The Martlet

It’s no secret that Victoria, often hailed as a Canadian mini-Britain, has a strong association with tea. Victoria’s love for tea and North America’s budding gourmet tea culture came together for a good cause on Feb. 14 and 15 in the third-annual Victoria Tea Festival at Crystal Gardens.

Chinese folklore says tea was invented by Emperor Shennong around 2737 B.C.E. Almost five millennia later, gourmet tea culture has become one of North America’s most recent and enthusiastic Eastern appropriations.

The west’s relationship with tea is a narrative history more extensive than the roots of the tea plant itself, involving revolutions in trade routes, tastes and social custom. The most recent story of this union is happening all around us as North America awakens to tea’s real potential.

This year’s festival functioned as both fundraiser and exhibit. Ticket proceeds and portions of vendor sales went to support Camosun College Childcare Services.

Local tea companies showcased their know-how, equipment and unique blends for a crowd of about 3,000 people — a long way from the first festival’s estimated 500 and a sign of tea’s increasing popularity. Events, including 10 lectures over the course of the weekend, provided entertainment, information and a chance to sample some rare teas and tea concoctions.

“It’s no longer just about orange pekoe any more,” said Christine Smart of Smart Events about the kinds of teas available, as she lectured on how to host the perfect tea party.

At the festival, the big stars of the show were matcha and yerba mate, followed closely by a buzz about white teas and rooibos. These teas and tisanes (the proper tea aficionado’s word for a steeped herbal concoction) have been drawing a lot of publicity because of their health benefits. Besides appealing to the health-conscious, this new wave of tea is offering a flavor experience far and away from the old-style cuppa.

Daniela Cubelic attended the festival not only because she’s the co-owner of Silk Road Tea, but because she’s also a tea master with a direct training line descending from Lu Yu, author of the world’s oldest book on tea. She explained North America’s belated love affair with tea to a full house during her lecture on tea connoisseurship.

The black tea originally introduced to Europeans was substandard, high-yield stuff, and China’s tea culture was not exported with the leaves themselves. But for generations, Europeans didn’t know what they were missing, what elite brews and delicate concoctions remained out of commercial reach. Instead, Europeans developed a taste for strong, black tea with a punch of flavor and caffeine rather than a bouquet of subtler notes. But the tea bush has over 600 aromatic varietals hidden away in the chemical structure of its leaves, just waiting to be brewed to be discovered.

“Tea artisans are just as important as a vintner might be,” Cubelic said.

A sample of a rare Makaibari Estate darjeeling proved the point: even a black tea, something with a bad rap with the developing North American palate, can be exquisite.

Chef Steve Walker-Duncan of Ambrosia Conference and Event Centre dealt tea’s dusty reputation another death-blow with edible concoctions to fill the imagination and the stomach. A tenderloin with a dry rub of lapsang souchong, chai broth meat fondue, hojicha risotto with mushrooms, tea-infused vinaigrettes, butters, chocolates and sauces. The list goes on almost endlessly with possible combinations of foods and different teas, presenting an avenue for tea experience both for the purely hungry and the staunch coffee-drinker.

The healthy and eco-conscious, the gourmand, the explorer, the poet — tea is reaching out in new ways to new palates, finally blooming into a modern niche that is warmly receiving it. It’s a local-global, solitary-social phenomena recently commandeered by gourmets, but far too sincere to be pretentious.

Whether in a mousse, a meat, or a mug, whether black, white, red, green, or a tisane, a novel world of tea awaits within this very city for all noses and taste buds to discover.