Abstract: This paper is to expore the relationship between the taste feature recognition of black tea and its polyphenol by using 13 kinds of black tea in China and combining with sensory evaluation and chemical analysis.The result of sensory evaluation shows that the 13 kinds of black tea can be divided into 4 types in taste:sweet and gentle,sweet and fresh,sweet and alcohol,and xiaozhong type.The result of chemical anlysis shows that the outcome of principal component analysis and cluster analysis are basically consistent with the results of tea sensory evaluation classification,and the similarity is 77%,which using the relative contents of tea polyphenol,tea tris and 7 catechins as variables .Base on the distinguish result of sensory evaluation,13 kinds of black tea are discriminated and analyzed,and the discrimination accuracy is 92.3%.To sum up,the result shows that the content of polyphenols can be used for classification and identification of black tea flavor characteristics.This study can provide experimental basis and application reference for the classification and identification of different tea flavor.

Key words: black tea, taste characteristics, cluster analysis, principal component analysis, discriminant analysis