Factory Display of Puerh Cakes

Have you heard of Puerh tea?  It can be spelled multiple ways but it’s all the same tea.  People tend to think that only green tea is healthy for you, but studies are showing that other teas, especially this one, are just as good for you.

Puerh and Cholesterol

The most eye opening of these studies was conducted in France several years ago. A blind study was conducted with 500 hyperlipidemia patients (individuals with advanced cholesterol conditions, usually controlled with medication). Half of the controlled group consumed 3-4 cups of Puerh daily, while the rest of the participants were given something else. After a 30-day period the results showed that drinking Puerh on a regular basis could significantly lower cholesterol and further research confirmed that Puerh was as effective as the most advanced cholesterol lowering medications available.  (source: http://www.innteas.com/teas/puerh.htm)

Is it a black tea?

So what exactly is Puerh? And how did it get its name? The name “Puerh” comes from the name of the town in Yunnan Province in China where the tea is processed and sold, not from where the tea is actually grown.  Because the transportation of goods in the mountainous area was very difficult, it took a long time to transport the tea out of Yunnan by horseback.  The tea was transported inside burlap bags.  It began as “Sheng cha” green or raw tea and after the long journey often times a year or more, it naturally evolved into “Shou cha” or dark finished tea.  The high moisture content in the raw green leaves naturally promoted fermentation inside the burlap bags.  The result is a dark tea with a full bodied, deep red liquor with many layers and complex flavor (Puerh information obtained from Roy Fong of the Imperial Tea Court’s OMG Tea Class).

Puerh can be found in both loose leaf and compressed forms. It is not a black tea but rather its own type.  When you think of tea on a spectrum with green being the least processed to the most processed, Puerh falls at the end of the spectrum.  To find out more about this fascinating tea, stay tuned for Babette’s upcoming blog posts on Puerh teas and her experiences picking and processing her own tea cake.

Cinnamon Apple Scones

• 12 c. self-rising flour
• 2 c. sugar
• 1 lb. unsalted butter
• 4 c. apples, chopped
• 2 T. cinnamon
• 4 c. buttermilk

Topping:

• 1 c. butter, softened
• 2 c. brown sugar
• 1/2 c. flour
• 1 c. oatmeal
• 2 t. cinnamon
• 1 c. pecans, chopped

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine flour and sugar.  cut in butter until mixture is coarse and crumbly.
3. Add chopped apples and cinnamon.
4. Fold in about 3/4 of the buttermilk into the flour mixture to make a soft dough.
5. If dough is too dry, gradually add more buttermilk.
6. Turn out on a floured board.
7. Form into a circle which is about 8″ in diameter.  Press down lightly to about 1 inch thick.
8. Cut dough into 8 pie-shaped wedges.
9. Place scones on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.
10. Mix together topping ingredients, place 1-2 T. of topping on each scone.
11. Press down topping lightly.
12. Bake until lightly browned about 10 minutes in a convection oven (all ovens are different so baking time can vary widely.)

Makes about 40 scones.

C&C Front

Crown and Crumpet celebrate their 1st year anniversary!

We had the pleasure of meeting Christopher and Amy Dean in June of 2008 at the World Tea Expo, only a few months before they opened their lavish new tearoom in Ghirardelli Square, San Francisco. The ‘lavishness’ refers not only to the décor, but also the view and the rent. Amy fondly remembers, “Christopher was so excited showing me his pictures of the newly designed teapots with their logo on his mobile phone.  You could tell this tea room was his baby.  His excitement was infectious. It reminded of me when I opened my own tearoom.”

We all were impressed that they were choosing such a challenging market with the high-profile tourism. It’s an expensive piece of real estate with high demands by the landlord but they have the opportunity to make teatime much more visible. People will come to their door that may never have considered a cuppa in the afternoon. Christopher, Amy and their will trained staff will often be the first to introduce a tea menu and serve a pot of loose leaves. On the other hand, those of us with closets full tins love the opportunity to sit on the terrace and savor a fine Darjeeling while feasting on the visual flavor of fog dripping over the Golden Gate Bridge.

