Tea
tea is a delicious beverage
Tea, or cha, is an aromatic beverage prepared by pouring hot or boiling
water over cured or fresh leaves of Camellia sinensis, an evergreen
shrub native to East Asia which probably originated in the borderlands
of southwestern China and northern Myanmar.
Tea is also rarely made from the leaves of Camellia taliensis. After
plain water, tea is the most widely consumed drink in the world. There
are many different types of tea; some have a cooling, slightly bitter,
and astringent flavour, while others have vastly different profiles that
include sweet, nutty, floral, or grassy notes. Tea has a stimulating
effect in humans primarily due to its caffeine content. An early
credible record of tea drinking dates to the third century AD, in a
medical text written by Chinese physician Hua Tuo. It was popularised as
a recreational drink during the Chinese Tang dynasty, and tea drinking
subsequently spread to other East Asian countries. Portuguese priests
and merchants introduced it to Europe during the 16th century.
During the 17th century, drinking tea became fashionable among the
English, who started to plant tea on a large scale in British India. The
term herbal tea refers to drinks not made from Camellia sinensis. They
are the infusions of fruit, leaves, or other plant parts, such as steeps
of rosehip, chamomile, or rooibos. These may be called tisanes or herbal
infusions to prevent confusion with tea made from the tea plant.