Ivan-tea - a healing drink Rusov

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

The participants in the capture of Kazan and the conquest of Astrakhan, the warriors of Minin and Pozharsky, the walking freeman Stepan Razin drank Ivan tea, which was an integral part of their life.

In particular, England and Denmark received thousands of poods of Ivan tea. And to Prussia and France, he was smuggled. An article about him was even included in the Great Britannica. But England owned huge colonies, including India, where ordinary tea was grown. But he was preferred by the English Puritans, who had the opportunity to compare and choose the best varieties in the world.

He (Ivan-tea) received such a name in the first half of the 17th century, that is, at the time of the beginning of the tea and coffee World expansion!

And before that, Russian healers called "Ivan-tea" for its powerful healing properties a borax potion. Especially popular were infusions on the leaves of "Ivan-tea", which were used to treat headaches, relieve various inflammations. "Ivan-chai" also had such nicknames as bread-bin or mill-keeper. They appeared due to the fact that the dried, ground roots of "Ivan-chai", following the recommendations of folk healers, were often added to flour for baking bread. Also "Ivan-tea" was called cockerel apples - for the taste properties of young leaves, which are quite a substitute for salad. Yes, as soon as they did not call "Ivan-tea" among the people, which once again speaks of its popularity!

So, our "teas" brewed "Ivan-tea" in such a way that it began to resemble subtropical tea in taste and color. It was made like this: the leaves of "Ivan-chai" were dried, scalded in a tub with boiling water, ground in a trough, then thrown back onto baking sheets and dried in a Russian oven. After drying, the leaves were crumpled again and the tea was ready.

Most of this tea was prepared in the village of Koporye near St. Petersburg. Therefore, they began to call the drink, and later the "Ivan-tea" itself, Koporsky tea. HUNDREDS of poods of this product have been used in Russia. He was appreciated by Siberians and Dutch, Don Cossacks and Danes. Later, it became the MOST IMPORTANT component in Russian exports. After special processing, "Ivan-tea" was sent by sea to England and other European countries, where it was also REPLACED, like Persian carpets, Chinese silk, Damascus steel. Abroad, "Ivan-tea" was called Russian tea!

Leaving on a long journey, Russian sailors always took Ivan-tea with them in order to drink themselves. And as gifts in foreign ports.

However, there were also unscrupulous merchants who used Ivan-tea to counterfeit Chinese (Peking) tea. They mixed Ivan-tea leaves with Chinese tea and passed off this mixture as an expensive oriental curiosity. But I must say that in pre-revolutionary Russia, and even after the revolution until 1941, adding other plants to subtropical teas was considered shameless falsification, fraud and was prosecuted. Therefore, such merchants were most often convicted of such unseemly acts and brought to justice, sometimes even arranging high-profile trials.

However, even such cases could not deprive Koporsky tea of popularity, and already in the 19th century it became a powerful competitor to Indian tea.

Great Britain, which owned HUGE tea plantations in India, bought tens of thousands of poods of Koporye tea annually, preferring Russian tea to Indian tea!

So why has such a profitable production of Koporsk tea stopped in Russia? The fact is that at the end of the 19th century its popularity turned out to be so great that it began to undermine the financial power of the East Indian Tea Campaign, which traded Indian tea !!! The campaign fanned a scandal, as if Russians were grinding tea with white clay, which, they say, is unhealthy. And the real reason is that the owners of the East India campaign had to remove the most powerful competitor from their own market in England - Russian tea!

The company achieved its goal, the purchase of Russian tea was reduced, and after the revolution in Russia in 1917, when England entered the military bloc "Entente", the purchase of tea in Russia stopped completely! The koporye went bankrupt …

And just recently, people remembered about this healing drink. After a long break, the sailors of the "Kruzenshtern" took with them to the round-the-world regatta according to the old recipes. The famous lone traveler F. Konyukhov always uses this healing "Ivan-tea" in all his travels!