Chai Wallah Margate – Assam
I think that robust black teas sometimes get short shrift in tea appreciation circles. Most of us start off with PG tips and the like in our youth and as the world of delicate whites, complex oolongs and vegetal greens opens up ahead of us, it’s easy to think of the likes of Assam as being somehow less sophisticated. Chai Wallah Margate’s Assam tea proves that a bloody good Assam tea can be a thing of joy and beauty.
You can feel this tea doing you good as you drink it. It’s energising and invigorating and all kinds of other dynamic go-getter words. If you were planning to take on the world today, I reckon a cup of Chai Wallah Margate’s Assam would be a good place to start.
I was going to furnish this review with a quick history of Assam tea. Delving into the beginnings of tea production in India in the nineteenth century is a harrowing read though. We all know that the British behaved abysmally in the countries they colonised but, you know, it really bears repeating. We were absolute bastards.
The East India Company forced local farmers in Assam to grow tea instead of their traditional crops. The tea workers were indentured servants, which means they were effectively slaves and the mistreatment, poverty and starvation were horrific.
The history of tea (or at least the bits where the British are involved) is a very dark place. It doesn’t ruin my enjoyment of a cup of tea, but it certainly wouldn’t be doing anyone any favours to airbrush it out. At the very least, it serves as a reminder to comfortable twenty-first-century tea consumers like me of the importance of sourcing ethically produced tea. India’s tea production may have started under the yoke of British Imperialists but it is an industry that is now all their own. India is the second largest tea producer in the world after China, and 80% of its tea is grown for domestic consumption.
Chai Wallah Margate is certainly a prime example of teamongering done right. It was born out of a love for India and the company explains its ethical ethos on its website:
“A strong ethical and environmental ethos is extremely important to us, we only buy from suppliers that ensure the growers, pickers and processors are paid a fair wage.”
So there you go, Chai Wallah Margate’s Assam tea is both ethical and delicious. I think I’ll have another cup.
Today’s featured book is A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth.
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