Tea drinking in Song Dynasty is rich and colorful.
Today, I will introduce you to the knowledge of tea culture in Song Dynasty. Song Dynasty experienced the enlightenment development stage of tea industry and tea culture in Tang Dynasty, and it became the most active era of tea drinking in history. In addition to the rich content and superb skills of "fighting tea", "dividing tea" and "embroidering tea", folk tea drinking methods are more colorful.
Folk tea drinking in the Song Dynasty is a classic in Lin 'an (now Hangzhou, Zhejiang), the capital of the Southern Song Dynasty. At that time, in the bustling city of Lin 'an, tea shops were open around the clock. Whether in the hot sun or in the dead of winter, someone always comes to buy tea with a pot. Famous people's paintings and calligraphy are hung in the tea shop, with simple decoration and flowers in all seasons. People come to drink tea in an endless stream.
There are many different types of tea shops in Lin 'an in the Southern Song Dynasty, which can be divided into many types to adapt to different levels of consumers. There are some tea shops, most of which are places where scholars and officials meet with friends. People not only drink tea and chat, but even carry out sports activities, such as Cuju Teahouse.
There are also teahouses and teahouses. The main customers here are mostly elegant and knowledgeable people. They play musical instruments and learn to play songs here. At that time, people called this kind of tea shop "famous brand". There are also some teahouses that do not make tea for a living, but only in name. People buy and sell, talk about things, drink and even gamble here, becoming entertainment places.
The Prosperity of Tea Culture in Song Dynasty in China
In the Song Dynasty, the tea planting area was constantly expanding, and the techniques of planting, harvesting and making tea were becoming more and more exquisite. The focus of tea industry began to move south, and fried tea (Wuyi tea area in a broad sense) rose. Gongcha Institute moved south to Beiyuan, Jian 'an, Fujian, and became the main technical center for making group tea and cake tea in China. The Longfeng tea produced in Jian 'an Beiyuan is famous all over the world. This special tribute tea that shapes the shape of a dragon or a phoenix is also called Dragon Tuan Feng Cake.
There were many teahouses in the Song Dynasty, and the way of drinking tea took a step forward on the basis of the Tang Dynasty, and the elegant and exquisite way of ordering tea prevailed. The biggest difference between the tea-ordering method and the tea-boiling method in the Tang Dynasty is that the screened tea powder is no longer boiled in a pot, but put in a teacup, then mixed with a small amount of boiling water, and then added with boiling water, and repeatedly struck with a bamboo teapot while adding it, so that it produces foam (called soup flower), and the best state is to reach the side wall of the teacup without water marks.
Tea people in Song Dynasty not only pursued the foam beauty of tea soup, but also paid more attention to the true taste of tea soup. They ordered tea without salt and simply tasted the aroma and taste of tea. At the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, Zhaoming Nanpu, a Japanese monk, went to China to learn from the scriptures, and spread China's tea-ordering method to Japan for the first time, becoming the earliest disseminator of China Tea Ceremony in Japan. Mori Riky, the founder of Japanese tea ceremony, transformed it into Japanese tea ceremony. At present, the matcha road in El tea ceremony adopts the way of ordering tea.
Comparing tea blending technology and tea quality was popular in Song Dynasty, also called fighting tea. Use some tea when fighting tea. Fighting tea is actually a tea ceremony competition. Usually three or five confidants get together, boil water and order tea, and judge each other to see who orders tea better. There are two factors that determine the outcome: one is the color of the soup, the other is the flower of the soup, and the last is the comprehensive evaluation of taste, fragrance and color.
The soup is milky white, and the noodle soup is covered with "soup flowers", which can condense the inner wall of the cup for a long time, thus making a good cup of tea. Tea ordering pursues the true fragrance and taste of tea, and attaches great importance to the beautiful coordination of tea ordering. The teacup used for fighting tea is black, which makes it easier to set off the white of tea soup, and it is also easier to see whether there are water marks on the teacup. Therefore, the black glazed tea lamps produced in Jian 'an, Fujian were the most popular at that time.
The tea industry in Song Dynasty developed greatly, which promoted the development of tea culture. Among the literati, professional tea tasting societies have emerged, including the "Tang Society" composed of officials and the "Thousand People Society" composed of Buddhists. In addition to tea poems, tea paintings and tea books, there are also a number of works with tea as the theme, such as Cai Xiang's Tea Story, Fan Xiong's Tea Story in Xuanhe Beiyuan, and Shen An's Tea Set Picture Praise.
Tea Ceremony in Song Dynasty: Drinking tea with porcelain bowls became a common practice.
In the Tang Dynasty, all teas were boiled: first, tea bricks were crushed with a tea mill and ground into powder tea powder, then the tea powder was filtered with a tea roller, then the tea powder was put into boiling water, boiled three times like jiaozi, and finally the pot of tea soup was drunk.
People in the Song Dynasty drank tea better than those in the Tang Dynasty. They divided the tea powder into several bowls with a small spoon, poured it into boiling water, and stirred it while rushing, so that the tea powder was fully mixed with boiling water. This is called "ordering tea". There will also be milk bubbles on the tea soup, like cappuccino.