China News Service, August 16. According to Hong Kong's "Ta Kung Pao" report, the 2022 Hong Kong Food Expo was held a few days ago.

Among them, "Golden Tea King" held a Hong Kong-style milk tea workshop to relive the nostalgic taste of Hong Kong-style milk tea with the audience.

Starting from the ratio of different tea leaves, the Moonlight Treasure Box has been opened.

Baked tea, smashed tea, until the white tea bag is dyed to brown, also witnesses the superb skills of the milk tea master.

Hong Kong has developed from a small fishing village to an international city. Architecture will change, people will change, but feelings remain the same.

Holding a cup of Hong Kong-style milk tea in your hand, the vicissitudes of life are in your hands.

Hong Kong-style milk tea is named silk stocking milk tea because the tea bag looks like silk stockings, and Lanfang Garden is famous for its silk stocking milk tea.

Image source: Hong Kong Wenhui Network

　　According to the report, fragrant, thick, smooth and sweet are the first impressions Hong Kong-style milk tea leaves on diners.

A cup of Hong Kong-style milk tea and a piece of toast, a simple afternoon tea set has accompanied generations of Hong Kong people and has become a major feature of Hong Kong's food culture.

　　Ceylon black tea produced in Sri Lanka is used as the base, more than three kinds of tea leaves are added, and evaporated milk is added to make a classic Hong Kong-style milk tea.

However, the seemingly simple steps of making Hong Kong-style milk tea are a test of how to make tea.

From the process of blending tea, boiling tea, baking tea, and bumping tea, the aroma and taste of tea with different tastes are fully preserved.

The final step of bumping into the milk is to give the milk tea a sweet taste.

Hong Kong-style milk tea has a long history

　　Huang Jiahe, chairman of the Hong Kong Coffee and Black Tea Association, said that as early as the 1930s, his father Huang Qiao had set up a trading company in Hong Kong to import tea and coffee.

With these ingredients, Hong Kong-style milk tea became popular in the 1930s.

At 3:15 pm every day, many people will have a cup of afternoon tea in the tea restaurant to relax, and the afternoon tea atmosphere is gradually becoming popular in Hong Kong.

　　According to reports, with the surge of Hong Kong's population in the 1950s, in order to meet the needs of the people's diet and employment, big-name stalls came into being, which also gave milk tea a considerable market size.

Since the consumer groups of Hong Kong-style milk tea at that time were mostly engaged in manual labor such as handling, construction, and seamen, Hong Kong-style milk tea was cooked with a variety of cheap tea leaves.

However, strong tea can refresh the mind and evaporated milk can add calories, which makes Hong Kong-style milk tea still a popular drink among diners.

　　Looking back at the development of Hong Kong-style milk tea, it is not difficult to find that the formation of Hong Kong-style milk tea contains the imprint of the times and the unique wisdom of Hong Kong people.

The Hong Kong-style milk tea has contributed to the development of milk tea culture by transforming the British black tea, which was only available in the upper class, into a delicacy that the general public can enjoy.

As a traditional handicraft, the making technique of Hong Kong-style milk tea was included in Hong Kong's intangible cultural heritage in 2014, and continues to witness the fusion of Chinese and Western food cultures in its own way.

　　In Huang Jiahe's view, Hong Kong-style milk tea still has an important place in the hearts of the public.

Every day, sales of Hong Kong-style milk tea can reach 2.5 million cups.

In addition to Hong Kong, Hong Kong-style milk tea is also booming in the mainland market.

"My company basically has cooperative relations with most parts of the country. Among them, there are nearly 3,000 stores in the Greater Bay Area that can drink Hong Kong-style milk tea, of which 2,000 are tea restaurants and 1,000 are fast food restaurants. There are also many tea restaurants in Central China, North China, West China and other places.”

The participants of the Golden Tea King Competition are getting younger

　　According to the report, in order to promote tea culture, the "Golden Tea King Competition" jointly organized by the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (TDC) and the Hong Kong Coffee Black Tea Association has been successfully held for 12 times since the first Golden Tea King Competition was held in 2009. .

In 2010, the Golden Tea King Competition added the "Golden Duck Competition", international competitions and youth categories; in 2019, the first "Greater Bay Area Golden Tea King Competition" was also held.

　　In the Golden Tea King Competition, you can see milk tea masters from all over the country, and even foreign masters, which makes the influence of authentic Hong Kong-style milk tea continue to expand.

Among them, many masters who won the Golden Tea King Competition have been in the industry for decades.

In Huang Jiahe's opinion, like other crafts, the milk tea master's profession is easy to learn but difficult to master.

For the control of the temperature of the baked tea, the color and taste of different teas, you need to sink your heart and slowly experience it.

　　"However, in recent years, the milk tea masters have gradually become younger." According to Huang Jiahe's recollection, the participants of the earliest Golden Tea King Competitions were generally over 50 years old, and now there are some masters in their twenties.

"Drinking Hong Kong-style milk tea can feel the character of the tea maker. There is a little girl who participated in the Golden Tea King Competition in Shanghai in her twenties, and she can still win the competition."

　　With the expansion of the influence of Hong Kong-style milk tea, Beijing, Shanghai, Inner Mongolia, and even overseas tea masters have come to the Golden Tea King Competition to compete.

Huang Jiahe recalled, "I have tasted the milk tea made by Inner Mongolian masters with mare's milk, and it has a unique flavor."

Hong Kong-style milk tea VS Taiwan milk tea flavor is very different

　　According to reports, Hong Kong and Taiwan have had decades of milk tea culture.

Although the transportation between Hong Kong and Taiwan is convenient, it only takes two hours to reach by plane, but the history of milk tea and the taste of milk tea in the two places are different.

　　Hong Kong-style milk tea is also known as "silk socks milk tea", and the name contains the wisdom of Hong Kong people's life.

Huang Jiahe explained that at that time, there were some people working in British restaurants in Hong Kong and saw that the chefs would make tea with filters.

However, it is difficult to fully release the tea flavor, and the taste will be very weak.

Furthermore, this is actually not in line with economic principles.

Therefore, in order to allow the tea to be brewed repeatedly, it evolved into making Hong Kong-style milk tea with tea bags.

The dyed cloth bags are very similar to the stockings worn by women, also known as "silk stockings milk tea".

　　The development of milk tea in Taiwan is later than that in Hong Kong.

The prototype of Taiwanese pearl milk tea's "pearl milk tea" should be "Simi Yuanzi" from Southeast Asia, but due to the high price of introduction, Taiwanese folks switched to sweet potato flour in the later stage, and added tapioca flour to it to make it not sticky Together, suitable for adding to cold drinks.

　　But bubble tea became popular in Taiwan in the 1980s.

With the invention and popularity of bubble black tea, in stores similar to cafes, merchants use tapioca flour to make pearls in the shape of pearls. After adding sugar and boiling, they turn into pearl powder rounds with a Q-like taste, providing richness for diners when drinking tea. For an extra choice of taste, this leads to the much-loved bubble tea.