Thank God for tea! What would the world do without tea? —how did it exist? I am glad I was not born before tea. —Sydney Smith
Tea ranks with the compass, porcelain and silk as one of China's unforgettable contributions to civilized living. The "shrub that satisfies" has been plucked and steeped in boiling water to make a delicious beverage since man's memory runneth not to the contrary. Coffee may receive more publicity but much more tea gets consumed—something like 2 billion pounds a year. One reason is that a pound of tea yields 250 to 300 cups, compared with only 50 or so for a pound of coffee.
People try to stop drinking alcoholic beverages and even coffee. The tea habit is a happy one. There is no need to worry about addiction or after-effects. Only a few persons with an idiosyncratic susceptibility to alkaloids need be cautious about the quantity consumed, and they will need to be even more careful about imbibing coffee and cocoa.
Chinese, Japanese and British are the ranking tea-drinkers of the world. Despite the popularity of iced tea as a summer drink, Americans consume 40 cups of coffee for everyone of tea. Ironically, England was the nation of coffee-drinkers before the East India Company began its successful propaganda campaign to popularize tea. Conversely, the American colonialists were the heavy tea-drinkers, a fact which accounted for the Boston Tea Party in 1773. The 342 chests tossed into Boston harbor had been taken there by East India Company ships from Amoy in southwestern China.
The English Tea Act of 1773 sought to perpetuate the East India Company monopoly on the tea trade. This was distasteful to both British and American merchants, not to mention tea-drinkers. Boston's wasn't the only tea party. There were five others in the American colonies. England was on its way to losing the most valuable jewel in the crown of empire, at least partly because of trying to please the East India Company.
The word "tea" comes from the Amoy dialect word t'e, pronounced "tay." In Cantonese and Mandarin, it is ch'a, pronounced "chah", a word which traveled to Japan, India, Persia and Russia. The word "tea" was carried to Europe and England by the Dutch.
When tea was first sold publicly in 1657 at Garway's Coffee House in London, it cost as much as £ 10 per pound. A London newspaper ad in 1658 announced: "That Excellent and by all Physitians approved China drink, called by the Chineans Tcha, by other nations, Tay, alias Tee, is sold at the Sultaness Head Cophee House in Sweetings Rents, by The Royal Exchange, London." There were 2,000 coffee houses in London at that time. Trade coins known as tea tokens were becoming popular. Tea was retailed by chemists' shops, glass sellers, milliners, silk mercers and chinaware dealers as well as coffee houses.
Samuel Pepys wrote in his diary in 1660: "I did send for a cup of tee (a China drink) of which I never had drank before." In 1662, Edmund Waller wrote the first eulogy of tea in English verse and at the same time hailed England's first tea-drinking queen, Catherine of Braganza. It is to Anna, the Duchess of Bedford, that Britons owe the custom of afternoon tea. She had tea and cakes served at 5 because, in her words, she "had a sinking feeling."
No one knows when the Chinese began to taste tea. Legend holds that the Emperor Shen Nung, who is supposed to have reigned from 2737 to 2697 B.C., was sitting before a cauldron of boiling water when some leaves fell into the pot. He was about to fish them out when they gave forth a fragrance that invited him to drink. The earliest credible mention of tea is by Kuo P'o in the Erh Ya, a kind of dictionary, in 350-A.D. A favorite Chinese tale of tea's origin tells of Bodhidharma, a Buddhist patriarch who reached Canton by sea in 520 or so after a three-year journey from India. Having fallen asleep during one of his meditations at Shao-lin Temple in Loyang of present-day Honan, Bodhidharma cut off his eyelids to make sure he stayed awake. The eyelids took root and grew up as tea bush—symbol of eternal wakefulness.
Tea cultivation and use subsequently was popularized in China and then in Japan under the patronage of Buddhist priests who were campaigning against intemperance.
The first definitive book on tea was Ch'a Ching, or the "Tea Classic," published in 780 by a scholarly circus clown named Lu Yu. He was commissioned by a group of merchants to write a treatise on the cultivation, processing and consumption of tea. The book of three volumes and ten chapters is a comprehensive presentation of all that was known about tea at that time. In that era tea was pressed into cakes made from leaves that had been steamed, crushed and molded. To prepare tea, the cake was fired or toasted and shredded, then steeped in salted boiling water.
