Indian tea with an elephant on a yellow pack. Attributes of Soviet life - Indian tea with an elephant

- Where's your tea?

- To the left, a whole department. You'll see right away.

It's easy to say. Looking into a large supermarket in Delhi, I rummaged through several shelves before I came across loose-leaf black tea familiar from childhood. No wonder - after all, the culture of tea drinking in India is different from what we are used to. Soluble (!) Is popular - yes, like coffee - tea, which is poured with boiling water, as well as the "granular version" - leaves twisted into solid balls. "Normal" tea in our understanding in India is not easy to find. In the mornings, they drink masala tea from glass glasses - tea leaves with milk ( pernicious influence British colonizers) and masala spices containing pepper and spices. You swallow such “happiness”, and your tongue burns - so sharply. But that's okay. In the state of Himachal Pradesh, where many Tibetans live, they prefer tea with yak butter and ... dried chicken. Both a drink and breakfast at the same time. Some tribes (in particular, the Gurkhas) do not brew anything at all, but simply chew tea leaves with ... garlic. In general, the naive idea of India as a tea country is crumbling from the very first days of your stay.

Only female fingers

“Extensive tea plantations in India appeared only in 1856 - English planters brought seedlings from China,” explains one of the tea businessmen. Abdul-Wahid Jamarati. - Before that, only wild varieties grew here. Now tea is grown in three mountainous regions. In the northeast of India - in Darjeeling and the state of Assam, as well as in the south - Nilgiri tea is produced there. The taste requires cool weather and frequent rains: the leaves love to absorb moisture. Most fragrant tea they are harvested only by hand and only by women (their salary is about 5 thousand rubles a month for Russian money. - Auth.): male fingers are rougher and cannot pinch off the youngest shoots - flushes. During machine harvesting, everything is cut off in a row, so these varieties are cheap: experts cynically call them a broom. Personally, I am an ardent fan of tea, which is harvested in Darjeeling between February and May, it has a very bright and rich taste. By the way, never buy tea in the bazaars, where it is poured into open bags and kept all day long. outdoors. At such a leaf, the aroma disappears: it turns into chopped hay. I was in Russia and saw - you store the leaves incorrectly. Tea should be put in the refrigerator, at a temperature of + 8 °, so it concentrates its qualities. Do not keep it in a paper box, the best option is an ordinary glass jar.

The most fragrant tea is collected only by hand and only by women. Photo: www.globallookpress.com

The plantations of Darjeeling are fascinating - huge mountains covered with greenery of tea bushes. My guide, 28-year-old Lakshmi from Tamil Nadu, assures me that she is satisfied with the position: “It’s not coal at a damn depth in a mine to mine.” She considers herself a tea professional, as she is able to collect 80 kg (!) of a leaf per day. The machine, by the way, collects 1.5 tons, but it is very small: we subsequently drink this dust, brewing tea bags. Rubbing the delicate leaves of a tea bush with his fingers, Lakshmi says: they grow back in two weeks, and in a year one can accumulate 70 kg of tea from one plant (2.5 times more in Assam). True, now some site owners are planting artificially bred varieties - the taste is not a fountain, but they will cut 100 kilos in six months. Alas, there are enough various frauds with tea in India.

For example, empty jars and packs with the inscription “Elite” or “Choice” are freely sold in the surrounding shops, and unscrupulous traders pour penny varieties into them: after all, only highly experienced tasters abroad can determine the quality of tea.

What's in the brew?

"Unfortunately, good tea small firms often do bodywork, they tell me on the plantation. “They throw in cheap versions of Kenyan or Malaysian, put the stamp “Made in India” and the pack goes to the international market.” How much counterfeit tea is sold in Russia, they could not estimate in Darjeeling. The British (and in Britain they love Indian tea no less than we do) carefully monitor the quality and strictly check the suppliers. Do they do it for us?

“Frankly, even the tea that the USSR bought could hardly be called Indian,” says businessman Vijay Sharma, whose firm sold tea for deliveries to Soviet Union in the late 1970s - It was a blend, a mixture. Depending on the variety, the share of tea from India in the famous in Soviet times pack with the image of an elephant was only 15-25%. The main filler (more than 50%) was Georgian leaf. And right now, things aren't going well. I tried tea from sellers in Moscow and St. Petersburg, it turned out that they have no idea what period the collection (taste depends on) of Darjeeling. And what's more - Nilgiri tea is often sold as "elite" tea, although in India it is the cheapest, a drink for the poor, it is it that is packaged in bags. In places, Indonesian or Vietnamese tea was sold under the guise of Indian tea.

