# Please tell me more about tea. **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 14, 2001, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397 "2001-11-14T21:55:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Rue\_DeDay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/41988e/32.png) [@Rue\_DeDay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rue_DeDay)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/1 "2001-11-14T21:55:20Z")
I told you what [I drink](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=98937) and you told me what you drink. Cool. Now I have questions. Not General Questions, this is going to get IMHO-y. Irish Breakfast tea? English Breakfast tea? I’m guessing they are different, but why “Breakfast”? Lady Grey? Similar to Earl? Related? Just a quirk of naming? PG Tip? That’s the maker? Or a type of tea? Chai? Is that Chinese for “tea”? Russian Caravan? I think the Russians were big on tea. They have those cool glasses with the metal holders. Do they have their own kinds of tea? We can skip the herbals and the green tea. Unless someone feels strongly about them. Lay some tea-ology on me, baby. I know I _could_ do my own research, but like that’s going to happen. -Rue. ---
**Author:** ![Chez\_Guevara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/aeb1de/32.png) [@Chez\_Guevara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chez_Guevara)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/2 "2001-11-14T22:32:57Z")
The well known brand of tea was originally known as _Digestive Tea_ when it was introduced in the 1940s, since it claimed to relieve indigestion. The manufacturers were requested by the (British) government to drop the reference to a medicinal benefit, however, so they altered the name to _Pre-Gestee_, suggesting a tea that could be drunk before food was digested. This rather awkward name was soon abbreviated to _P.G._ and _Tips_ was added to refer to the tips of tea leaves that give a blend’s distinctive flavour. From: _Brewer’s Names_. As far as I know, PG Tips is manufactured by Brooke-Bond. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/3 "2001-11-14T22:36:26Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Rue DeDay \* > **Irish Breakfast tea? > English Breakfast tea? > I’m guessing they are different, but why “Breakfast”?** Serious tea people (the Irish and the English, e.g., and if you taste the coffee they make over there, you’ll KNOW why they’re serious tea people) drink one sort of blend at breakfast-time, and others later in the day. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/4 "2001-11-14T22:39:59Z")
Oh…and for years I’d assumed that Irish Breakfast was tougher and harsher and tweedier and more manly than English Breakfast (gosh, I wonder from whence THAT assumption arose), but I recently found out that it tends to be smoother and more subtle. Any teaheads, or Irish or English people, care to explain why? ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/5 "2001-11-14T22:41:34Z")
While recommended as a toxin-remover, tea comsumption in excess inhibits the body’s ability to absorb iron. ---
**Author:** ![CheapBastid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8baadc/32.png) [@CheapBastid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CheapBastid)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/6 "2001-11-14T22:48:13Z")
[Tea Man](http://www.teatalk.com/) is a wonderful resource. ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2001, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/7 "2001-11-15T00:34:05Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Rue DeDay \* > **Chai? Is that Chinese for “tea”?** Naw, Chinese for tea is “cha” pronounced like the cha in cha-cha-cha. IIRC, Chai is how it’s pronounced in India. Nepalese also call it chai. You haven’t even gotten into the different chinese teas. There’s stuff picked by monkeys from steep mountain tops, other stuff fermented and stored for decades (pu’er), Iron budda, dragon well and a whole host of other red (what we call black tea), green, silver types of tea. Then there are the ceremonies and accessories. ---
**Author:** ![rocking\_chair](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocking_chair/32/2918_2.png) [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2001, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/8 "2001-11-15T00:48:05Z")
chai is tea in russian. yes, there are russian types of tea, they tend to be black and strongly flavoured. many russians i know like to drink tea through some sort of jellied candy, or sugar cube. a bit weird to me. i do use the glass in the cup holder, but the samavoir at home mostly brews dust. ---
**Author:** ![TwistofFate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cdc98d/32.png) [@TwistofFate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwistofFate)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/9 "2001-11-19T12:42:31Z")
Irish Breakfast tea? it might be a little smoother due to the amount of fried food in what we call an Irish Breakfast. A cuppa cha is great. Coffee is for breakfast when we cant handle food 😉 As for your remarks, Mr. Ike, what we called Coffee is whats known as Coffee-flavoured coffee. none of this variety of coffee’s that you need a Menu for. I’m going to listen to some Denis Leary… ---