But the blessing of such an amazing view and brisk tourist trade is challenged by some of the leasehold demands. They are required to be open 9 AM-9 PM, seven days a week.  In addition to their tearoom menu, they must be open for breakfast and stay open late. And to the evening crowd they offer sherry and aperitifs along with tea and their fine food pairings.

Amy and Babette toasting tea at Crown and Crumpet

We were there on the day they first opened and celebrated by returning for their first anniversary. It was going to be an unusually hectic day so we snuck in before the crowds. The annual Chocolate Festival. Crown & Crumpet had already sold out of their seatings for special chocolate-themed teas. So, we accepted our bit of view and wished them well for a busy day and a successful year.

Crown and Crumpet

Dan: “I went to one tea house too many. It was in Wuyi Shan. A pretty girl took 15 minutes to make me a cup of tea. I watched as she meticulously brewed the tea and thought that it could have been done exactly the same way in this same place a thousand years ago.”

Dan Robertson picking tea in Yunnan, China

A common questions to ask a tea professional is how they chose this as their life’s work. One thing that seems to be universally true is that there are many experiences and then there is a single moment. For Dan Robertson, an interest in the culture of tea drew him more deeply into the love of the brew itself and his tea related businesses: The Tea House and World Tea Tours. And, in conducting his daily tea businesses he recreates something of what became his inspirational moment in tea. Tea is served at a traditional Chinese tea table. Your tea selections can be made after tasting teas and savoring bit of tea talk. Fifteen minutes? Maybe more, if you get Dan started on his stories? The pretty girl?

He can tell you about bamboo tea, pocket tea, and other more extreme methods of processing the rare leaf. He even shares a tale of one Chinese tour guide who picked a large amount and transformed the bus into a mobile drying room – bus tea.

Dan has also studied Chinese culture and language for many years, teaches Tai Chi and delights in an evening of fast-paced Mah Jong. Tea conversations can quickly drift into many other areas. Learning about the art and craft of fine teas is so much more interesting when we know the stories of the people and life in other countries.

Drinking Bamboo Tea

I’ve had the good fortune to be his next-door-booth-neighbor at World Tea Expo, to attend his classes, to enjoy several lengthy tea chats by phone and to be part of his 2009 China Tea Tour. Dan’s tea education, like many of the pros we will feature here, is the result of a personal journey. Most are not just self-taught but had to write their own curriculum. They started before STI (Specialty Tea Institute) and other tea schools. They traveled to the countries of origin, observed the complete process, talked with the manufacturers and the exporters. And they know the world history and literature as well. It’s a big picture. And most of these great teachers emphasize knowing culture to know the leaf.

Beginning as a documentary filmmaker in 1989, Dan has traveled throughout Tea Land meeting tea growers and manufacturers in the main tea producing countries. His film, For All The Tea In China, focuses the lens on the history, evolution and culture of tea. But it wasn’t until 1995 that The Tea House opened. Then, in 1997 World Tea Tours led their first tour to China. Since then there have been tours to both China (including Inner Mongolia and Tibet) and India with plans to expand into Japan, Ceylon and Vietnam in 2010 and 2011.

Lecture and tasting with Fujian Tea Manufacturer

Dan Robertson is also a tea educator and everyone who visits his shop becomes a student. Like many of the tea people in the early days of importing tea to the U.S., he realizes the importance of sharing the picturesque background of tea with newcomers. From small school groups who visit his shop to the larger venues at World Tea Expo – he customizes the message of tea. His topics vary from a basic Tea 101 and legends of tea to more specific growing and manufacturing techniques. But to every tea conversation, he brings an authenticity built on an investment in time and study of the people and places of tea as well as the leaf.

≈ ≈ ≈

With the rapidly growing interest in premium teas, there is also an increased need for experienced teachers. One of the most frustrating aspects of the US tea industry now is how to qualify the expertise of our industry spokespersons.

Some of the most experienced tea people, our mentors and icons, tend to shy away from the Expert label. It may be that the more you know, the more you realize you don’t yet know. And someone who might seize the label to draw media attention could have done very little to develop true expertise.

