How Tea Time Came to England

There’s nothing quite as quintessentially British as a cuppa tea. But how did the Chinese tradition make its way into the British consciousness? It’s all thanks to Catherine of Braganza, a Portuguese royal who married England’s King Charles II in 1662. When she arrived in England, she brought with her loose leaves and spices in a set of crates labeled “Transporte de Ervas Aromatics,” or T.E.A. Soon, everyone wanted to be just like the Queen and sales of tea began to skyrocket. The rest, as they say, is history.

This story is a part of our Flavors series, where we do so much more than play with our food. Come with us as we dive into deliciously different and tastefully off-beat stories in the culinary world.

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[soralb]

The story about Catherine popularizing tea in England is true. But the thing about T.E.A. is complete nonsense. The word tea is a corruption of the south chinese name for tea.

[drashetidfromsabahan]

China:*invent tea*
Japan:cool
India:cool

Britain:

GIVE ME THE PLANT

[jbwnz]

It was also partly due to disease hitting the British coffee plantations. They planted tea in its place

[AgakAgakEngineer]

Britain: Hey China, give us more of those delicious tea bro
China: Ok Britain, here you go, now pay up bro
Britain: But we don't have money anymore bro
China: Sorry bro, no money no tea
Britain: Ok bro, how about we give you something we make in return
China: But we don't need anything you make bro
Britain: Ok bro, how about some drugs then
China: Hey that's not cool bro, we don't want drugs
Britain: THIS MEANS WAR!

[ignorethischannelanditscom]

Nothing is more satisfying than tapping sounds of tea cupss....

[cosmasindico]

Fascinating. When are you going to do the story about the Opium Wars?

[CarolineNiggAyaLee-Janet]

I met a british guy asking a Japanese guy “do you guys have tea in Asia”

And then he instantly noticed and said “ oh buy you guys have green tea”.... No, Edward. Tea, in every color, is from Asia. Red(black in English), Green, Black(pu-er) etc... are categorizations used in Ancient China.

[Cikeb]

Tea is not an abbreviation. The English started out calling it cha, just like the Portuguese, who heard it in China from those who spoke Mandarin Chinese. The English changed the word later though to the word the Dutch were using; thee. The Dutch adopted their version in Malaysia, where it travelled from Chinese dialects in southeastern China; t’e. Both versions are essentially Chinese in origin.

[brindade]

It's the same here in India. At least in West Bengal. I drink tea twice a day and it's my favorite beverage and for sure the brits didn't bring it here. One of the best tea in the world is cultivated here in Darjeeling, West Bengal, India.

[Knoar]

I always assumed it was an even older tradition that gained popularity because boiled water is safe to drink, and tea tastes better than boiled water. Well, now I know.

[jerrywu]

Love this story.

Some extra info from a native Chinese born in 1990s: this actually has been integrated into almost every textbook in middle school, talking about how we were forced to get addicted to opium - we paid for opium and British used that to buy tea from us again. A loop that was full of blood. Qing dynasty emperors (especially empress dowager cixi) were so shortsighted, didn’t care about ordinary people and “leased out” Hong Kong for 99 years (1989 - 1997).

The motivation of the stories on our textbook is to teach us that without a strong country, that would happen to us in the future again. Peace is important, tea is great, we love peace, but the history behind is sad in 19th century.

[vorpa]

And the portuguese were the people who traded tea with china

[cheahweiren]

China: yo pay up, u behind on ur pay for tea
Britain: *literally starts a fucking war*

[pauloamw]

If you add this to the fact that the Portuguese also taught the British to deep-fry stuff in batter, the Brits have to thank Portugal for.

[ubertronicuk]

Who else is drinking tea watching this?

[HPPYx]

Coming from a Brit that tea was way too milky

[TheChocolatiie]

Had no idea my home country had such a big influence on britain n its tea! So cool

[Amit_R_Tudu]

In India Tea (known as Chai) is Love.
Most liked beverage amongst all age groups.

[jasonaalab]

Fun fact:uk got bombay as a dowry gift from portugese for the marriage of catherine of briganza

[susactivities_]

This is why Portugal and England will always be allies