Tea world

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Wanting to start out with a light morning, we headed to he town of Yingge, which hosts a very large and famous Taiwan has many different ethnicities, each with their own customs, traditions, foods, etc. While it would be impossible to capture all of Taiwan’s diversity in a four day trip, we tried to focus on a few examples each day. Beipu, which is in Hsinchu county, just south of where we start, is well known for Hakka culture. Lei Cha is a drink made with tea that is representative of Hakka culture. We got to observe, participate, and enjoy this tasty beverage at the Water Well Tea House and Hakka Cultural Workshop. Left: Ching-Yu (who is part Hakka!) is standing outside the tea house. The sign reads “Water Well Tea House” in Chinese. This building is very old and has great historical significance. The baroque-style archways were popular at the time it was built, during the late Qing dynasty (late 1800s, early 1900s). The original building actually occupied the entire street block, and has since been divided into several unique tea shops and residences. Some shots of corridor in front of the building, including the entrance to the bathroom, which was really cool. The red fabric you see is a very typical Hakka fabric print. Inside the tea shop:There was a very neat little back room in the tea house, full of pictures of people that have visited the tea shop, some celebrities, some just cool old pictures of everyday local tea drinkers. There was also some artwork created by passerbys of the tea shop. This poster is a collection of many different people - kids and adults alike - drawing the fruit 金桔 (jin ju), which translates to kumquat in English. The kumquat is a very lucky symbol in Chinese, loosely relating to the similarities in its pronunciation and the words for good fortune and wealth in Chinese. More to come about kumquats in a future blog.... In the background, you can see part of the large scroll hanging on the wall, along with pictures of customers over the years. And finally, the Lei Cha:Top: Ingredients: Taiwanese tea, peanuts, pumpkin seeds, and sesame seeds. These are all ground together in a clay mortar with ribs on the bottom with a huge stick. As you can imagine, this is NOT EASY. We all tried, and let me tell you, this woman is a PROFESSIONAL, in both technique, strength, and stamina. You will have to check out our video to see us trying. Bottom: Finally, all the seeds, nuts, and tea turns into a thick homogeneous paste and hot water is added to make the tea. It is garnished with puffed rice (not too different from Rice Krispies). the lady was telling us that in Hakka culture, the ladies would be sitting around chatting, passing the mortar around and taking turns mashing all the ingredients. Let me tell you, it takes a long time and is always done by hand. You won’t find any Magic Bullets in this tea shop. The Lei Cha was very delicious and quite filling. I think of it as more of a breakfast than a beverage. This tea shop had a huge array of other types of tea for sale. We were served some cold Oriental Beauty tea before we left, a nice segue to our next stop in Beipu... an Oriental Beauty tea factory!(be sure to check out the This is the gentleman we met (below). You see, Ching-Yu spent countless hours contact the farmers’ association in each county we were visiting. They put her in touch with the “class leaders” of each group of tea farmers in the area. This particular class leader was not making tea that day, but his buddy, another tea farmer, was. We just briefly saw the inside of this guy’s store, as seen below. He then took us to his buddy’s tea factory, which also made Oriental Beauty Tea. He also gave us two samples of his own tea, which I have since drank and let me tell you: it’s awesome. That’s why it costs 10,000 Taiwan dollars for a 600g bag (about 300 USD)......Oriental Beauty Tea (東方美人