Cup of red pepper

I order tea at street cafe in Delhi. It is usually cooked in an iron kettle (or even a saucepan) for open fire. The leaves are sometimes boiled immediately in milk (at the request of the client) or in water, after adding cinnamon, cardamom, ginger and chili pepper. In general, from the outside it looks like cooking soup. A glass costs 15 rupees (13.5 rubles). The taste is something strange, and almost ten spoons of sugar are poured: in India they love it to the extreme sweet tea. I ask you to brew black Assam leaves without milk and spices. The waiter appears with a glass of steaming tea and ... puts a jug of milk next to him. "For what?! I asked…” “Sir,” his voice sounds with obvious pity. “But you won’t taste good!”

Summing up, I will say: deliveries of Indian tea to our country are still chaotic, sellers understand varieties poorly or frankly fantasize, pushing poor-quality tea leaves from other countries to the Russian consumer. I am generally silent about the price - in India, tea costs 130 rubles. per kilo, we can sell it for a thousand. It's a pity. Indian varieties, especially Darjeeling, are great, and our business has long had to work directly with India, and not buy tea at exorbitant prices through Europe and dubious small firms in India. So for us it will be cheaper and, most importantly, tastier.

Today, many people do not even know what a deficit is. But literally thirty years ago in the USSR, people stood in line for hours to buy products, the assortment of which left much to be desired. This is exactly what our country was like in the seventies and eighties of the last century. It was at that time that the Soviet people for the first time could feel the taste of Indian tea. Today we will tell you all about black tea "with an elephant", which was considered one of the best products of a bygone era.

Own tea industry

Initially, there was only domestic Georgian tea in the USSR. It was a real breakthrough in the industrial industry, and the drink was even exported to other countries, where it became popular. That is why the authorities decided to expand production from self made switched to the machine, which caused the loss of its former quality, since the mechanisms, unlike people, could not distinguish good tea leaves from bad ones. In the seventies, the tea industry in the USSR fell, the state suffered losses and began to decide what to do with it.

The appearance on the shelves of tea "with an elephant"

Many people who survived the times of the USSR sadly recall those times when "the grass was greener, and the sky was cleaner," and the products were of the highest quality, in comparison with them, even imported ones were useless. But many did not even suspect at that time that they drank tea collected not on the territory of their beloved Motherland, but far beyond its borders.

It so happened that it fell into disrepair, so the USSR entered into an agreement for the supply of tea with countries such as Sri Lanka, Kenya, Tanzania, India and Vietnam. With its previous importer, China, which could also supply tea, our state quarreled and therefore did not use its services. So, in order not to lose face in front of their citizens, factories began to pass off imported tea as domestic, bad Georgian leaves were added to it so that they would not be wasted. Since tea came in bulk in loose form, it was easy to do this, without loss. Initially, this scam went well, but still the "domestic" tea was replaced by the same Indian tea "with an elephant". The citizens really loved him.

The history of the creation of tea "with an elephant"

How did tea "with an elephant" appear on the shelves of domestic stores? The development of the recipe, according to some sources, belongs to the Irkutsk tea-packing factory, according to others, to the Moscow tea factory. But this is not so important now, and even then few people asked this question. The main thing is that the recipe was so successful that the tea "with an elephant" was really distinguishable from all other drinks. Distinguished by this tea is not only bright and strong taste, but also the packaging, which was specially developed in 1967, and Indian tea "with an elephant" went on sale in 1972.

Tea composition

But then again, that was not real Indian tea, but a blend (mixture). This tea included varieties of Georgian, Madagascar, and Ceylon leaves.

Tea "with an elephant" was divided into the highest and first grade, their composition was significantly different. The package of the first grade contained only 15% of tea from India, 5% from Ceylon, 25% from Madagascar, and as much as 55% of sheets from Georgia.

That's why it was the highest, and therefore there was one third of real Indian tea in it, and two thirds belonged to Georgian.