Lu Yu said the best tea leaves "must have creases like the leather boot of a Tartar horseman, curl like the dewlap of a mighty bullock, unfold like a mist rising out of a ravine, gleam like a lake touched by a zephyr and be wet and soft like fine earth swept by rain." Lu Yu compared tea to "red wine and sweet dew."
Cultivation of tea spread from China to Japan at the beginning of the 9th century. Japanese tea was introduced into Java in 1684 by Andreas Cleyer, a German naturalist and doctor of medicine. In 1827, J.I.L.L. Jacobson took Chinese tea plants to Java and established the island's commercial tea industry.
Indigenous tea was discovered in upper Assam of India in 1823 but the Indian tea industry dates from the appointment in 1834 of a committee to formulate plans to grow tea commercially. In Ceylon, tea dramatically took over after rust attacked coffee plants in the late 1870s. Russia began growing tea in 1847, Natal in South Africa in 1850, Nyasaland in 1878 and Uganda and Kenya in 1900. The United States experimented with tea cultivation at Summerville, South Carolina, and in Texas but the effort was given up as economically impracticable.
The first accounts of tea reached the Arabs in 850, the Venetians (as chai catai or "tea of China") in 1559, the English (as chaa) in 1598 and the Portuguese in 1600. The Dutch took the tea to Europe around 1610. It reached Russia in 1618, Paris in 1648 and England and America about 1650.
One of the most picturesque eras in maritime history was that of the American clipper ships, which carried tea from China to England and the United States in the 19th century. In 1866 the Great Tea Race was run between Foochow north of Amoy to London, 16,000 miles away. The first two of eleven clippers were only 10 minutes apart after a race halfway round the world.
Tea and tea-drinking have been celebrated through 12 centuries of literature and fine arts. Dr. Nicholas Brady, chaplain to the court of William and Mary, called tea "the sovereign drink of pleasure and of health." William Cowper wrote of "the cups that cheer but do not inebriate." Paul Revere the American patriot, was famous both for his anti-tea cartoons and his beautiful silver tea services. "Waltzing Matilda" is an Australian billy-can tea song. Many great paintings have been inspired by tea. Japanese have glorified tea in the art of cha-no-yu (literally "hot water tea") ceremony.
The principal chemical constituents of tea are caffeine, tannin and essential oil. Caffeine supplies the stimulating quality but, because of its purity, appears to have no harmful effect. Tannin affords strength of body. Oils provide flavor and aroma.
A cup of tea usually contains a little under a grain of caffeine and about two grains of tannin. These quantities are less than the medical dosages of 1-5 grains of caffeine and 5-10 grains of tannin. The caffeine is absorbed gradually and the tannin is fixed by proteins during its journey through the alimentary tract. An infusion of tea is faintly acid, almost neutral. Gastric juice is a thousand times more acid.
Sugar added to tea sweetens the liquid and adds food value to the drink. But the addition of milk robs tea of virtually all its astringency. The tannin is, fixed by the casein in the milk. As tea is drunk, a comforting effect is felt at once because of fragrance and warmth. Stimulus of the caffeine comes about a quarter of an hour later.
The Culture and Marketing of Tea published by the Oxford University Press in 1933 shows, this percentage distribution of caffeine, tannin and soluble solids in leading teas after a five-minute infusion:
Caffeine Tannin Solubles
Java black 2.7-4.4% 6-20% 16-26%
Japan green 2.0-3.3 4-12 16-26
China black 2.0-3.7 5-10 16-22
Taiwan oolong 3.1-3.7 12-23 23-25
India black 2.0-3.0 6-10 22-25
Perfectly brewed, tea offers a maximum of caffeine without too much tannin. Aroma and flavor—evanescent qualities easily lost by careless preparation—will be conserved. Fresh water is the first essential. Tea infuses more rapidly in soft water than hard. The water should be bought to a bubbling boil and immediately poured over the leaves. To delay means flat water which will spoil the finest tea.
