Teh Tarik

Teh Tarik

Today we are making pulled tea. It is also known as nylon tea (because the tool used to brew the tea looks like a lady's nylon). I don't have one of these "nylons" to brew it with, and they obviously aren't the type of nylons women wear because they don't have gaping holes in them (or little dabs of nail polish everywhere to stop various runs to make them usable just a little bit longer). Okay, I'm glad the 1990s are long gone. But I digress, back to tea. If you want to know more about this brewing method (and whether or not it makes a difference for the flavor), I will leave you to watch this video. 

This style of tea is popular in many countries, and is served hot or iced. It is also the base for bubble tea. If you want to make it into bubble tea, add some cooked large pearl tapioca that has been soaked in sugar syrup, and ice. I think people also add extra sugar to it as well. 

Malaysia, a country at the end of a small peninsula (West Malaysia) just north of the equator, and on the island of Borneo (East Malaysia, which is shared with Indonesia). Malaysia is covered by rain forest, and most of the people live on the peninsula. About 75% of the population is reported as urban, and over 50% of the population is under age 30. 

Brunei is a small nation o Borneo as well. It has a small coast, and is bordered by Malaysia. It is also broken up into 2 disconnected parts of unequal size. Its climate is equatorial monsoon, and 3/5 of their land is reported to be rain forest. Most of the population is also Maylay, so it makes sense that they take their tea the same. 

Laos, a landlocked country with a diverse landscape of mountains, plateaus, and valleys. It is bordered by China, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and Myanmar. 

Hong Kong, while not a country of its own, this tea is widely associated with this "special administrative region". I remember Hong Kong most from PJ O'Rourke's book "Eat the Rich: A Treatise on Economics." Hong Kong was the example of making something out of nothing. A small piece of land with few natural resources, and they build high rises and a huge economy. 

So, what is pulled tea? It is a very sweet tea made with sweetened condensed milk. Sometimes condensed milk, salt, and additional sugar are added. So, I gathered my ingredients. 

Suggested ingredients
One video I watched said that Lipton is one of the brands used in Malaysia. I have a lot of decaf Lipton on hand because I thought that it would be nice to drink in the evenings. It turns out decaf Lipton tea tastes horrible, and I have been mixing it with other stuff to make it palatable. I also didn't feel like opening yet another can of evaporated milk knowing that I wasn't going to use it, so I substituted some cream from the cheese salt tea experiment. 
What I really used
So, I put all 3 tea bags in a cup of water and waited several minutes. Then the mixing began...

I was a bit intrigued by what I ended up with in my measuring cup. 2 teaspoons of sweetened condensed milk on the bottom, and a layer of cream on top. Evaporated milk wouldn't float like this (but it was really fun watching the globules of cream float up to the top after I dumped it in the cup). I also added a little salt - a few sprinkles from my shaker. The video suggested dipping your spoon in warm water with salt dissolved in it before using it to scoop your milk, but I didn't feel like messing around with that. She also didn't say what proportion of salt to water to use. 

Then I "pulled" the tea. I don't have pictures of this, but rest assured I did this over the kitchen sink. There's a reason I made this in a measuring cup, and have a second one waiting in the background. "Pulling" tea means pouring it back and forth between cups to mix it and make it frothy. 

Here is what I ended up with. Everything finally mixed together!

How was it, you ask? Cloyingly sweet. I could have put more salt in it, but it needed a lot more. I'm amazed that people actually put more sugar in this as well. Granted, I think they use more salt. Either way, this did not turn me into a fan of sweet tea. 

Comments

  1. Poppy CrockerApril 8, 2018 at 8:51 AM

    At least it's pretty.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Lace makerApril 8, 2018 at 10:17 AM

      It does have that going for it, but there are plenty of other pretty teas I can make.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Equatorial Guinea

Image
Equatorial Guinea Today we go to Equatorial Guinea , which consists of "Rio Muni" - Continental Equatorial Guinea, and 5 small islands known collectively as Insular Equatorial Guinea. When researching this country, I found "osang" tea. I found the name only, no instructions on how to make it. Mystery tea Upon doing some research, osang is a generic name for African milk tea. I couldn't pin down any specific flavors used for this region, just a general description of how people all over Africa make this tea. The base is black tea with milk. The suggested add ins are shown below. Tea Masala (thank you Indian food store), ginger, cardamom, or lemongrass. No, don't use them all together. Today I'm in the mood for cardamom, so that's what I used. The one blog I found about making this suggested a 1:1 ratio of milk and tea. I used 3/4 cup (about 200 ml) of each, with 3 cardamom pods. As usual, you can add sugar to taste. I decided to add the c
Read more

Afghani Pink Milk Tea (Qaimaq Chai)

Image
Afghani Pink Milk Tea ...and inadvertent lessons in chemistry. If you look up Afghani tea, you will find some really pretty pictures of a pink tea ranging from vaguely pink to really bright pink. How do you make it? Well, here are the ingredients for the tea portion: Ah yes, the usual. Some sort of tea (this time green tea), good old cardamom with the mortar and pestle waiting in the background, and baking soda. Wait a minute, WHAT?! Are we making tea or cookies today? Well, I'm just following directions. A little skeptically at this point, but here we go. I read some blogs about gross retro recipes , and I feel like I'm looking at a contender, but I will trust that the people in Afghanistan know what they are doing, and make it. After all, for the people who like to actually cook those recipes and taste them, some really do work quite well. I went with the instructions with the shorter video. The one that can be brewed in less than an hour. I started with 2-3 cups (5
Read more

Ataya/Waraga/Tuareg Tea

Image
"Berber Whiskey" What do you make on a Saturday afternoon when you're tired? I mean really tired. Like you just woke up from a 3 hour nap, and all you want to do is go back to sleep. I will admit I was a bit leery of this one when I found out how it was made, but this is wildly popular so I had to try it. This version of tea has many names, and some sources say that this is used like alcohol in cultures that forbid drinking and using drugs.  Ataya (or attaya - I've seen it spelled both ways), also known as Tuareg tea (so named for the Tuareg tribe), is a very social tea ceremony in West Africa. Most reviews say to expect to take at least 3 hours and have several rounds of tea. Over time, each round of tea is supposed to get milder and sweeter. Sometimes instructions say that mint is added. It is popular in many countries: The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau , Senegal (The Gambia is actually inside Senegal with a small border on the Atlantic), Sierra Leone , Mali , Mau
Read more