Each of the varieties adhered to the requirements of GOST and TU, only the highest grade Darjeeling was added to Indian tea. This tea was produced in the factories of Moscow, Irkutsk, Ryazan, Ufa, Odessa. Each production had its own tasters, whose duties included compiling the necessary mixture of purchased varieties so that all the qualities correspond to the product (taste, aroma, smell, color and price). Each factory was already quite self-sufficient and entered into contracts for the supply of tea with each country.

Packaging design

Since tea was produced in two varieties, they had to be somehow distinguished visually. So, on the package of the first grade, the elephant had a blue head color, and on the top grade tea - green. Over time, the design changed, and each of the factories had its own differences. There was only one thing: cardboard packaging, an elephant.

What design did tea "with an elephant" have? Consider the most memorable variations: the color of the packaging was both white and orange, but yellow is more familiar to us. The elephants themselves were also different, there were packs where one elephant with the trunk lowered down steps to the left, there were also three elephants walking in the same direction, and also with the trunk lowered. The most striking example of a drawing is one with a raised trunk against the backdrop of an Indian city, and the domes are clearly visible. On all of the above elephants there was a mahout.

Why do we remember more precisely the yellow packaging of tea, where the elephant is against the background of India, and its trunk is looking up? The thing is that due to the popularity of tea, and sometimes its absence on the shelves, fakes often began to appear, where there was no smell from Indian tea, and most of the composition belonged to Turkish, terrible in quality. In this regard, citizens began to give preference to one type of packaging, which was rarely faked due to a more saturated pattern.

Symbol of the era

With memories of the times of the USSR, the image of that tea, the same elephant, soft cardboard packaging brightly pops up. Along with many products of that era (take the same condensed milk), this tea remains recognizable even in the 2000s, and more than seventy percent of the population of the former Soviet Union can remember it.

Tea "with an elephant" (price for 50 grams - 48 kopecks, and for 125 - 95 kopecks) was loved by everyone. The presence of this drink in the house spoke of the stable prosperity of the family.

But, like all good things, tea "with an elephant" once disappeared from the shelves. The USSR collapsed, and tea could still be found for some time, then it was simply swept off the shelves.

Brewing rules

Many housewives made a terrible mistake when white sticks were pulled out of a pack "with an elephant" and, mistaking them for garbage, they simply threw them away. After such a stripping, it was impossible to fully experience the taste of tea, since those sticks were tips (tea buds), and this raw material is of the highest quality.

This tea is brewed in the same way as all other varieties. Pour into a teapot treated with boiling water required amount tea leaves, pour boiling water. Let it brew for at least ten minutes, you can dilute it with milk.

India is a mysterious country, the historical center of trade routes, the birthplace of ancient civilizations, a unique culture and different religions. It attracts historians, archaeologists and scientists like a magnet, makes one admire its dissimilarity to other countries of Europe and the whole world. One of the main steps in the history of India is occupied by a magnificent, fragrant, invigorating tea. Indian tea known all over the world, it is drunk in Russia, America, and Ukraine. Today, most countries of the world have become developed and independent, but now you will not meet long queues near store shelves, you will not see a lot of the same things and you will not even remember about the shortage. But quite recently, about 20-25 years ago, this chaos was happening on every street in the country. People stood in line for days, bought clothes and food, sweeping away on the spot. It's still about the deficit was not out of the question. In the early 70s of the last century, the USSR was just that.

Many people remember and sometimes miss Soviet times and products. After all, they were really high quality. Imported products were no exception. Very often people talk about Indian tea with an elephant on yellow pack. It was the first Indian tea brought to the USSR. Until that time, Georgian tea of the highest grade was the domestic brand. In the 1970s, the tea industry began to move from manual to machine work. The quality of Georgian tea has dropped catastrophically. The Soviet tea industry suffered losses. In addition, the country quarreled with the only importer - China, but established ties with other countries in which the tea industry was ideally developed. In addition, India, Tanzania, Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Kenya were friendly to our system and policy. At first, imported tea was mixed with low-quality tea. Georgian tea and passed it off as domestic. For some time, such a scam worked well and brought good profits. And then the same Indian tea came to the fore, which eventually became a symbol of the Soviet system.