Here in our Who’s Who in Tea Land section, we are seeking out the people who have invested time in study, travel and tasting. But there will also be features on the local tearoom owners and creative writers. Each will have an interesting story and a bit of wisdom to share. We will to point to their particular areas of expertise and help you come to know the people of passion in tea.

Tips on Making Scones

• Use quality ingredients.
• Use cold butter; don’t let it soften.  Cold butter makes the scones rise higher.
• Drain fruit very well.
• Add fruit last, barely mix it in to flour mixture.
• Add only enough buttermilk to make dough stick together.
• If dough is too sticky when you pat it on the floured board, add more flour.
• If dough is too dry and crumbles when you try and pat it on the floured board, add more buttermilk.
• If you are using frozen fruit, make sure it does not thaw out.  Mix it in quickly and cut scones fast.  If it thaws out, the dough is very sticky and a mess!
• Make sure oven is hot and preheated to 400 degrees.

An Afternoon to Remember’s Amaretto Apricot Scones

• 3 c. self-rising flour
• 3/4 c. sugar
• 1 stick unsalted butter
• 1 c. blackberries, fresh
• 3/4 c.-1 c. buttermilk

Glaze (mix together):

• 1 c. powdered sugar
• 1 t. lemon extract
• 2-3 T. water or to desired consistency

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. In a large mixing bowl combine self-rising flour and sugar. Cut in butter until mixture is coarse and crumbly.
3. Add blackberries.
4. Fold in (by hand, do not use mixer)about 3/4 c. of buttermilk into the flour mixture to make a soft dough.
5. If dough is too dry, gradually add more buttermilk. Do not overmix.
6. Turn out on a floured board.
7. Form into a circle which is about 8” in diameter. Press down lightly to about 1 inch thick.
8. Cut dough into 8 pie-shaped wedges.
9. Place scones on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.
10. Bake until lightly browned about 10 minutes in a convection oven. (All ovens vary, so baking time may vary.)
11. Brush or dip in glaze if desired.

May be reheated in foil.

Makes about 10-15 scones.

Also it’s important to keep in mind a time limit.  If you keep the party moving along everyone is engaged and has fun.  One hour for young guests is perfect, 2 hours for older children works fine.   When children arrive, have a short activity ready for them while they wait for the other guests to arrive.  This could be creating their name card, decorating a chair, etc.  This gets them engaged and allows parents to get away without them causing a fit (especially for the shy ones).

After everyone has arrived, set the expectations.  Say to them, “Today we are having a tea party.  I want everyone to use their best manners. Do you know some good manners?”  Elicit responses, such as please and thank you, put your napkin on your lap, etc.  You can also say, “This is a special day, we are using real grown-up cups and saucers. I know everyone will be careful and act grown-up.”

If children are aware that this is a special tea party, and that they will be treated like adults, then they will act like adults.  I’m always amazed when I do a children’s event at my tea room. The children are extremely careful with their tea cups-they haven’t broken one yet!  They straighten their backs, hold their heads up high and use their manners. They know coming to tea is something special. Even their parents are often shocked at their children’s good manners.  Remember, always set the expectations.

Also it’s important to tell them the time-line of the party, first we will have tea, then open presents, then eat cake, then outside for an activity, then it’s time to go home.  If you give them the schedule, they will know what’s ahead and you’ll have fewer problems.  When children know what’s expected, they will be more apt to follow along.

I find it is always nice to give them a demonstration of tea party etiquette.  Demonstrate how to use the sugar tongs to put sugar in their tea, how to gently stir the tea, how to pour milk in their tea if desired and how to carefully hold the tea cup. If they are older, show them how to pour their own tea. Teaching them how to make a pot of tea can be a  fun activity. My son who is 9 is able to make tea all on his own (with an electric kettle).  He takes pride in making tea for me when I get home from the tea room.  I often have him demonstrate how easy it is to make tea during our special children’s events.  This gets the children very excited and by the end they all want to buy some tea to take home and make on their own.

