Green Tea

Camellia sinensis · chai sabz · shin chai · qehwa

Poured after every meal and for every visitor.

What it is

Green tea is the leaf of the tea bush, heated soon after picking so that it does not oxidise and turn black. Brewed briefly it is pale and grassy. Boiled hard, the tannins come forward and the colour deepens. Afghan kitchens use it both ways.

Where it comes from

The tea plant came from China and reached Afghanistan along the trade routes, and green tea has been the everyday cup there ever since. It is served to guests on arrival and after every meal, with black tea drunk alongside it.

What it's called

Chai sabz (Dari, green tea) · shin chai (Pashto, the same) · qehwa, the name in Peshawar and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa for green tea brewed with cardamom. Qymaq, the clotted cream floated on the pink tea, gives that tea its name.

In the kitchen

For qehwa it is brewed with cracked cardamom, a little saffron and sugar, and drunk from small cups. For chai-e-zanjafeel it is boiled with ginger and ground walnut until cloudy. For qymaq chai it is boiled very dark, poured from a height between two pans until it turns deep red, then whitened with milk to a pale purple-pink and topped with clotted cream. Use loose gunpowder or plain Chinese green tea; Japanese teas are too delicate to boil.

What we know about the claims

Green tea carries catechins and caffeine, and a large body of observational research links regular drinking with modest heart and metabolic benefits. Little of it is settled cause and effect, and none of it depends on sugar and clotted cream, which is how qymaq chai is drunk.

Choosing and buying

Loose green tea from any Afghan, Iranian, Chinese or South Asian grocer; gunpowder tea is cheap and stands up to boiling. Supermarket green tea bags will do for qehwa at a pinch, never for qymaq chai, which needs leaves boiled hard. Keep it airtight, because it fades within months.