**Author:** ![vanilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/f19dbf/32.png) [@vanilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vanilla)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/10 "2001-11-19T14:26:37Z")
Like my sig says… ---
**Author:** ![Yue\_Han](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/eada6e/32.png) [@Yue\_Han](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yue_Han)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/11 "2001-11-19T14:51:12Z")
> [@](#): > > red (what we call black tea) This is one of my favorite bits of translational weirdness. The Chinese literally means red tea… but it’s translated as black tea because that’s what we call it… none of which changes the fact that the tea is brown. I don’t know why but it amuses me. –John ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/12 "2001-11-19T15:01:53Z")
\*Chinese _ch‘a_ became _chây_ in Persian. The Silk Route, you know. Persian phonology has a tendency to add a final -y glide after long open monosyllables. For example, _jâ_ ‘place’ is also _jây_. _Pâ_ ‘foot, leg’ is also _pây_. _Rû_ ‘face’ is also _rûy_. So when the Persians picked up the Chinese word _ch‘a_, it was natural for them to pronounce it _chây_. It was from Persian that Hindi/Urdu (and the other languages of India), Russian, and Turkish got the word. The Modern Greek word _tsai_ is borrowed in turn from the Turkish. Meanwhile, western Europe was introduced to tea by Dutch East India traders who bought it from Malays. The predominant Chinese dialect spoken in Malaysia is a southern speech, Amoy-Hokkien, and there the same character for ‘tea’ (Mandarin _ch‘a_) is pronounced _teh_. Both forms derived from Ancient Chinese _d‘a_. So the Malay word _teh_ was brought to western European languages: Dutch _thee_, French _thé_ (they moved the h around), English _tea_. You know, in the 17th and 18th centuries, the English pronounced it “tay” and the vowel didn’t shift until the end of the eighteenth century. In the more conservative pronunciation in Ireland, it remained “tay.” You may have heard the old work song that goes _Oh, ye work all day for sugar in your tay_… Incidentally, the name of the “teapoy” has nothing to do with tea (even though it _is_ used for serving tea). It’s from a compound of Hindi _tîn_ ‘three’ and Persian _pây_, i.e. a three-legged table. An exact Indo-European cognate of “tripod.” (Compare “charpoy”: _châr_ is Persian for ‘four’.) The English must have changed the spelling of _tîn-pây_ to “teapoy” because they associated it with tea service. In Armenian, tea is _t‘ey_; I’m not sure how they got that form. ---
**Author:** ![romansperson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/romansperson/32/17100_2.png) [@romansperson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/romansperson)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/13 "2001-11-19T16:04:29Z")
Russian Caravan tea acquired its name (and supposedly its taste) from the method by which the tea was transported from China via the desert of Central Asia into Russia - camel caravan. This method took a long time - a year or more - and the tea was believed to have acquired its smoky taste from the campfires of the traders. Here’s a bite-sized piece of the history of the China/Russia Tea Road: [http://www.abisnet.com/buryatia1.htm#The%20Tea%20Road](http://www.abisnet.com/buryatia1.htm#The%20Tea%20Road) ---
**Author:** ![Podkayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Podkayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Podkayne)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/14 "2001-11-19T19:50:29Z")
Let’s see. . . \*\*\*\*\* Lady Gray is a Twinnings tea trademark, and, like Earl Grey gets its distinctive taste from oil of bergamot, though is less strongly flavored than Earl Grey IIRC, and also includes orange and lemon flavorings. \*\*\*\*\* “Authentic” Indian chai is not to be missed–the best thing on a chilly day. Combine about half milk and half water in a sauce pan, with lots of sugar. Add 1 tsp. tea leaves per cup (preferably loose tea, if you have only bagged, cut the bags open and dump the leaves in or else the milk and sugar will “clog” the little openings in the bag and the tea will be too weak). Add lots of spices: a few cloves, a cinnamon stick or two, some whole allspice berries, some grated nutmeg, etc., mixing and matching as you prefer. Simmer a loooong time. Strain into mugs. (Chai for me is usually an all-day thing. I ladle out and strain one serving at a time, dump the goodies back into the pot, and let it keep simmering.) \*\*\*\*\* As for green tea, it’s the same leaves from the same plant as black tea, but it’s picked while still green, so there’s less oxidation. This leads to a mellower taste, and less caffeine. Oolong tea is intermediate, less oxidized than black tea, more oxidized than green. These teas should be brewed with water that is _not quite_ boiling. Herbal teas are a whole 'nother ball of wax, not made from the tea tree, but rather from all sorts of different plants. Tea snobs say they should be called “tisanes,” (pronounced ti-ZANS) not “teas.” ---
