to the smoky character.

The different commercial and historical versions of the "soldiers' legend" were compared to avoid turning a passed-down story into a certain historical event.

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