Memoirs of a Foreigner

My preferred morning beverage these days is Jasmine Tea with lemon and a spoon-full of sugar. It’s my Dad’s fault. It’s his latest obsession in hot beverages. I like coffee, but in the morning I find that it is too harsh on my stomach. I like milk-tea but in Delhi milk in the morning gets suck in my throat and I am concerned that I might end up doing that morning gag heard so commonly in the streets of Delhi. So, green jasmine tea it is, nimbu aur chinni ka sath around 8 in the morning.

On a perfect winter day, someone would make me “chai, chai, special chai” around 10 or 11 in the morning. No one can make this quite like the chai-wallah at an Indian train station. Starbucks has tried, but fallen short. This is black Indian tea (more than likely Red Label), boiled with milk, sugar, and cardamom or ginger.

Then around 4 in the afternoon it depends on my mood: coffee, cappuccino , Coca-cola, simple milk tea, jasmine tea, on Fridays–red wine.

But back to tea. I recently got to spend a few days at a tea plantation in Sri Lanka. It was beautiful–amazing. And, I learned a few things. Did you know that all tea is made from the same type of bush–Camellia Sinensis? The varieties have to do with where the tea is grown (elevation and soil) and the way in which the leaves or buds are processed. White tea, green tea, and black tea are all from Camillia Sinensis. Green tea is simply tea leaves dried. White tea is made from the tea buds. And, black tea is made from oxidized tea leaves. F.Y.I. I almost never use tea bags anymore–loose leaf it is…