A cup of tea that is perfect chemically may not be ideal from the consumer's point of view. A three-minute infusion normally extracts the maximum amount of caffeine and all the soluble matter but a minimum of tannin. This may make for a very "skinny" cup of tea, lacking in body and without the pungency desired by tea-drinkers. .
When tea is to be sipped without cream or milk, it should be infused from 3 to 4 minutes. That to be drunk with cream or milk should be steeped from 4 to 6 minutes. Leaves ordinarily are not used a second time, although Chinese connoisseurs steep them two or three times within a brief interval.
Scholars and artists in China long have maintained that only in a congenial atmosphere can one truly enjoy color, fragrance and flavor as he prepares and drinks tea. Alcohol is for the noisy. Tea is for those who prefer to contemplate life quietly. Because tea symbolizes earthly purity, fastidious cleanliness is to be observed in its preparation. Japanese tea ceremonies may take place in specially constructed small buildings. All ostentation and suggestions of luxury are banished from sight and thought.
The Chinese have not developed such a rigid system as the Japanese. But connoisseurs make sure everything is clean and orderly. In the classical way, the burner is set before a window in a room away from the kitchen. The charcoal must be hard. A small pot and four tiny cups—washed but never dried with a towel—are arranged on a tray. The tea leaves are held in readiness. The stove must not to be left alone from the time the kettle begins to sing. Although the fire must be fanned, one may stop at times to lift the lid for a look at the tiny bubbles on the bottom of the kettle. These bubbles, known as "fish eyes" or "crab froth," are signs of the "first boil" The second boil is reached as the singing turns into a gurgle and small bubbles start coming up the sides of the kettle. The vapor from the spout must then be watched so the kettle can be lifted from the fire just as the third and full boil starts. The teapot is scalded inside and out with the boiling water. The proper quantity of leaves is placed in the pot and covered with water.
The pot holds only enough for four small cups. As the leaves take up about a third of the pot's capacity, the tea is quickly poured into, the cups and sipped. This exhausts the pot and a kettle of fresh water is put on the fire for the second infusion. Connoisseurs compare the first pot to a girl of 13 and the second to a girl of sweet 16. The third is regarded as a "woman." A third infusion from the same leaves is frowned upon by some connoisseurs but most tea-drinkers are not concerned. Actually, the small pots and cups are also for connoisseurs. No such nicety can be expected when tea is consumed by the gallon.
About half of the world's annual output of 2 billion pounds of tea used to be consumed in China. There are no figures for the Communist-occupied mainland today. On Taiwan, tea is consumed continuously at all hours. It is served when one enters an office, visits a home or boards a train traveling any distance.
Until recently, few Chinese set out on a journey without the fixings for their perpetual cup of tea. Hot water vendors with giant kettles and portable stoves were a familiar sight throughout the country. In the old days on the mainland, even the tiniest country village had its teahouse where the people could indulge in their great pleasure of talking, a luxury equally enjoyed by the highest and lowest. Patrons needed pay only a few coppers for some pinches of tea. Their individual pots were kept filled with hot water for hours.
The teahouse was China's traditional court of justice. Business and social disputes were argued openly. Patrons served as judge and jury. When the verdict was handed down, the loser would kowtow to all and pay for the tea they had consumed.
Merchants transacted much of their business in teahouses. Cooperative societies met to discuss mortgages and requests for loans. Fortunetellers and letter-writers could be found in their accustomed corners, ready to be of service. Chess players were involved in their endless game, surrounded by kibitzers. Groups of old cronies talked away the day and night—smoking, gossipping and napping between pots of tea. Peddlers selling cigarettes, peanuts, fruits and dried watermelon seeds hawked their wares from table to table, followed by bootblacks, newsboys, storytellers and even jugglers, who passed the rice bowl for their pay.
The tea plant is an evergreen shrub which grows to 30 feet but is usually kept pruned to less than 5 feet. The blossoms are white and suggest the wild rose. The flowers are succeeded by the tea fruit, containing three seeds.