**Author:** ![Podkayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Podkayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Podkayne)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/15 "2001-11-19T19:52:03Z")
ARGH. “Twinings,” not “Twinnings.” ---
**Author:** ![Futile\_Gesture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f05b48/32.png) [@Futile\_Gesture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Futile_Gesture)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/16 "2001-11-19T22:54:01Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Ukulele Ike \* > \*\*Oh…and for years I’d assumed that Irish Breakfast was tougher and harsher and tweedier and more manly than English Breakfast (gosh, I wonder from whence THAT assumption arose), but I recently found out that it tends to be smoother and more subtle. > > Any teaheads, or Irish or English people, care to explain why? \*\* English Breakfast was developed by a Scotsman called Drysdale in Edinburgh. It was called “Breakfast Tea”. Then tea shops in England discovered it and, in that charming English manner of the time of co-opting anything on the planet that wasn’t bolted down, called it “English Breakfast”. So, if anything, it really should be called ‘Scottish Breakfast’. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2001, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/17 "2001-11-20T05:54:26Z")
It’s funny the way Americans in the past few years have taken to using the word “chai” in a specialized way. It now means specifically ‘tea prepared with spices and sugar and usually milk, Indian-style’. When all along, in India, _chai_ is simply the word for tea. Any sort of tea. If you were going to ask for regular old Lipton’s Orange Pekoe in Urdu, you would simply call it “_chai_.” The spiced/sugared/milky beverage is called _masala chai_ in India. _Masala_ refers to the spice blend (from the Arabic word _maSâliH_ meaning ‘ingredients’ or, in down-home parlance, “fixin’s”). It usually includes cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, ginger, and a wee bit of black pepper. (:eek:Black _pepper_?!?! In the tea? Yes. In South India they put it in coffee, too.) Despite the image it’s gotten in America, _masala chai_ is not an everyday drink for most Indians. However, they do invariably use milk and sugar. Black tea is thought of as only a sort of medicine for sick people. It was from India that the Brits got the habit of always using milk in their tea. But in Indian teahouses they are fond of seething the milk before using it, and adding a dab of coagulated cream from the cooked milk on top of each cup. I’m thinking there must be a known linguistic phenomenon at work here, when a newly borrowed foreign word is used for a particular exotic variety of a thing, while in its native language it’s just the plain unmarked word for a thing. ---
**Author:** ![chique](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@chique](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chique)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2001, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/18 "2001-11-20T06:31:48Z")
Brew it per normal (loose leaves, mind, not bags) with some mint leaves, add lots of sugar, and serve with a fresh mint sprig. _Heaven_. ---
**Author:** ![Rue\_DeDay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/41988e/32.png) [@Rue\_DeDay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rue_DeDay)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2001, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/19 "2001-11-20T14:12:26Z")
Just to let everyone know I haven’t just wandered off, humming to myself, I still come back here to catch up on stuff. Thanks for all the info. Now STOP IT!! I’m _learning_ stuff here! (Ow, ow, the pain!) -Rue. ---
**Author:** ![KimKatt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ac91a4/32.png) [@KimKatt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KimKatt)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2001, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397/20 "2001-11-20T15:48:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Jomo Mojo \* > \*\*The spiced/sugared/milky beverage is called _masala chai_ in India. _Masala_ refers to the spice blend (from the Arabic word _maSâliH_ meaning ‘ingredients’ or, in down-home parlance, “fixin’s”). It usually includes cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, ginger, and a wee bit of black pepper. \*\* Cool. Thanks, **Jomo Mojo**! [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-tell-me-more-about-tea/93397.md?page=2)