Ch'a Ching

In the misty distant past, the second of China’s emperor’s ruled Asia. He was a sage named Shen Nong who understood all manner of plants and their uses. The Chinese say it was Shen Nong who first taught them agriculture and herbal medicine and – of equal importance in their eyes – how to make tea. The first book on the subject, the Ch’a Ching, the “classic” or “scripture” of tea, written in the 760s, cited the emperor as an authority. “Shen Nong’s treatise on food said tea gives one vigor of body, contentment of mind, and determination of purpose,” recorded the famous author Lu Yü (715—803). That Shen Nong is said to have lived some thirty-five centuries before Lu Yü’s book was written illustrates the ancient origins of China’s love of tea, whether or not the legendary emperor really existed.

The Ch’a Ching appeared when China was at the height of its grandeur and power under the mighty Tang dynasty (618—906). By that time, tea was well known throughout an empire which extended from present day Afghanistan to Korea. Lu Yü began his book by stating “the tea plant is a beautiful and beneficial tree of the southern regions.” And indeed, the custom of tea drinking arose in south China, the original home of the wild tea plant Camellia sinensis. In the beginning tea was not very a pleasant beverage–in fact, it was considered a medicine. After some time, it was used also as a tonic, that is, not something to get you well, but something to keep you from getting ill. Scholars of traditional Chinese medicine claim that by 200 BC tea had sixty-one applications for the prevention of disease and over two hundred uses as a cure for specific conditions. By this time it was also used as a beverage throughout southern China, the plant’s indigenous growing region. From there the custom spread until, with the slow passage of centuries, tea became China’s national drink.

Tea’s popularity corresponded with the introduction and spread of Buddhism in China. The Buddha, a contemporary of Pythagoras and Confucius, lived in India from about 563 to 483 BC. and his teachings followed the Silk Route to China, where they took root about the time of Christ. Just as Buddhists adopted use of the image of the Buddha at the Indian end of the Silk Route, so in Western China they adopted drinking tea, which also became part of their practice. Tea was employed by the Buddhists as an aid to meditation and as a focus of many ceremonies. Wherever they went, Buddhists carried a taste for tea along with them.

TALES OF TEA

This explains why some Chinese myths ascribe the origins of tea not to Shen Nong, but to Buddhist teachers. The hero of one such story is the Chinese monk Ganlu or “Sweet Dew.” Returning from a pilgrimage to Buddhist sites in India in the first century AD, he brought back scriptures full of esoteric secrets along with “seven magic tea plants,” China’s first tea, according to the story.

Another story attributes the origin of tea to Bodhidharma, an Indian prince who went to China in 520 to teach the Buddhist practice of meditation, known as “Ch’an” in Chinese and “Zen” in Japanese. On his arrival, Bodhidharma is said to have sat down facing a wall at the Shaolin monastery and there remained in meditation for nine years without interruption. Only once in the course of this marathon did the great man’s mind begin to wander, allowing his eyelids momentarily to droop in drowsiness. To insure that no such lapse could recur, the story says, without an instant’s hesitation he severed the offending eyelids.

Such heroic devotion to wakefulness won the tender heart of the Kuan Yin, as the bodhisattva of compassion is known in Chinese. Where Bodhidhama’s eyelids fell to earth, Kuan Yin straightaway raised up China’s first tea plants to help Buddhist meditators remain alert and tranquil. Always, whatever the story, tea was held to be somehow divine in origin.

RELIGIOUS PARALELLS

The role of Buddhism in the history of tea in Asia parallels that of Catholicism in the history of wine in Europe. Both beverages assumed ritual significance and the faithful of both traditions became devoted consumers. Many European monasteries were famous centers of grape-growing and wine-making. Similarly, nearly all the early teas in China were named for mountains that were sites of large Buddhist temples and monasteries. Just as experiments by Catholic monks like Dom Perignon led to champagne and the like, it was Buddhist monks who produced Asia’s superior teas and gradually developed new methods of processing the leaf and preparing the drink.

