Tea

History of the Drink

 Time line:

• 500 BC, The Chinese philosopher Laozi wrote about the heath properties of the plant, going so far as to include it as the main ingredient in his "elixir of life".
• 220 BC, physician Hua Tuo wrote about tea's ability to improve the mind as well as the body.
• 59 BC, Wang Bao wrote instructions on buying and preparing tea. This signaled a transition from tea being purely a medicine, to being an integral part of the diet.
• 600 AD, Japan became interested in Chinese culture, and sent Buddhist monks to investigate. Thus, tea was introduced to the Island of Japan.
• 661 AD, In Korea tea was used as an offering to the spirits of kings.
• 760 AD, Lu Yu describes tea drinking as a common practice. During this period tea leaves were steamed and compressed into " tea bricks" for easy transportation and exchange. They were often used as a form of money further from the empire as coins lost their perceived value.
• 1000, Tea leaves were still steamed, but not necessarily compressed into bricks. This ensured that the delicate taste, preferred by many, was maintained.
• 1250, other ways of processing tea leaves started to be used in China.
• 1391, the Ming court would only accept loose tea as a "tribute." Production of tea brinks started to decline as the demand for loose leaf increased.
• 1550, A Buddhist monk named Sen no Rikyū developed what could be considered the base of modern day Japanese tea ceremony.
• 1598, A Dutch sailor witnessed the consumption of tea in India. However, this is most likely simply the first observed consumption, hinting at a long history for the Indian plants.
• 1600 The Dutch East India Company brought the first tea leaves to Amsterdam from China, it was a green tea.
• 1648 Tea had a brief period of popularity in Paris, and was introduced to England, and the American colonies.
• 1665, With the marriage of King Charles II to the Portuguese princess Catherine of Braganza, tea was popularized amount the aristocrats in to Briton.
• 1738, Sencha (literally roasted tea) was developed by a man named Soen Nagatani
• 1750, tea became the national brink in Briton. Around this time England started using opium grown in India as an alternative to Silver bullion in trade of tea.
• 1835, By shading the tea trees leading up to harvest, Kahei Yamamoto developed gyokuro (Literally jewel dew)
• 1836, The British introduced its version of tea culture to India. Tea plants were discovered in Assam, and thus India was on its way to being the worlds largest supplier of tea. This was good for England, because the Chinese were hard to trade with, while the Indians were being colonized.

Processing the plant into a Food