Tea was imported to the territory of the USSR in bulk, and only then it was packaged in packs. Colorful, bright packs attracted citizens to try the wonderful indian drink. The color of the pack depended on the type of packaged tea. The highest grade of tea was packed in a yellow box, while the first grade was packaged in green and red boxes. Despite the regime of the country, it was often possible to buy a fake on the counter of the store, which included Indian, Georgian, Madagascar and Ceylon tea. Therefore, tea with an elephant was bought only in those cases when the elephant's trunk was raised up. Tea in this package was considered real. Soon both the trunk and the tea itself disappeared. They began to import it less often, and where it appeared, it was immediately taken apart. Then Turkish tea came to replace the beloved Indian tea. Today, tea with an elephant is called “the same tea”, but has little in common with the tea of the Soviet era.

In India, tea began to grow only in the 19th century, although tea trees in the northeast of the country have always grown. Tea leaves were collected and brewed by the locals, but the plant began to be cultivated with the advent of the English colonialists. In the 1930s, they brought tea bushes from China to set up plantations in India. From these few bushes began the great tea history of India. Currently, this country ranks second among the countries where tea is grown and produced.

Areas of tea production in India

Indian tea, known throughout the world, is grown on plantations that are concentrated in the following areas of the country:

Assam,
Sikkim,
Nilgiri.

by the most the best varieties Indian teas are Darjeeling and Assam.

Tea Assam

The state of Assam is located in the foothills of the Himalayas, in the northern part of India. The tea trees from which this type of tea is obtained differ from Chinese tea trees in more large leaves. These trees give good harvest even if the weather conditions were unfavorable. unpretentiousness tea type makes it attractive for cultivation and cultivation.

Tea Indian Assam - black. It is harvested twice a year: in spring and late summer or early autumn. The second fee is valued higher. Sometimes the collection lasts until December. Assam tea has a spicy floral honey aroma. It is better to drink this drink without additives to enjoy the pure taste. This variety is often used during the traditional morning tea in England.

Darjeeling tea

This tea variety is grown on the plantations of the state of the same name. Unique climatic conditions, soil features allow you to get high-quality Indian tea with exquisite taste and refined aromas of nutmeg and flowers. The tea belongs to the group of black teas, but it is not fully fermented. Because of this, some consider it to be an oolong. This tea differs from the Assam variety in that it represents the Chinese subspecies of the plant.

The first harvest of the Darjeeling variety is carried out in the spring, it gives the lightest infusion when brewed. Then tea is harvested in June, it is valued above others. More tea leaves are collected in autumn and during the rainy season. But their value is not too high. Tea is very picky about storage conditions. It's better to keep it in cool place like oolong. This is what a refrigerator is for.

Elephant packaging: tea from India

Elephant tea - black tea that was considered best product Soviet era. In the USSR, they usually drank Georgian tea. In the 70s of the last century, Indian tea appeared on the shelves. On its packaging was an elephant with its trunk raised up. It cannot be said that the tea was 100% Indian. Rather, it was a blend - a mixture of Ceylon, Madagascar, Georgian teas. Divided such tea into the first and top grade, they differed in composition. The package of the first grade contained 15% Indian tea, 25% Madagascar, 5% Ceylon. Most was tea leaf from Georgia.

The highest grade of tea was better, it consisted of a third of real Indian tea, the rest was Georgian tea. Only the Darjeeling variety was used as Indian tea. The production strictly adhered to the requirements of GOST. The famous yellow packages with the image of an elephant were produced at factories in Ufa, Irkutsk, Moscow, Odessa and Ryazan. Special tasters worked at each factory, who made the necessary blending mixture, checking that all varieties met the requirements for smell, taste, color.

Tea packaging design

Indian tea was produced in two varieties, in addition to the information on the packages, the pattern was also changed. Blue color the head of an elephant denoted the first grade of tea, green color- the highest. The design has changed a little over the years, it differed in different factories. But the elephant itself, as well as the cardboard packaging of tea, remained unchanged. The cost of this tea Soviet time was: 48 kopecks for 50 g, 95 kopecks for 125 grams. The presence of Indian tea with an elephant at that time spoke of prosperity in the house. But the USSR collapsed, perestroika began, inflation, shortages. Along with other products, the favorite tea also disappeared from the store shelves.

Tea brewing rules

At that time, many housewives did not even realize that by throwing white sticks out of a pack with an elephant, they were depriving the drink of the most useful and valuable components. The white sticks mistaken for garbage were tips (tea buds), without them it was impossible to taste real taste Indian tea. Raw materials with tips are considered the most valuable. Indian tea was brewed simply, the tea leaves were poured into a heated teapot, boiling water was added and insisted. Most often, tea was diluted before drinking with boiling water or boiled water. In many families, it was customary to drink tea with milk.