LU YÜ AND CH’A CHING

Lu Yü - The Sage of Tea

Lu Yü was apparently brought up and educated in such a temple or monastery where tea was grown and manufactured. Chinese sources give differing accounts of his life but most agree that he was abandoned as an infant and that a Ch’an priest named Zhiji found him near the banks of a lake and raised him at a temple. Even at his chores, the child proved precocious. He passed the time as a cowherd practicing his writing on the backs of the cows with a bamboo stick. His boyhood must have included many hours working in tea fields and manufactories also, for he filled the Ch’a Ching with precise observations and practical directions for cultivating, plucking, and processing tea leaf.

As an adolescent, Lu Yü seems to have rebelled against the pieties and practices of his received religion. He fled the monastery and made his living first as a circus comic and clown, then as a government official of some sort before turning to a life of scholarship and tea. By the time Lu Yü completed the first book on tea, five years in the writing, he had barely entered middle age.

The Ch’a Ching was no mere disquisition on tea-producing regions, tea’s efficacy as a medicine, the ways to discriminate between tea varieties, or their processing and preparation. Although he covered such matters masterfully, Lu Yü also managed to convey something of the contemplative life he experienced because of partaking of tea and the transformed world to which that life opened his eyes. He likens tea to the elixir of the immortals in flavor. “The effect of tea is cooling and as a beverage it is most suitable. It is especially fitting for persons of self-restraint and inner worth,” he wrote. From start to finish, his wonderfully poetic classical Chinese constantly implies that there was a spiritual dimension to making tea – not that he made any such claim directly.

Lu Yü’s work made him not only a celebrity but also a god in the eyes of the tea-drinking public. People in the tea business made offerings to porcelain statues of Lu Yü, praying that the tea crop be large and profitable. When business was bad, the same people would scald the unoffending image with a kettleful of boiling water. The author was befriended by the emperor Taisong (ruled 763—779) and was revered by the intelligentsia, as numerous poems and stories about him demonstrate. According to one tale, Zhiji, the Ch’an priest who raised Lu Yü, would never drink tea made by anyone else’s hand, even at court. The emperor considered this a tea snob’s affectation and laid a trap for the unsuspecting old man by having him served tea that Lu Yü had in fact just prepared. “Now this tastes like Lu Yü’s tea!” said Zhiji, and he asked for more.

TANG DYNASTY TEA

A master’s hand was needed to make perfect tea because of the way it was manufactured at that time. Lu Yü listed twenty-four utensils required for tea’s preparation and serving. The freshly plucked leaves were steamed, crushed in a mortar, and then made into a cake, which was dried and stored. To prepare tea, the cake had to be roasted carefully before a fire “until soft as a baby’s arm,” Lu Yü recommended. The cake was then shredded between two pieces of fine paper and added to the best available water, which was just about to come to a full boil. When the water reached a rolling boil, a dipperful of cold water was added to revive “the youth of the water” and settle the tea. The beverage was then poured into tea bowls and ready for drinking.

Lu Yü went into detail about the appearance of various teas in the bowl and how to appreciate the drink properly: the number of bowls to drink, the temperature of the tea, and the speed at which to drink it. He observed that just sipping any properly made tea brought out its bitter quality, while swallowing it brought out the sweet.

SONG DYNASTY TEA

Emperor Taizu, founder of the Song Dynasty

In the tenth century, the Song dynasty (960-1279) came to China’s dragon throne. In order to obtain the Central Asian horses vital to China’s defense, the vastly reduced empire that the Song ruled was forced to barter with the nomadic people now beyond China’s frontiers. Song policy was “to control the border regions with tea,” which was the nomadic people’s chief source of vitamin C. During the Song dynasty, Sichuan tea, so highly favored by the Tang, was made only as an item for trade. The Song also formalized an institution which was to last a thousand years: Tribute Teas. Fast horses, no doubt bought with Sichuan tea, were used to transport the newly popular Fujian teas to the Song court each spring.

