Tea in Great Britain
|
Tea in Great Britain |
|
|
All over the world people like to drink tea, but the British made a science out of this beverage. They gave the world some golden rules how to brew the perfect cup of tea as there are: use fresh water in cleaned, warmed up teapots made of porcelain and don't let the water overboil. Take one teaspoon of best quality tea per cup and person, then take the cup to the kettle and not the other way round and let it stand and brew for 5 to 10 minutes. If the tea is too strong reduce the amount of tea but not the brewing time. Stir up once before serving and store the dry tea leaves in a closed container. We already see what emphasis they put on this member of the camelia family with its stimulating effect.
Most of the world production of nearly 3 mio. tonnes a year (1998) is from China, India, Indonesia, and Kenia, where it finds ideal conditions as warm climate, a lot of rain and acidic soil, especially in the Himalaja. This plant grows in rows or on terraces and it is, although the tree can become 30 meters high, kept to a hight of only one meter for an easier harvest. Depending on the region, at sea level the tree is able to develop faster, the first step of manufacturing, the plucking, is earlier or later in the year. Then a special procedure, the fermentation, is necessary till the tea can reach the shops 20 or 30 weeks after the plucking. Before the leaves are broken into smaller particles by machines they are dryed or withered at a temperature of 25 to 30 degrees for 10 to 16 hours. The next step is the oxidation where the tea turns into its characteristic dark, golden colour. Quality controls by factory tea tasters follow before the 1500 different kinds of tea are sold at auctions on an international exchange. By ship the tea reaches the single countries for sale. There the tea is mixed up with fruits, flowers, oils, herbs and spices. This is called blending. After that 4 kilos of plucked leaves will have turned into 1 kilo of black tea.
The history of tea begins in Asia, where the Chinese learned to know the properties of tea long before the Europeans did. The Chinese mythology tells a story that a Chinese emperor discovered the taste of tea when a leaf by chance dropped into his boiling water. Authentic references as an old Chinese dictionary tell us about its spreading out of the province of Assam till "t'u" became China's national drink around 600 AD with the help of Buddhist movements. In 850 AD it was brought to Europe by the Arabs, now named "ch'a" or "tchai". For example in Turkey it is still called "¸ay". The Portuguese opened up the sea routes to China and India in 1515 and 100 years later the Dutch entered the tea trade. After that in the 17th century the "East India Company" was founded and was given the monopoly of importing goods from outside Europe to Britain by the government. The new beverage rapidly gained popularity and replaced ale and gin on the list of favorite drinks although it was quite expensive. High taxes, temporarily at a level of 119%, caused a lot of smuggling activities. The so-called coffee houses where mainly tea was sold now needed a special licence to be allowed to sell tea. In 1784 the taxes were reduced to a lower level. The most famous tea, the Darjeeling, was brought into the Himalaja in 1841 by a Scotsman, where it found ideal conditions to grow and to develop its characteristic flavour.
The fact that especially the British can't resist the taste of good teas you see when you look at some statistics. Every day 165 mio. cups of tea are drunk in the United Kingdom. 68,3% of the population drink tea every day, which means an average consumption of 3 cups per person and day, in comparison to 1,5 cup units of coffee and 1,2 cup units of alcoholic drinks. The tradition of drinking tea, especially around four and five o'clock in the afternoon among the higher society reaches back into early 1800s. The Earls of Sandwich invented the snack for the social gatherings between lunch and dinner, which has remained until today.
As a form of entertainment the British also had tea gardens on the weekends and as highlight between music and dancing there were special tea ceremonies. But not only the upper classes have their traditions around the subject of tea. Also the workers have their tea breaks between 5 and 6 o'clock in the morning and at again the same time in the afternoon since 1864 and although the industrialists and landowners tried to abolish this tradition the workers made a stand for their right of "tea breaks" and won the fight, so that the tea break remains with us to this day. So you can see that drinking tea is still an integral part of social life in Great Britain.
Written by Susanne Erdmann & Koray Külcür, July 2000
| Related Links: | Back to homepage |