Tasting notes

Tea and the magic of Christmas Chai ☕️

Fifty shades of tea

Last night my husband caught me ‘adjusting’ the tea he had made me. Well to be fair I wasn’t really adjusting it, more pouring it down the sink and making a new one. When you’ve ‘over milked’ there’s not much coming back from that.

My best friend used to say how she can’t stand making me tea because I’ll always adjust it. An extra splash of milk, a touch more water, a furtive squeeze of an additional teabag. I thought I was being so subtle. (Just like when I hid the Shepherd’s Pie she cooked me under the sofa - that has never been forgiven). ‘Don’t be so ungrateful’ - I chide myself. But to be fair, there aren’t many worse things than a shit cup of tea.

When I worked as an air traffic controller at Gatwick, somebody actually brought in a colour chart for tea. You got to pick your shade. There was a special magic of having tea on the console - ashtrays long since gone - allowing a brief but much needed quench during the moments when listening to a pilot’s reply allowed the mouth to be used to slurp rather than speak. That was until some numbnuts spilled their tea all over the multi-million dollar equipment and hot drinks were banned. [They were later reinstated in hideous tall plastic corporate ‘mugs’ a la Starbucks. No one factored in their flawed centre of gravity though and more often than not, twelve of those would fall flat on their sides in the lift].

The kitchen was one flight of stairs and nine further floors down, and breaks would be spent preparing everyone’s tea to their particular Farrow and Ball shades of ‘Earl Gray Fey’, ‘Builder’s Basic Brown’, ‘Rich Tea Tan’ or ‘Piss Weak Watery’ before running the gauntlet of shuddery lifts and steep tower steps back to the top. It was when someone asked me to stir their half a teaspoon of sugar in a figure of eight, one-and-a-half times, I thought ‘enough is enough’.

Tea in its simplest form, however, is and will always be, that which evokes care, consideration and love. Allowing us a deliberate pause - no matter how brief. it doesn’t matter how you take your tea or which tea you drink, it’s about what it symbolises.

And let’s not even get onto the best biscuit discussion…not yet anyway.

Photo by Ranit Chakraborty on Unsplash

A tea sommelier? What now?

About four years ago, whilst still working in aviation, I took a week off work - my perennially distracted brain having discovered the rather marvellous ‘The UK Tea Academy’, and I decided to train as a ‘Tea Champion’. [I am very random - I was also enrolled on an Open University meteorology course focussing on cloud formations and learning Spanish, and that was just that week].

The Tea Champion training involved a week gathered with fellow students in London, tasting and savouring teas from all over the world, as well as learning the origins of tea, an outline of the history and geopolitics of tea (large dollop of colonialism, anyone?), tea manufacture and trading - just fascinating.

Back in the present day, I now find myself writing my second book about tea - as my job?!? How crazy is that? Little Tufts of Tea is not a tea ‘expert’ book, more an exploration of the stories of tea. Of tea as a love language, tea as it presents around the world, my interest rooted deep within my own Irish heritage; and how we pass down our culture, history and traditions in ways other than words. This in mind, I decided to further my studies and take on the next qualification with the UK Tea Academy to become a qualified ‘Tea Sommelier’. Yep, it’s a thing. Think wine sommelier - but with tea (obvs) - regions, terroirs, cultivation, climate, topography, methodology, manufacture, brewing, colours, classifications…everything.

I received teas from India, China, Japan, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Nepal, East Africa, South Korea, Vietnam. There were jade oolongs and jasmine pearls, fermented pu-erhs and steamed senchas, high mountain whites and Assam greens. Enchanting teas with names evoking a romanticism perhaps belying their complex origins - Nilgiri Frost, Oriental Beauty, White Antlers, Honey Orchid and Golden Monkey. Their legends swirling in the fragrance of their steam, to be inhaled and absorbed before being captured in the pot. Tales I cannot wait to reveal.

There will be much to come about tea and the tea sommelier experience in coming months but here is a little…er…taster.

Welcome to class!