During the Song era a new institution sprang up throughout China, the tea house, where Chinese high and low could seek refreshment and relaxation with their friends over tea. In the tea houses, tea was prepared by the boiling method as it had been for centuries. Among the nobility and the higher ranks of Buddhist priests, however, the old methods of preparing tea were being phased out as a new type of tea evolved. In this new method, the tea cake was ground into a powder so fine that it could be added to hot water and drunk powdered leaf and all. Tea like this was prepared by whipping the powder and water with a split bamboo whisk, one bowl at a time.

In this latest development once again, it was the Ch’an monastics who seem to have taken the lead in ritualising the preparation and drinking of tea, both privately and for group occasions. Ceremonial occasions included seasonal assemblies, arrival and departure ceremonies, and events like a liturgy enacted annually before an image of Bodhidharma in which the monks all drank from a single huge bowl. These formal sacraments would eventually become the basis of Japanese tea ceremony. Tea, as ephemeral experience, as opportunity for wordless awareness that was equally inner and outward-looking, contemplative and yet socially interactive, was found to contain the Buddha’s teaching entire.

When the new method of preparing tea was introduced, tea bowls suddenly became the most important items in the tea equippage. For old-style boiled tea, the preferred cups had an exquisite blue glaze that complemented the reddish-brown liquid poured into them. The new whipped tea, however, was usually a vivid lime green that inspired ceramacists to create “chinaware” of a beauty never before imagined. Song tea bowls were glazed in black, blue-black, dark brown, or deep purple. Everyone could finally afford and obtain porcelain once, under Song patronage, the city of Jingdezhen grew into a major ceramics manufacturing center. Centuries later, it was Jingdezhen’s kilns that would produce the first “chinaware” seen in Europe.

TO THE EMPEROR’S TASTE

Song culture reached its height under emperor Huizong (ruled 1101—1125). Distinguished as a painter and poet – as well as the husband of 3,912 wives and concubines – Huizong was also the leading tea lover of his day. In the tea treatise that he wrote, he showed an amazing familiarity with tea cultivation and manufacture, considering that the emperor was shielded from all manual labor. Huizong’s favorite was a white tea “from trees that grow wild on forested cliffs.” Harvested by four or five families in the Wuyi mountains, no more than two or three bagfuls of the leaves could be gathered each year. He records this as a tea-lover, as a fact to be accepted, not as a shortage to be corrected by imperial edict. More artist than ruler, Huizong ended his days in sad exile after Mongol invaders from the north took control of his beautiful capital city of Hangzhou and, eventually, seized the entire Song empire.

AFTER MONGOLS INVADE, MINGS RE-INVENT TEA

Guywan

Mongols under Genghis Khan (1162-1227) and his sons reduced China’s population by a third and very nearly destroyed Chinese culture. His grandson Kublai Khan (1215-1294) completed the conquest of the country and established a Mongol dynasty to rule over it. But only 75 years after Kublai’s death a nation-wide rebellion, which was co-ordinated through China’s tea houses and is still memorialised in the “moon cakes” of the Autumn Moon Festival, drove out the Mongols and brought the native Ming dynasty (1368—1644) to power. By that time not even scholars could recall the shape of the bamboo tea whisk that had been used by the Song nobility. China’s elite had been nigh exterminated.

While the Mongols were in power, loose whole-leaf tea like ours today replaced cake and powdered teas. Tea producers had discovered the manufacturing process of pan-firing or chaoqing, “roasting out the green,” which improved the flavor of tea while at the same time the use of this whole leaf tea simplified the preparing of it. Two decades into the Ming dynasty, a tea manual called the Cha Pu appeared which described the methods of manufacturing and preparing loose-leaf tea. Making tea required nothing more than placing the leaf in a vessel and covering it with water (rather less-than-boiling) to steep. This covered cup or guywan, a combined drinking cup and steeping vessel, was created by adding a saucer and lid to the tea bowl of former times. The Chinese under Ming rule took to loose-leaf tea and the guywan the way Americans would one day take to the teabag.

