Drinking Lei Cha is Jiangle’s traditional way of socializing. Every wedding, birthday, housewarming, gatherings of relatives and friends, and neighbors visiting each other, they often treat each other with tea. If the child of a family gets a good result in the college entrance examination, the parents will invite the teacher to drink lei cha at home. The big bowl is respected, and the small bowl is added to show the deep affection cultivated by the mentor. On the Lei Cha banquet, there are usually loose, sweet, fragrant, and crisp foods that accompany tea, such as candies, biscuits, melon seeds, and peanuts.
People in coastal areas are warm and welcome guests with Lei Cha. There are two types of lei cha for hospitality: meat and vegetables. For vegetarian guests, add peanuts, cowpea or soybeans, glutinous rice, kelp, sweet potato vermicelli, dried japonica rice noodles, cold dishes, etc.; for those who eat meat, add fried shredded pork or small intestines, sweet bamboo shoots, shredded mushrooms, Fried tofu, vermicelli, chives and other ingredients.
Foods with tea in different regions
Drinking Taojiang Leicha also has the habit of setting “dishes”. On the antique table of the Eight Immortals, there are usually eight “plates” placed, including withered shelled peanuts, burnt fried sweet potato chips, rolling pumpkin seeds, crispy fruit slices and purple foreign nests. …are some homemade, appetizing and delicious green food.
Why put eight plates? The locals have two meanings: one is that eight people sit at a table, which means that everyone has a share; the other is that the horoscope is an auspicious number.
When drinking Wuling Leicha, it is called “Takcha” with deep-fried noodles with local characteristics and specially made jar dishes. There are at least a dozen kinds of tea, and as many as forty-eight kinds of tea. It is very interesting to eat and drink.
The preparation of Jiexi Lei Cha is not complicated. The main ingredient is rice or popcorn, but the ingredients are complicated. First, put peanuts, sesame seeds, tea leaves, gold buds, or bitter and spicy cores in the bowl, grind them into a paste with a tea stick, wash with boiling water, and then fry some dried radishes, cabbage, green onions, green onions, soybeans, etc. in a casserole. Tree vegetables and more. Or add some shredded lean meat, shrimp rice, squid, etc., and finally mix with cooked white rice (or popcorn). This kind of Lei Cha tastes sweet, sour, spicy, bitter, and salty. It whets the appetite and is full of flavor. Especially on the seventh day of the first lunar month, every household eats Lei Cha. Because seven kinds of vegetables are used on the seventh day, it is called “seven kinds of vegetable tea”, and fifteen kinds of vegetables are also used, which is called “fifteen kinds of vegetable tea”.
After the Lei Cha is made, relatives and friends gather around the table to drink the steaming Lei Cha. At this time, some refreshments of melons and fruits, together with chatting all over the world, are an extension of the happiness after the hands-on labor of Lei Cha.
ฉall tea
In Jiangle, calling people to drink Lei Cha is called “Hou Lei Cha”. In the local area, this is a bit of a rule: four o’clock and eight festivals are called festival tea, weekdays are called mutual reward tea, those who have happy events call happiness tea, and those who ask for help call thank you tea. The hottest time for shouting Lei Cha is mid-August. At this time, those who have been admitted to college technical secondary schools, those who have recruited, and those who have graduated all call for Lei Cha, and they focus on inviting teachers. …
Main Schools of Lei Cha
Lei Cha production methods vary from place to place, especially in the selection of ingredients. According to regions and ethnic groups, it can be divided into two categories: Hakka Lei Cha and Hunan (non-Hakka) Lei Cha.
For example, the folk Lei Cha in northwestern Fujian is made by putting tea leaves and an appropriate amount of sesame seeds in a pottery pot, grinding them into fine powder with tea sticks and adding boiling water; Qingyuan, Yingde, Shanwei City, Jiexi, The Hakka Leicha drunk by the Hakka people living in Puning and other places is to put the tea leaves into a tooth bowl (a Leicha pottery pot with lines on the inner wall) and grind it into powder, then add cooked peanuts and sesame seeds in turn, grind and grind it, and then add Add a little salt and coriander, and brew it with boiling water; there is a special custom of drinking sesame Leicha in Taohuayuan, Hunan. It is to grind tea leaves, ginger, and raw rice in a mortar made of hawthorn wood, and then wash it with boiling water for drinking. If you can put some sesame seeds and fine salt in, the taste will be more fragrant and delicious.
When drinking Leicha from the Qin Dynasty, you should first drink it while it is hot, and secondly, swallow it slowly. Only in this way can you feel the feeling of “nine bends and ileum, refreshing and happy”. Finally, brew with boiled water, and then put some sugar. Lei Cha is as sticky as a paste after it is made, the color is light coffee, the aroma is tangy, and the mouth is smooth, soft and sweet. The preparation method is roughly the same as Taoyuan, but the eating method is different.
Taojiang Lei Cha is usually sweetened with sugar, making it a “sweet drink”. Taoyuan Leicha uses salt, which is mostly “salty food”. Women in Taojiang have a special custom of drinking Lei Cha after they become pregnant. It is said that the more Lei Cha they drink, the whiter and fatter their babies will be.
Whenever ordinary guests arrive, they can serve them with a spoonful of fried rice and a handful of fried beans, stirred into tea. What is amazing is that Lei Cha does not exclude any “food ingredients”, and almost all foods can be added. It is extremely convenient for farmers to obtain materials. Beans, rice, peanuts, vermicelli and dried fruits should be boiled first, and then poured in with water; mushrooms, bamboo shoots, spices and meat should be fried separately; sesame rice crackers can be sprinkled directly into the tea.
Stir well with a spoon and it’s ready. It can not only quench your thirst, but also satisfy your hunger. It is economical to entertain guests. The Hakka people are hospitable and hospitable. When eating lei cha, there is always a share in the meeting. The more you eat, the more people you eat. The guests eat one bowl after another.
Serving Lei Cha requires chewing, so strictly speaking, it is not accurate to use the word “drink”, “drink” or “eat”. Hakka people use the word “food” to express it. When eating Lei Cha, there is often a share for those who eat it, and the more you eat, the more people you eat. If there are guests, especially female guests, the host and guest should sit around the dinner table, and the neighbor housewife will also come without invitation and bring various refreshments, such as fried peanuts. Crispy salted beans, orange cakes, fried cakes, etc. are all served in small plates, and the entire tabletop is full of beautiful things in eyes and colors.
While presenting tea one by one, the host frequently raises the sign, “Eat, eat”, the gestures are enthusiastic, the voice is sweet, affectionate, and full of meaning. A tea ceremony opens people’s hearts and communicates their emotions. up. Everything seems so smooth and natural, without any trace of artificiality. Such an atmosphere of “lower Riba people” is difficult to appreciate in the metropolis of “spring and snow”.