Tea plants grow best in the monsoon climate of the tropics from sea level to 6,000 feet. In temperate zones where there is danger of frost, plants must be kept at low elevations. The commercial tea belt of the world is largely confined to upland areas not more than 40 degrees north or 33 degrees south of the equator.
Tea is commonly grown from seed in nursery beds. On large estates, young plants are transplanted to prepared fields when they are about six months old and from 6 to 8 inches high. They are set out in rows 3 to 6 feet apart. After two years, they have reached a height of 4 to 6 feet. Then they are cut down to something less than a foot. By the end of the third year, they are ready for plucking. Chinese and Japanese tea-growers working in small family plots do not use seedbeds. They plant the seeds where the bushes are to grow.
Weeding, cultivation and pruning are carried out regularly for the 25 to 50-year life span of a tea bush. When at full bearing—about the 10th year—a bush yields as much as a quarter of a pound of leaf in its several annual flushes.
The quality of tea is best at different seasons depending on the place of growth. Teas are plucked the year around in southern India, Ceylon, Java and Sumatra. Seasonal teas are those from northern India, the Chinese mainland, Japan and Taiwan.
Tea-pluckers pluck the bud and first two leaves and drop them into bamboo baskets or duck bags at their sides or toss them over their shoulder into baskets, hung on their backs. An experienced plucker picks some 30,000 shoots a day, about enough for 10 pounds of manufactured tea. Taiwan tea-pickers are mostly women. Delicate, agile fingers of young girls are considered the best. Plantations are mostly on cool hillsides and picking generally starts before dawn while the dew still shines on the leaves. Most of the girls wear cloth-shrouded conical bamboo hats, arm bindings and gaiters to protect their skins. They sing of the love they hope to find as they move between the rows. Songs of the tea-pickers are among the best folk songs of the island.
Teas are divided into three classes: (1) fermented or black, (2) unfermented or green and (3) semi-fermented oolong. All three are produced in Taiwan. Tea comes from the leaves of the Thea sinensis in all countries. Differences in variety are due to methods of manufacture and local conditions of climate, soil and cultivation. There are about 1,500 different growths and over 2,000 possible blends. About 40 different growths of commercial value are found in Taiwan.
Black and green teas are made in this way: After plucking, leaves are spread on bamboo trays in the sun or on indoor withering mats. This takes 18 to 24 hours. They then are rolled by hand or machine for up to three hours to break down the cells and release juices and enzymes. After this the leaves are taken to the roll breaker and green leaf shifting machine. Fermentation follows for from 30 minutes to 4½ hours in baskets, on glass shelves or on cool cement floors under damp cloths. Next comes firing for from 30 to 40 minutes. Green tea is made by steaming without fermentation in a perforated cylinder or boiler. This retains some of the green color. Black tea is fermented between the rolling and the firing. Fermentation, or oxidation, reduces the astringency of tea leaves and deepens the color and increases the aroma of the liquor.
Semi-fermented oolong has some of the characteristics of both black and green teas. Oolong is allowed to wither and to ferment partially.
After firing, teas are cut, sifted and sorted before grading and packing.
Tea plants were found in Taiwan by Chinese settlers of the 17th century. Apparently these had not been used by the aborigines, although they had been on the island for centuries. A 1723 account says tribesmen dared not drink tea because of its "cooling effects." Chinese pickers were permitted to enter aborigine districts and collect leaves. Seeds were brought from the mainland for cultivation. Shipment of crude tea to Amoy and Foochow started in the second quarter of the 19th century.
Taiwan tea exports were begun in 1865 by an English merchant named John Dodd. He also introduced young plants from the mainland, provided Taiwan tea-growers with capital and, in 1868, set up the island's first tea factory at Wanhua near the Tamsui River in Taipei's old southwest district. The island's tea industry was started in the north and gradually spread south but never got much beyond Taichung in central Taiwan.