NEW DEVELOPMENTS

Also developed in Ming China around the time that Columbus was heading toward the New World was the teapot, which appeared about the same time as the semi-fermented oolong teas which required it. Best brewed in a fist-sized earthenware teapot, semi-fermented oolong teas were associated primarily with southern China as a local taste. Popular throughout China was another creation – scented tea. The Ming have never been surpassed in their obsession with flowers. In addition to flower paintings and floral embroidery, Ming poetry even produced epics written about a single blossom. Most Chinese floral porcelain patterns originated during this period. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that the Ming were first to produce jasmine tea. Although only one among numerous other flower-scented teas–notably rose, magnolia, chloranthus, osmanthus, and lichee– Jasmine has remained the most popular tea in China.

Tea’s long, slow evolution from medicine to tonic to beverage and on from cake to powder to leaf, from preparation by boiling, then whisking, then steeping, was essentially completed during the Ming dynasty. In 1398 the reigning Ming Emperor decreed that even Imperial Tribute Teas were allowed to be made in the new-fangled loose leaf form. By 1500 loose leaf tea suitable for steeping such as we know today–and teapots to steep it in besides–had been brought to perfection and both were ready to be discovered by the rest of the world. The ceremonial whipped tea of Song times would be remembered and preserved only in Japan.

Jane Pettigrew and Amy Lawrence

Have you ever wondered where the idea of afternoon tea originated?   You may have heard about Duchess Anna, but have you heard about Princess Catharine of Braganza?  Did you ever wonder how tea made it to England in the first place?

There are many books dedicated to the history of afternoon tea, but Jane Pettigrew’s book, “A Social History of Tea” is simply the best!  And my favorite!  Unfortunately it is out of print!  Jane thoroughly explores the history of afternoon tea in great detail and weaves it all together with beautiful photographs.  Her unique style just appeals to me.  I just love her!  I was very fortunate to have attended her Master Tea Class in London a year ago.

According her book, it is said that when the Portuguese princess-Catharine of Braganza arrived in England to marry Charles II in 1662, she brought with her a casket of tea.  Catharine had grown up drinking tea and because she enjoyed it so much, she made it fashionable in England.

The idea of taking afternoon tea is believed to have been started by the Duchess Anna of Bedford.  She had a “sinking feeling,” in the middle of the afternoon as there was a long gap between meals.  She asked her maid to bring her the necessary equipment to make tea and something small to eat in her private room.  This idea “taking of tea in the afternoon” developed into a new social event between the late 1830’s and early 1840’s and thus “afternoon tea” was born.

High tea tends to co notate an idea of elegancy and sophistication when in reality it was originally an evening meal around 6 pm as laborers returned home.  High tea consists of meat and potatoes as well as other foods and tea.  It was not exclusively a working class meal but was adopted by all social groups.  Families with servants often took high tea on Sundays in order to allow the servants time to go to church and not worry about cooking an evening meal for the family.

Various Tea Times

Cream Tea- A simple tea consisting of scones, clotted cream, marmalade or lemon curd and tea.

Low Tea/Afternoon Tea-  An afternoon meal including sandwiches, scones, clotted cream, curd, 2-3 sweets and tea. Known as “low tea” because guests were seated in low armchairs with low side-tables on which to place their cups and saucers.

Elevensies-Morning coffee hour in England

Royale Tea- A social tea served with champagne at the beginning or sherry at the end.

High Tea-  A misnomer.  An evening meal enjoyed around 6 p.m. as laborers and miners returned home.  This tea consists of meat and potatoes, other dishes and tea.

Afternoon Tea

Tea rooms contributed many changes that are still in use today.  The tables were decorated with candles and flowers.  Food was simple and wholesome, unlike the fancy French cooking served in restaurants.  Tea rooms introduced outdoors eating, welcomed both women and children into colorfully settings often decorated with a playful theme.
Hotels, department stores, and even Greenwich Village expanded the number of tea rooms around the country.  Children practiced their manners in tea rooms and those who wished to throw off the old Victorian ways read poetry aloud, played cards, and even smoked in tea rooms.

