Tea

The History of Tea:

China is considered to be the birthplace of tea.

There, the beneficial effect of the tealeaf was already described about 5000 years ago. The legends surrounding the discovery of tea are innumerable. One of them tells how chance got the Chinese emperor Shen Nung (2737 BC), who paid a lot of attention to cleanliness, and therefore always boiled his drinking water, to take a liking to tea. A gust of wind blew a few tealeaves into the kettle with the boiling water. The leaves turned the water golden and gave it a pleasant aroma. The emperor tasted the beverage and felt refreshed. Subsequently, tea became the beverage of China.

Tea-picker

In 1610, a Dutch ship brought tea to Europe for the first time. Shortly afterwards, the English got into this growing business and became the sole supplier of tea for the next 200 years. In 1662, the official introduction of the tea-hour took place at the court of the English king Karl II. Thus, tea became socially acceptable and an important trade good.

Today, tea is the most popular beverage on earth with an annual production of 2.9 million tons worldwide.

As We Know It Today - the Tea-Bag:

The first precursor of the tea bag came from the New York tea importer Thomas Sullivan, who sent tea samples wrapped in small gauze bags to his costumers in 1908. These gauze bags proved to be a resounding success.
In 1949, the company Teekanne marketed the double chamber tea bag. It is folded, not glued, and made of the finest filter paper!

Cultivation and Harvest:

The tea-plant only grows under special conditions. The best tea-growing areas of the world are China, India, Sri Lanka and Kenya.

The wild China tea-plant (Camellia sinensis var. sinensis) is a three to four metre high shrub. It thrives in poor soil, withstands light frost as well as longer periods of drought and the low humidity of the subtropics. The shrub grows slowly and already flowers lushly in the second year.

The green leaves are picked by hand. The two youngest shoots and the bud ("two leaves and the bud") yield a very high-quality tea. Whether these leaves become green or black tea solely depends on the method of processing.

Tea Viewed Chemically

Tea contains a great number of different chemical compounds. For sure the best-known component is the stimulating caffeine, but this complicated cocktail also contains tannin (a bitter principle), various flavouring substances, essential oils, minerals (iron, zinc, calcium) and even vitamins.

Caffeine

Delicious Tea - the Right Preparation

Only the right preparation yields highly enjoyable tea. Therefore, real tea connoisseurs follow the 6 golden tea-rules":":

1. Only use branded teas. You can be sure that they are made of high-quality teas.
2. If possible, use your home water as it comes out of the tap, since you know its taste and perceive it as 'neutral'. In any other case, use still water with as little taste as possible. On principle, black tea has to be brewed with boiling water.
3. Let water that contains a lot of chlorine boil for 2 - 3 minutes at least, so that the calcium carbonate can settle and the chlorine can escape. But don’t cook the water to death, that means too long!
4. Rinse and warm the teapot with hot water.
5. Tea tastes much better when it is prepared strong. So you’d better add an additional bag or spoon of tea to the pot. Serve tea with sugar or rock candy and milk or crème (no canned milk) or with citron to taste.
6. Tea has to draw. How long depends on your taste - 4 minutes as a rule. If you want the tea to be stimulating and refreshing, use slightly more tea and only infuse it for 2 - 3 minutes. If you want the tea to be relaxing and calming, let it draw a little longer, but not longer than 5 minutes.