Vietnamese Tea
 

Someone asked a week or so ago about Vietnamese tea. I don't know very
much about it, but what I do know is that most of the tea drunk in Vietnam
proper is flavoured tea. Most popular are a jasmine tea "Saigon tea" that
is reminiscent of the Chinese yellow-box tea, and a distant second is
lotus tea "Hue tea" or "tra sen" which my wife describes as tasting
like rotting flowers.

I rather like both of these, and both of them are made from cheap commodity
tea with flowers added to it. I don't know about pesticide use (although
given the economic necessities I would doubt there was very much), and
I know really nothing about higher grade teas from Vietnam.

I will say that I recently tried the "Vietnam Orange Pekoe" from Uptons
and was very impressed. It had a strong flavour almost reminiscent of
clove, but clearly not eugenol/clove itself. Very aromatic. I know a
lot of folks turn their nose up at anything with an OP marking on the
box, but I urge you to try this. It's only a couple bucks and I think it
is a fine drinking tea at an excellent price.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

On Sat, 04 Jun 2005 11:40:44 -0400, Scott Dorsey wrote:
> I will say that I recently tried the "Vietnam Orange Pekoe" from Uptons
> and was very impressed. It had a strong flavour almost reminiscent of
> clove, but clearly not eugenol/clove itself. Very aromatic. I know a
> lot of folks turn their nose up at anything with an OP marking on the
> box, but I urge you to try this. It's only a couple bucks and I think it
> is a fine drinking tea at an excellent price.


What is the "OP" marketing of which you speak frankly?

I am not familiar with this linguistic term. Please define this anagram of
commodity.

Thank You for YOUR response of thoughtfulness.

:)

Sajo Sendak > wrote:
>On Sat, 04 Jun 2005 11:40:44 -0400, Scott Dorsey wrote:
>> I will say that I recently tried the "Vietnam Orange Pekoe" from Uptons
>> and was very impressed. It had a strong flavour almost reminiscent of
>> clove, but clearly not eugenol/clove itself. Very aromatic. I know a
>> lot of folks turn their nose up at anything with an OP marking on the
>> box, but I urge you to try this. It's only a couple bucks and I think it
>> is a fine drinking tea at an excellent price.
>
>What is the "OP" marketing of which you speak frankly?
>
>I am not familiar with this linguistic term. Please define this anagram of
>commodity.

Orange Pekoe. A lot of folks will turn their nose up at anything that
is marked as orange pekoe.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

(Scott Dorsey) writes:

> Someone asked a week or so ago about Vietnamese tea. I don't know
> very much about it, but what I do know is that most of the tea drunk
> in Vietnam proper is flavoured tea. Most popular are a jasmine tea
> "Saigon tea" that is reminiscent of the Chinese yellow-box tea, and
> a distant second is lotus tea "Hue tea" or "tra sen" which my wife
> describes as tasting like rotting flowers.
>
> I rather like both of these, and both of them are made from cheap
> commodity tea with flowers added to it. I don't know about
> pesticide use (although given the economic necessities I would doubt
> there was very much), and I know really nothing about higher grade
> teas from Vietnam.

There's a Vietnamese green that's decidedly above commodity level
called Thai Nguyen. I believe you spend some of your time in DC; you
might check Teaism, which has carried it in the past.

> I will say that I recently tried the "Vietnam Orange Pekoe" from
> Uptons and was very impressed. It had a strong flavour almost
> reminiscent of clove, but clearly not eugenol/clove itself. Very
> aromatic. I know a lot of folks turn their nose up at anything with
> an OP marking on the box, but I urge you to try this. It's only a
> couple bucks and I think it is a fine drinking tea at an excellent
> price.

I was once given a sample of a Vietnamese black called Marble
Mountain. It was rich and complex, with some fruit and a hint of
tobacco. I was about to say I don't know where you can get it, but
look:

http://www.nbtea.co.uk/acatalog/Other_Black_Teas.html

/Lew
---
Lew Perin /
http://www.panix.com/~perin/babelcarp.html

"Lewis Perin" > wrote in message
...
>
> There's a Vietnamese green that's decidedly above commodity level
> called Thai Nguyen. I believe you spend some of your time in DC; you
> might check Teaism, which has carried it in the past.
>
My son-in-law's father (who is Vietnamese himself) gave me a tin of Thai
Nguyen just last week. It is a very nice green, and although I've had Wuyi
and Liu An's that I thought were better, this is good stuff.

Regards,
Dean

My metro area has a large Vietnamese population catered by Chinese and
Vietnamese stores. When I see the Vietnamese tea selection it is like
the first time I saw Chinese teas. They have their own nomenclature
with corresponding Chinese tea characters. I have a tin of Thai Nguyen
$4/150g with dark green twisted whole leaf. The selections I see are
packed in Hong Kong. Hedley's Tea is Vietnamese packed in Ceylon.

Jim

DPM wrote:
> "Lewis Perin" > wrote in message
> ...
> >
> > There's a Vietnamese green that's decidedly above commodity level
> > called Thai Nguyen. I believe you spend some of your time in DC; you
> > might check Teaism, which has carried it in the past.
> >
> My son-in-law's father (who is Vietnamese himself) gave me a tin of Thai
> Nguyen just last week. It is a very nice green, and although I've had Wuyi
> and Liu An's that I thought were better, this is good stuff.
>
> Regards,
> Dean

Jim,

Sounds like mine, except my tin is 100g, and since it was a gift I have no
idea how much it cost. My son-in-law's father (odd - we don't have a single
word for that relationship in English) has a fairly large extended family in
the San Jose area, and from some comments he made I think the tea came from
them. But it too appears to be dark green twisted whole leaf. The taste is
on the grassy/vegetal side of the spectrum; my daughter thinks it tastes a
lot like Japanese green which, since I understand that Vietnam now supplies
a lot of tea to Japan, is not surprising.