Just as milestone events had opened the doors to women business owners and workers, other public policy changes began to close them.  In 1964, the Civil Rights Act guaranteed access by all people to all public businesses.  Now women could eat in any restaurant, grill, or even a bar if they chose to do so.  More women occupied the work force and had less time to linger over a tea meal. Finally, department stores began to down-size or close along with their tea rooms.  Nonetheless the influence of tea rooms did not fade into history. Today it survives in restaurants and newly opened tea parlors, tea houses, tea spas, and tea stores nationwide for all to enjoy.

Fresh ripe tea ready to be picked

Tea has a robust past and a promising future and it is summed up very well in a quote by Dr. Ralph W. Moss, PhD when he said, “However you brew it, you should consider making tea your basic beverage of choice.  Coffee offers little in the way of health benefits (and may in fact be harmful to some people).  But the wonders of tea never cease.  It is a simple, inexpensive and healthful habit, ‘that Excellent and by All Physicians approved China drink,’ as an English author of 1658 put it.  In sophisticated ways, modern science is now confirming the insights of our tea-imbibing ancestors.”

Dr. Moss is a leading author and consultant on cancer treatment.  He is an independent researcher who has been investigating and writing about promising cancer treatments since 1974.  He was formerly science writer and assistant director of public affairs at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, NY and is considered by many to be the most knowledgeable writer in the world on alternative therapies for cancer.
Interestingly enough, Dr. Moss’s quote is very similar in context to the quote from the famous Chinese pharmacist Chen Zang from the time of the Tang Dynasty in the 8th century.  He said, “drugs are medicines for various diseases, but tea is the medicine for all diseases.”

Tea and cancer prevention have long been associated but tea is good for more than just cancer and specific teas are better for some conditions than others.  There is quite a long list of conditions mitigated by teas.
The Mayo Clinic asserts that green tea can be used for arthritis, asthma, cancer prevention, dental cavity prevention, diabetes, fertility enhancement, heart attack prevention, high cholesterol, lower triglycerides, memory enhancement, menopausal symptoms, mental performance/alertness, prostate cancer treatment, sun protection/skin damage, weight loss, and anxiety.

Not to be lost in all of the antioxidant, anticancer and general feeling of contentment from drinking tea has to be a primary function of tea which is hydration.  Tea is by all measures the second most consumed drink in the world second only to pure water.  Tea takes good water and transforms it into a super food.  Part of its magic is in the drinking of large quantities of it so that harmful substances can be removed from the body.

The UNC Carolina Population Center recommends that a healthy individual should drink at least 114 fluid ounces per day.  Of this total at least 15 ounces of it should be from tea and coffee.  Because of the health benefits of tea we know that between 4-6 cups should be drunk per day for optimum health.

According to a Symposium on Polyphenols and Health held at the University of California, Davis in 2005 there is no recommended dietary intake for flavonoids and optimum health.  Studies do suggest that consumption of 600 to 1000 mg of flavonoids per day would be optimum. According to the USDA flavonoids database black, white, green and oolong teas contain 150-190mg of flavonoids per cup.

Once again the recommendation of 4-6 cups per day which is similar to traditional Asian drinkers provides the optimal benefit for health.  It should also be noted that consumption with citrus, particularly lemon greatly enhances the absorption and increases the benefits by as much as 5 times as that tea drunk without lemon.

Some of the research reported on black tea includes a study from the Netherlands National Institute of Public Health and the Environment that showed flavonoid consumption reduced the risk of stroke.  Most of the beneficial flavonoids in the subjects diets came from black tea and men who drank more than 4 cups per day were in the lowest risk group.

At the Fourth International Scientific Symposium on Tea & Human Health much research was presented of studies about the potential benefits of tea.  Recent findings suggest that tea improves cardiovascular health, it preserves DNA from free radical damage, it promotes bone health, it stimulates the human immune system and it is a primary source of non-caloric hydration which can maintain a healthy weight.  The studies focused on digestive cancers, prostate cancer, skin cancer, oral cancer, lung cancer and ovarian cancer.  Bone density in older women who drank tea was greater than for women who did not drink tea.  Alzheimer’s disease effects were lessened by tea consumption and memory decline was found to be lessened because of a compound only found in tea called theanine.