Well at first, I couldn’t remember anything at all from the Tea Champion course and hadn’t had the time to go back and revise any of it, so I was fully conversant with Yorkshire Tea and that was about it. We began by looking at tea cultivation and sensory evaluation of teas - how to brew, taste and assess. I got very excited by the tea colour wheel - almost like the Gatwick days! Except this was a wheel of flavours not colours…

This session was conducted online by an absolute guru of the tea world - Jane Pettigrew. What she doesn’t know about tea, I daresay, is not worth knowing. Not only is she a true expert in every sense, she is also kind, generous, patient and has fabulous bright red hair. What’s not to love? After our first round of tasting her Zoom eyes fell on me, in my kitchen:

“Emma, what did you make of this tea?“

ARGH - Panic!!! School sweats!! What if I’m totally wrong?? These people clearly all did their homework, this is going to be sooo embarrassing…

“Er…artichoke” (I swear it smelt just like artichoke), “strong vegetal notes, salty”, I stuttered. Jane responded favourably and the rest of class followed suit, some even citing ‘artichoke’ too. Copycats. I felt very hashtag proud as I allowed myself to breathe out.

We brewed the second tea, and again Jane’s eyes seemed to fall on me. “Emma - thoughts?”

Seriously did you not get the teaching memo? Pick someone else to go first this time?

Slightly buoyed by the confidence of my previous, devastatingly successful, answer - “ah this one is smoky, fishy like sushi [bear with me reader, some teas do have a deep ‘umami’ flavour - especially Japanese green teas], with marine qualities”, I beamed.

Tumbleweed.

As Jane raised a kindly questioning eyebrow, one by one everyone else talked about berries, cinnamon, smells of Christmas. Jesus - what do they all eat for Christmas dinner? Blanched haddock?

And so it went on. Some tastes I identified easily, some I struggled with, some I loved, some I loathed. I am not one for the very brothy, umami Japanese greens but give me a Chinese high mountain white any day of the week. The exploration and discovery is all part of the adventure.

A few weeks later, after Korean tea class, I wrote my first ‘proper’ tasting notes - as if I were writing for the tea packaging - and felt really pleased with what I’d crafted, but then thought - oh my God I sound like such a wanker. It’s just a cup of tea. What am I crapping on about? But it’s never just a cup of tea… there are so many stories held within.

Jane was most delighted with my description. Back to my happy place at the top of the class. I am such a spod.

Leaping continents and a small gift

Skipping to the subcontinent a couple of weeks after that, we uncovered a whole other world, one I will write about more another time, but on this cold December evening in the week before Christmas, I shall simply introduce you to the tea we finished class with that night - Masala Chai.

Masala Chai is a sweet, spicy, black tea, taken with milk, that is particularly prevalent in India. As I grind the spices in my kitchen, sharp scents blending into the comforting, simmering milk, before softening with honey; I can envisage the Chaiwalas, the bubbling pots and the clay cups. I am visiting India next month and will find out much more about the history and culture behind it, but for now I will leave you with the recipe we were given for you to try and some thoughts as to how you can make it your own.

I like to use oat milk (although I am a dairy drinker) as it brings a special creamy texture to the chai, and I sweeten with a little maple syrup to taste. If you don’t have loose leaf tea, just chuck a couple of teabags in the pan - rip them open to let the tea infuse the liquid. It’s ok - you can play around with it!! No judgement here…it’s got to be enjoyable. I use a bit of extra pepper as I like the warmth in the back of my throat, and I love the combination of the fresh zing of the cardamom, the Christmas feel of the cloves and cinnamon, the soothing flavours of nutmeg and maple. It’s utterly delightful.

My family and friends loved it so much that they didn’t even make any adjustments. Not even a squeeze or a sprinkle. High praise indeed. It felt so special to share it and bring joy and comfort to those I love, that last week I spent a whole evening grinding up a big batch of the spices into jars. Martha Stewart vibes aside, It is so worth making it yourself as the pre-bought Chais are often full of refined sugar, and you can balance the spices to your own preferences. I gifted it to some friends for Christmas, complete with reusable teabags so they can spoon in the spices alongside their favourite black tea. It was the most fun gift I’ve ever created and it was received with joy.

A love language indeed.

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I hope you enjoyed this introductory dip into my world of tea! I can’t wait to share more.

Are you a tea lover?

How do you have yours?

I’d love to hear

Love & lemons, 💕🍋

Em x