Regards,
Dean

"Space Cowboy" > wrote in message
oups.com...
> My metro area has a large Vietnamese population catered by Chinese and
> Vietnamese stores. When I see the Vietnamese tea selection it is like
> the first time I saw Chinese teas. They have their own nomenclature
> with corresponding Chinese tea characters. I have a tin of Thai Nguyen
> $4/150g with dark green twisted whole leaf. The selections I see are
> packed in Hong Kong. Hedley's Tea is Vietnamese packed in Ceylon.
>
> Jim
>
> DPM wrote:
> > "Lewis Perin" > wrote in message
> > ...
> > >
> > > There's a Vietnamese green that's decidedly above commodity level
> > > called Thai Nguyen. I believe you spend some of your time in DC; you
> > > might check Teaism, which has carried it in the past.
> > >
> > My son-in-law's father (who is Vietnamese himself) gave me a tin of Thai
> > Nguyen just last week. It is a very nice green, and although I've had
Wuyi
> > and Liu An's that I thought were better, this is good stuff.
> >
> > Regards,
> > Dean
>

"DPM" > writes:
>
> [...Thai Nguyen...]
>
> The taste is on the grassy/vegetal side of the spectrum; my daughter
> thinks it tastes a lot like Japanese green which, since I understand
> that Vietnam now supplies a lot of tea to Japan, is not surprising.

The one I had from Teaism reminded me of a pretty good sencha, too.

/Lew
---
Lew Perin /
http://www.panix.com/~perin/babelcarp.html

Amazing. The official language is Guoc Ngu based on Latin character
set used by Catholic missionaries in the 17th century. It could
accomodate the tonal sounds. It evolved from Chinese to Western
characters. Maybe our resident language expert can add more. Thai
Nguyen is a province north of Hanoi noted for premium green teas. I'd
like to find some Vietnamese form of pu from the area that borders
Yunnan. It is part of the swath of mountainous jungle called Upper
India which contains the tea trees which became the cultivated bush in
China.

Jim

Space Cowboy wrote:
> They have their own nomenclature
> with corresponding Chinese tea characters.

Space Cowboy > wrote:
>Amazing. The official language is Guoc Ngu based on Latin character
>set used by Catholic missionaries in the 17th century. It could
>accomodate the tonal sounds. It evolved from Chinese to Western
>characters. Maybe our resident language expert can add more. Thai
>Nguyen is a province north of Hanoi noted for premium green teas. I'd
>like to find some Vietnamese form of pu from the area that borders
>Yunnan. It is part of the swath of mountainous jungle called Upper
>India which contains the tea trees which became the cultivated bush in
>China.

Originally there was a written language called "Nom" (with a circumflex
over the O), which used chinese characters but was phonetic. It was
_very_ rapidly replaced with the current latin alphabetic method... by
the late 19th century there were only a handful of historians who could
read Nom.

If you walk around cities in Vietnam, you'll see inscriptions in buildings
in Nom all over the place, and not a single one of the people passing by
know what they mean. This is kind of sad.

My suspicion is that the notation you're seeing on the tea boxes isn't
Nom at all, but is actual Chinese. It's easy enough to find out by
using a Chinese dictionary.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

I'm not sure what you mean. Why would it be Nom in any case? It's the
current form. HaNoi has the grave for the A and circumflex for the O
with the bottom dot. It took me awhile to satisify myself that the
bottom dot was part of the Latin character set. I didn't remember it
but it's been awhile since I studied the subject in high school. There
was a time Latin was required by some Universities for admission.
Today if you want a good high school education go to college.

Jim

Scott Dorsey wrote:
> Space Cowboy > wrote:
> >Amazing. The official language is Guoc Ngu based on Latin character
> >set used by Catholic missionaries in the 17th century. It could
> >accomodate the tonal sounds. It evolved from Chinese to Western
> >characters. Maybe our resident language expert can add more. Thai
> >Nguyen is a province north of Hanoi noted for premium green teas. I'd
> >like to find some Vietnamese form of pu from the area that borders
> >Yunnan. It is part of the swath of mountainous jungle called Upper
> >India which contains the tea trees which became the cultivated bush in
> >China.
>
> Originally there was a written language called "Nom" (with a circumflex
> over the O), which used chinese characters but was phonetic. It was
> _very_ rapidly replaced with the current latin alphabetic method... by
> the late 19th century there were only a handful of historians who could
> read Nom.
>
> If you walk around cities in Vietnam, you'll see inscriptions in buildings
> in Nom all over the place, and not a single one of the people passing by
> know what they mean. This is kind of sad.
>
> My suspicion is that the notation you're seeing on the tea boxes isn't
> Nom at all, but is actual Chinese. It's easy enough to find out by
> using a Chinese dictionary.
> --scott
>
> --
> "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

I was just in a Vietnamese traditional tea shop in Vancouver, BC, and
most of the teas were regular taiwan! The owner said that is mostly
what Vietnamese drink. The shop is on Kingsway if anyone is looking
for it.

Scott Dorsey wrote:
> Someone asked a week or so ago about Vietnamese tea. I don't know very
> much about it, but what I do know is that most of the tea drunk in Vietnam
> proper is flavoured tea. Most popular are a jasmine tea "Saigon tea" that
> is reminiscent of the Chinese yellow-box tea, and a distant second is
> lotus tea "Hue tea" or "tra sen" which my wife describes as tasting
> like rotting flowers.