Reawaken the scent of Thuy Tien tea from a golden age

Author: Le Ngoc Linh
Photo source:  Nguyen Phu Cuong

Narcissus, a flower with white petals and yellow pistil, has a gentle, elegant, yet no less noble scent. It used to contribute to the spring of noble Hanoi families during the old Lunar New Year days. Narcissus flower tea, known as “royal fragrance,” is only used by homeowners to serve guests or guests.

When December knocks on the door, the daffodils are carefully selected to keep up with the “playing flowers” season and marinate in tea. Good tubers must be flat, spongy, covered with cockroach-colored skin. The tubers are round, complex, and look healthy, but they must be removed because they have too many branches and will not produce flowers with an excellent scent to weave into tea. For the bulbs to be fragrant, the tea maker must also know how to “play” and take care of the flower bulbs carefully. Nguyen Viet Bac, owner of Thuong Tra shop, a famous tea maker and florist in Hanoi, said, “The Thuy Tien variety is sentimental and melancholy. Unfortunately, the leaf will break, and the spring will be torn. The person who peels the Thuy Tien must be like a true meditation practitioner, with no distracting thoughts in his head. Only then can he hope to have a satisfactory flower spring. After more than twenty days of caring for Narcissus, when the flowers have begun to loosen their petals, and the flower scent has awakened, it is also time to weave incense for tea.

When talking about Thuy Tien tea, we are talking about a tea with a fragrant scent that is not overpowering or seductive because of its deep and discreet appearance, gentle yet entangled. Therefore, the tea ingredients used to weave incense must also be gentle and refreshing, “the taste should not be too astringent, and the aftertaste must linger for a long time in the user’s mouth,” Viet Bac added. To make a tea suitable for Thuy Tien, the ingredients must be premium green tea that has been carefully brewed for four years, then combined with pure white flowers, promising to bring cups of tea with the scent of Tien Tien. Scene.

After choosing the right ingredients, the steps of weaving incense for tea begin. It is a manual process and requires a lot of skill, meticulousness, and care. The sophistication of a tea master will be revealed in every small step. Choosing a flower bowl to brew tea, Viet Bac slowly picked each flower from the celadon ceramic plate and arranged it side by side on the tea layer, like a floral cloth covering a tea mat, then a layer of tea. Covered with flowers, and so on, flowers covered the tea, and then the tea covered the flowers; they hugged each other neatly in the bowl. When the last layer of tea was spread evenly, he slowly folded each edge of the wind paper neatly, carefully covering them with an additional layer of wind paper that had been rubbed until it was as soft as silk before closing the lid of the bowl. After a period of incubation, you can be sure that the tea is full of floral scent; all the flower remains are picked up, not even a little pistil remains, a gentle fragrance wafts, and the tea continues to be heated to loosen the scent, then brewed. Cool for a few days to let the aroma blend with the tea. However, that fragile scent takes work to weave. After many trials and tests, “if the tea is clear, the taste is clear, and the scent is mild, it means that the tea can be presented to the family altar and treated to close guests.”

Ultimately, such thoroughness and diligence are just for having a delicious cup of tea. And, if you have the opportunity to take a sip of Thuy Tien tea in early spring, see the color of the brewed tea as clear as autumn lake water, the tea taste as precise as a fresh morning, the tea scent as soft as an early spring garden, you will surely be a customer. will want to let go of all the worldly thoughts and hustle and bustle of the city; It’s just you (and your loved ones) at the New Year tea table. At that time, the weather was chilly, a pot of tea was warm with the scent of spring, and people’s hearts were gentle and calm as if they had never wavered. At that time, you will understand why there are crazy people who spend a lot of time and energy just to wrap a little floral scent in a cup of spring tea.