Tea with an elephant: our days

Nostalgic for a past life, many are trying to find products with an elephant on store shelves. Indeed, you can see similar packs of tea, more often they have “The Same Tea” written on them, an elephant is drawn. Is it true that this is the tea that was in the distant 70-80s? As those who have already tried the drink say, Soviet tea he has no resemblance. Neither the aroma nor the taste are similar. It is possible that this is our pampering with numerous tea varieties, or maybe tea was simply better in Soviet times?

Green Indian tea

In the north of India, besides black, green tea is grown. It is not in demand among the locals. It is produced by the following plantations:

Dehra Dun, Almor, Garhwal. Tea leaves are distinguished by their small size, rigid structure. It turns out a low quality product. It is mainly exported to Nepal and Tibet.
Valley of Kagra. Enough grows on the tea plantation of the valley delicious tea. It is similar to good Chinese varieties and is exported to Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Darjeeling. Green tea plantations are also harvested, but its volume is very small, but it is valued above the rest.
Ranchi. This plantation produces tea. Chinese varieties. It cannot be compared with real Chinese mountain tea, but it is quite tasty and strong.

White Indian tea

A valuable and very rare white tea grows in the state of Darjeeling. It is harvested on a spring day when there is no rain and the sun is too hot. Tea upper leaves and buds are collected only by hand. There are very few young shoots, so the amount of tea collected is small. White tea is different delicate taste with hints of flowers and fruits. It leaves a sweet aftertaste. Most appreciated by connoisseurs of Indian tea.

Even though China surpasses India in terms of quality and quantity of tea produced, Indian tea has a lot of fans all over the world. Tea is available, bright, possesses rich color, taste and aroma. And those who think about tea with an elephant should try other varieties of Indian tea, their discovery can be a pleasant surprise for many.

elephant tea

Alternative descriptions

. “Do not count diamonds in stone caves” - the country from which the guest arrived.

Where is Uttar Pradesh

Ancient state in Asia

Unfulfilled dream of Columbus

Home of the sparkler

The country where the tramp from the famous movie lived

The country, which, according to the old man Hottabych, is located "on the very edge of the earth's disk" and is inhabited by "gold-bearing ants the size of a dog"

The birthplace of chess

Where did Afanasy Nikitin go across the three seas?

Which state has the "in" domain?

In which country did vegetarians originate?

Home country of actress Vivien Leigh

What country did Arabic numerals come from?

It was in this far from fictional country, according to Volka Kostylkov, that ants almost the size of a dog lived.

The largest number of films per year is released in this country

tea country

In which country is the cow considered a sacred animal?

Which Asian state the capital of Delhi?

What country was Columbus looking for?

Columbus wanted to get into this country, but missed

A country in Asia with a lot of elephants

The country where Columbus wanted to go, but never managed to

The country, the purpose of the journey of the merchant Afanasy Nikitin

Where did the game of bridge first originate?

According to the old man Hottabych, this country is located on the very edge of the globe

Country with its own ocean

Birthplace of the Kama Sutra

The country that Columbus was looking for

State in Asia

Homeland of the Raja

The birthplace of yoga

Country where cows are revered

A country where rupees are in circulation

Country, birthplace of the bridge

A country full of yogis and fakirs

Country of fakirs and dervishes

Asian power

The country that "gave" the world a guru

Rome is Italy, but Delhi?

Riga is Latvia, and Delhi?

China's southern neighbor

Close to China and Sri Lanka

Land of elephants and saris

Hindu country

The object of the search for Christopher Columbus

A country where cows are sacred

Pakistan's eastern neighbor

Close to Nepal and China

Indira Country and Rajiv Gandhi

Between China and Sri Lanka

A country where cows are idolized

The land of saris and Kamasutra

In which country are cows sacred?

Land of tea and elephants

Country of ladies with a mark on the forehead

Country in South Asia

Bangladesh's western neighbor

Which country until 1896 was known as the only supplier of diamonds in the world?

The area surrounding Delhi

Lady cow country

The address that Columbus got wrong

Country with the city of Delhi at the head

Country of Yogis

Its capital is Delhi

A country full of sarin ladies

Lilac variety

The land of women dressed in saris

The area around Delhi

A country where ladies wear saris

Close to Pakistan

The second most populous country in South Asia