British people who once loved coffee in coffee culture switched to tea.

British people love tea, but people living around Britain are keen on another drink, coffee. Northern Europe, north of Britain, is the most coffee-crazed region in the world. The five Nordic countries occupy the first, second, third, fourth and sixth positions in the coffee consumption ranking table per capita, while Belgium, which ranks eighth, faces Britain across the sea. Why do British people love that cup of tea surrounded by coffee-popular areas?

I loved coffee.

Tea is now more common than coffee in Britain. But coffee has also historically dominated the British beverage market. It is said that as early as 1760 England had the first coffee shop. At the end of the 17th century, London alone had more than 2000 cafes. The British drink coffee and talk loudly. As a result, cafes gradually developed into important social and information exchange places in British society. At that time, British cafes also had a nickname, called "Penny University," which meant that as long as you paid a penny, you could enter the cafe and exchange ideas with people, obtain various information or read newspapers. It was like a university-like learning place.

Unfortunately, English people love coffee, but coffee can't love Britain. Coffee trees used to produce coffee are small trees that are fastidious about their environment. They prefer cool, rain-rich areas, but they are immediately at risk in frosty weather. Therefore, coffee trees are basically concentrated in the mountains between 25° north and south latitude, while the southernmost part of the UK can only reach 50° north latitude, so it is basically impossible to grow coffee trees in the UK, and the demand for coffee can only be met through imports.

In the second half of the seventeenth century, when coffee became popular, and throughout the eighteenth century, the world coffee trade was dominated by the Dutch, who were skilled in navigation and trade. The Dutch produced coffee mainly from their three colonies: Indonesia, Suriname and Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka, then known as Ceylon, was an island lying between 5° and 10° north latitude, well within the coffee growing belt. Located in the mountains of the central part of the island, regardless of climatic conditions or soil conditions, it is very suitable for the growth of coffee trees. Sri Lanka was chosen by the Dutch as the initial coffee tree trial planting area due to its particularly favorable natural conditions, and it was from here that the Dutch coffee planting industry started. The British drank coffee bought from the Dutch for more than 100 years.

After the 19th century, the balance of power among European countries changed significantly, and the distribution of colonies changed accordingly. The waning Netherlands lost control of Sri Lanka and was taken over by Britain, already the world's largest power. The British, who love coffee and love to make money from coffee, treasure this excellent coffee producing area and begin to spare no effort to promote the expansion of coffee farming in Sri Lanka. In contrast to the Dutch, the English turned to plateaus and mountains after discovering that low-lying plains and slopes had been largely used. As a result, a large number of virgin forests at high altitudes were quickly cleared and developed into coffee plantations. Under the impetus of the British, coffee cultivation in Sri Lanka doubled from the 1830s to the 1860s. By the 1880s, the area under cultivation doubled again, to nearly 1600 square kilometers--and in Sri Lanka at the time, coffee trees grew on nearly 15 percent of farmland. With the continuous expansion of planting area, coffee exports from Sri Lanka have also begun to rise explosively. Coffee exports from Sri Lanka increased 20-fold in the 30 years between 1840 and 1870.

A steady stream of Sri Lanka coffee not only meets the needs of the British market, but also makes Britain the master of the world coffee trade. But, like many lessons from the history of farming, coffee plantations in Sri Lanka are man-made, single-species ecosystems, and beneath the system's prosperous exterior are environmental changes and extreme vulnerability to disease.

In 1875, just as Sri Lanka's coffee industry was booming, the destructive coffee rust disease began to spread throughout the island nation. The leaves of the diseased coffee tree first showed small yellow spots, then the spots became larger and larger, and the color gradually changed from yellow to red. Finally, the red spots merged into large spots. These spots are rust-like brown, hence the name rust. The diseased leaves with rust spots will gradually wither and fall off, and the whole coffee tree will lose its ability to produce coffee and die slowly within a few years.

In the face of failed efforts, farming in Sri Lanka was abandoned. To make up for their losses, they bought tea trees instead of coffee. Tea trees, which are well adapted to Sri Lanka's climate and soil and are resistant to rust, have since taken root in Sri Lanka and have made Sri Lanka a world-famous tea exporter. Nowadays, when we talk about Britain's long-standing tea culture, we will naturally refer to the world-famous Ceylon tea.

Change it to "that cup of tea"

Change your favorite "cup of coffee" to "cup of tea", what did the British encounter? History has no authority. But there is indeed a sudden change in the habits of the British. In the last year of the seventeenth century, Britain officially imported only six tons of tea. In less than 100 years, Britain officially imported more than 10,000 tons of tea. By the end of the eighteenth century, there were about 20,000 tons of tea entering Britain through various channels. It is recorded that besides the popularity of tea in English upper class, beggars also drank tea, coachmen also drank tea, and laborers also drank tea.

When it comes to British tea culture, one may immediately think of a very elegant afternoon tea. In fact, what really makes most Britons crazy is "construction workers tea".

The so-called construction workers tea, is in a large teacup into a black tea bag, pour boiling water, such as brown bubble thick, take out the tea bag, add milk and sugar can be stirred.

According to reports, this relatively rough tea drinking method was originally popular among manual workers in the Industrial Revolution era, especially construction workers, so it was named "Construction Workers Tea".

It is recorded that during World War I in Britain, workers in the rear munitions factories had special tea breaks every day because the arsenal management found that workers who drank large cups of strong milk tea were significantly more energetic and efficient than those who did not drink tea. In Britain today, whether blue-collar or white-collar, it is common to make a cup of "construction worker tea" at rest, and many people have to drink several large cups a day to enjoy themselves.

An English folk song goes like this: "When the clock strikes four, everything in the world stops for tea." In England, four or five o'clock in the afternoon is the famous "Teatime"(tea time). At this time, even if there is a big thing to wait for the British to finish afternoon tea, this is the rule.

Even in modern British businesses, afternoon tea breaks often become a standard institution. However, perhaps many people do not know that afternoon tea, a seemingly bourgeois lifestyle, actually originated in the countryside.

Many British people call afternoon tea "HIGHTEA", which comes from the English countryside. High originally meant "high table". In the English countryside, farmers used to sit at the kitchen table after a day's work. In the afternoon, they used to make some hot tea, eat some bread, and then continue to work after a short rest. Fearing that cats and dogs would jump on the table and spoil the food, farmers raised the table high, giving rise to the expression HIGHTEA. Unlike traditional English afternoon tea in the countryside, afternoon tea is now served in high-end English restaurants where guests must dress well.

Start your day with tea, end it with tea, and the British happily repeat the tea-to-tea-to-tea-to routine. Early in the morning, just rely on the bed to enjoy a cup of "bed tea"; breakfast time to have a cup of "breakfast tea", also known as "eye opening tea"; morning busy again, also have to pause for 20 minutes to sip "work break tea"; before work, it is the legal time for tea and dessert "afternoon tea"; before going to bed, there is no "farewell tea".

How much tea does an Englishman drink a day? According to statistics, the British drink 4 cups of black tea per person per day, an average of one year down, a person needs about 3.5 kilograms of tea.