When the Japanese took over Taiwan as a spoil of the 1894-95 war, the island was producing 10,200 tons (nearly 12.3 million pounds) of crude tea from 25,000 hectares (62,500 acres). The peak was reached in 1917 with 17,165 tons from 45,155 hectares for an average of 398 kilograms per hectare. The outbreak of the Pacific War in 1941 closed out most Taiwan export markets. Concentration on food production usurped land and manpower resources. Most tea plantations were neglected or converted to other crops. By V-J Day plantations had shrunk to 34,000 hectares. Picking was carried out on only 23,000 hectares (70 per cent). Annual crude tea production had dropped to 1,400 tons. Exports were a piddling 28 tons in 1946, the first year after the war.
Planted area had been boosted to 47,638 hectares by 1956 but output was only 13,420 tons for per hectare production of 282 kilograms. Since then, unit production has been calculated on the basis of output for the harvested area instead of the planted area. Sharp increases have been recorded, as follows:
Year Harvested Area Total Output Per Ha. Yield
(Hectares) (Metric Tons) (Kilograms)
1957 44,461 16,002 337
1958 44,780 15,764 352
1959 45,336 16,507 364
1860 45,703 17,365 380
1961 44,979 18,064 402
1962 36,043 19,753 548
1963 36,308 21,104 581
1964 35,236 18,306 520
1965 34,607 20,730 599
1966 34,516 21,510 623
1967 34,495 24,403 707
1968 34,278 24,418 712
1969 33,704 26,248 779
Taiwan exported more than 21 metric tons of tea worth more than US$12.5 million in 1969. Earnings were US$7.6 million in the first six months of 1970, more than in all of 1960.
Oolong was once synonymous with Taiwan tea. Then came paochung and after that black. The order has been reversed and green tea is now on top. Taiwan green took over top position in world sales in 1967 as a result of declining Japanese and Chinese Communist exports. Japan is consuming more green tea at home and has little left for export. The quality of Chinese mainland green tea has been deteriorating.
A good cup of oolong shows the bright gold of amber and smells like a ripe pear or apple, depending on the plants. There is a pleasing after-taste. Processed leaves resemble flower petals of red, yellow and white. Oolong was the only tea produced in Taiwan up to 1881. The semi-fermentation method was originated in Fukien but improved in Taiwan. Production stood at a record 9,208 tons in 1911.
Paochung also requires partial fermentation. The method was brought to Taiwan from Fukien in 1881. In the cup, paochung varies from bright orange yellow to reddish yellow. Firing of leaves makes the difference. Stronger firing results in stronger color and flavor. Flowers are added to increase fragrance and strength.
Production of black tea in Taiwan was started by the Japanese in 1903. Methods used in India and Ceylon were adopted. Because of the limited market, mass production did not start until after 1931. Varieties from Assam and Burma were introduced in the late 1920s and planted at Yuchih near Sun Moon Lake in central Taiwan. A black tea experimentation station was established there. The prewar black tea output record of 6,230 tons was registered in 1940.
Green tea production started in 1904 under specialists from the Chinese mainland. Average annual output was 26,323 kilograms in the 1911-1930 period but dropped to 16,334 kilograms in the 1931-1944 period. The year 1943 saw the prewar peak of 98,766 kilograms. A sharp upward trend started soon after the war as new markets in Africa opened up.
The government has been encouraging Taiwan growers to replace old plants. Processing facilities require modernization and export operations need strengthening. Under the 1969-72 Fifth Four-Year Economic Development Plan, planted area will be reduced about 4,900 hectares but stepped-up picking operations are expected to boost per hectare output to 1,010 kilograms. Output goal for 1972 is set at 30,900 metric tons, up 22.7 per cent from 1968.
Expected to contribute importantly is the new 60-acre tea processing zone at Kueishan just south of Taipei. Operating there are 44 processing plants, including 11 processors that moved out of Taipei, 4 processing plants from other places, 21 Taipei tea dealers who wanted factories of their own and 8 companies making packaging and processing machines. Cost of the zone was US$2.5 million. With the price of urban land skyrocketing, owners of city plants profited by moving and selling their old quarters.
Concentration of factories in a single place is facilitating cooperation and modernization. The example of Kueishan is expected to influence the 300 other Taiwan tea processors and spark a new blooming of an industry that once was noted for sending the "champagne of teas" to the four corners of a tea-drinking globe.