RUSSIAN EPICURISM IN TEA--THE JOLTAI TCHAI, OR YELLOW-FLOWER BRAND.
Being at Moscow, I improved the occasion to look up the yellow-flower
tea--the Joltai Tchai--of which I had read and heard much. Travelers,
claiming to be veracious, have told us that this tea is the first
picking of the young and tender leaves of the choicest plants in China,
and that it is brought overland on the backs of porters. I have seen
pictures of men in Chinese dress climbing up mountains at angles of
70°, with chests of the precious tea strapped on their shoulders.
The object of this incredible toil, we were assured, was to avoid a
sea-voyage, in which the damp, salt air would impair the exquisite
flavor of the Joltai Tchai. The story went that this tea could always
be known by the presence of the small, yellowish-white buds or flowers
of its native stalk scattered through it, without which, as the quack
advertisements say, “none is genuine”; though it always seemed to me
that that proof must be a fallible one for all those people outside of
China who had never seen a tea-flower, and that, anyhow, it would be
easy to cheat them by mixing the real blossom with poor tea. But these
same enthusiastic authors proceeded to give higher and more subtile
tests for Joltai Tchai. They declared that, when a package of it was
opened, it exhaled the most delicious of perfumes, which filled a
room on the instant. They did not compare it to any earthly or known
odor, but left the impression that it was something heavenly, and
therefore indescribable. Its flavor on the palate was vaguely mentioned
as aromatic, delicate, and yet perceptible when diluted with any
amount of water. The mental effects ascribed to this tea were no less
remarkable. It was said that a cup of it, with only two teaspoonfuls to
the ordinary pot, was equal to a pint of champagne for exhilaration,
without the least after-clap of headache. As for those obfuscations of
the intellect commonly known as “cobwebs,” it would brush away the last
filament of them from the nooks and corners of the stupidest minds. But
we were solemnly warned not to take two cups of it at a time, under
penalty of losing sleep for forty-eight hours. Its cost to the consumer
in Russia was variously stated at ten to twenty dollars a pound. But
a tea, half as wonderful as this, should be cheap at any price. I
resolved to buy some of it.
I was so anxious to secure the authentic article, that I called upon an
English gentleman, to whom I was referred, long a resident of Moscow,
and speaking Russian like a native. He consented to accompany me to the
only shop he knew of where the real Joltai Tchai could be obtained.
We found it in a part of the city but little visited by foreigners.
The shop was small, and three Tartar-like persons stood behind the
counter. On the walk thither the Englishman had kindly explained that
the Tartars were the most honest people in Russia--where honesty
is the rule, so far as I know. He assured me that Tartars pure and
simple were preferred before all other races for places of financial
responsibility. They made the best cashiers, head book-keepers,
superintendents, and managers. And when he said he was taking me to a
Tartar teashop, I felt as if I should not be robbed.
The three Tartars did not even nod at us as we entered, but only stood
at ease to take our order. This was quickly given in Russian by my
companion, who first, however, asked the price of Joltai Tchai by
the pound. It was ten rubles (about eight dollars and thirty cents
in paper money), which was less than I had expected, and I mentioned
the quantity I would buy. One of the Tartars took down a small box
from an upper shelf, opened it, and disclosed another box having a
tightly fitting slide cover; this he removed, and brought to light a
thick tin-foil wrapping, which being unfolded revealed tissue-paper,
beneath several thicknesses of which lay the tea. Up to this time
I had stood back, waiting to catch the all-penetrating odor of the
Joltai Tchai at a distance, but it did not report itself. So I leaned
forward, bent over the little chest, and took a good long sniff. Yes,
there was a decided tea-smell, but no more searching or ravishing than
that of the Oolong I had been consuming at home all my life. This was
disappointment number one.
The required amount of tea was carefully weighed before me. I could
watch it as it was shaken out of the chest into the capacious scale.
It looked about the color of green tea, with a yellow shade in a
side-light, and had no points of distinction except the presence of
many shriveled-up, dirty-white buds. These were yellow only to the eye
of faith; and that was disappointment number two.
After the tea had been weighed with great particularity, the Tartar
removed it to the back of the shop, to do it up in a package with many
thicknesses of rice-paper and tin-foil. I could not help fearing that,
when out of my sight, the man would substitute a far inferior tea
for the costly Joltai Tchai. But when the Englishman, speaking from
his past experience with the race, said, “You can trust him,” I felt
completely reassured, paid my bill, thanked my English friend for his
assistance, and returned to the hotel with my treasure. And here let me
give the sequel of my experience with Joltai Tchai.
It was not thoroughly tested for its supposed remarkable qualities till
I returned to the United States. Russian lovers of Joltai Tchai will
here object that the trial was not a fair one; that it should have
been made on their soil, before the tea had crossed any salt-water.
There is force in this suggestion. But it seemed a pity to break a
package so shapely, and intended to secure the contents completely
against the harmful influence of the elements. And then, too, all
the tea I drank in Russia was so excellent that I did not want any
better there. At home it was the subject of many experiments, which go
far to establish the following conclusions: The yellow-flower tea is
delicate to a fault; so much so that persons accustomed to the rank and
adulterated teas of commerce find it insipid. It is like the finest old
Johannisberger or Château-Margaux as compared with heady new wines; no
one but a professional tea-taster can appreciate its high grade. Its
odor is markedly not different from that of any other tea, except as
one may say it is more “tea-like.” Its unique excellence lies in its
clarifying and cheering effect on the mind of the drinker. It disperses
a headache like magic, and mental anxiety as well. If one were
possessed of “blue-devils,” I should expect two stiff cups of Joltai
Tchai to send them scampering.
If it is worth, as some think, two or three dollars to extract a few
fleeting moments of joy from a bottle of champagne, then one should
not grudge thrice as much for a pound of yellow-flower tea, which will
insure him perhaps some hundred hours of innocent exaltation. And, as
for sleep, I have not yet lost any from its use, but prefer not to
drink a strong infusion of it late at night.
Like any other high-grade tea, where the object is not to disguise
the flavor of the herb, it is best without sugar or cream, or even
the slice of lemon beloved by all Russians. But these ingredients,
unless too freely employed, do not rob the tea of its slightly peculiar
taste, or impair its virtue as a most agreeable tonic or stimulant.
Connoisseurs in teas prefer to treat it with fresh, actually boiling
water poured directly on the tea in a sunken cylinder full of holes
set into the pot. The clear infusion passes through this perforated
cylinder, and it should be drunk immediately afterward. But other
persons less critical like it better when the boiling water is poured
on the tea at the bottom of the pot, and then allowed to draw a good
five or even ten minutes on the stove itself, or, better still, on the
iron shelf for hot plates above it. This treatment makes a stronger
decoction, but tends to substitute rankness for delicacy of flavor.
But it brings out some of the valuable properties of the tea which do
not apparently respond to the other and more superficial method. On
the whole, the verdict of the majority of those who have tried it both
ways is in favor of the drawing process. Under no circumstances does it
acquire a bitter taste. And yet, after all that I have said in favor
of Joltai Tchai, it is a fact that nobody who drinks it seems to think
that it is anything extraordinary till told so. And I must say that I
am sometimes in serious doubt whether my high opinion of the tea is not
the work of pure imagination.