Touareg tea

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Touareg tea (also called Tuareg

Tuareg

The Tuareg are a Berber nomadic pastoralist people. They are the principal inhabitants of the Saharan interior of North Africa...

 tea or Mint tea) is a flavoured tea

Tea

Tea is the agricultural product of the leaves, leaf buds, and internodes of the Camellia sinensis plant, prepared and cured by various methods...

 prepared in northern Africa

Africa

Africa is the world's second-largest and second most-populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area. With a billion people in 61 territories, it accounts for about 14.8% of the...

 and in Arabian

Arab

Arab people or Arabs are an ethnic group whose members identify along linguistic, cultural or genealogical grounds...

 countries. Mint

Mentha

Mentha is a genus of about 25 species of flowering plants in the family Lamiaceae . Species within Mentha have a subcosmopolitan distribution across Europe, Africa, Asia, Australia, and North America. Several mint hybrids commonly occur.Mints are aromatic, almost exclusively perennial, rarely...

 tea (in Arabic, شاي بالنعناع, shāy bil n'anā', or more commonly, in dialect, الأتاي, at tay) is central to social life in Maghreb

Maghreb

The Maghreb , also rendered Maghrib , meaning "place of sunset" or "western" in Arabic, is a region in North Africa. The term is generally applied to all of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, but in older Arabic usage pertained only to the area of the three countries between the high ranges of the...

 countries. The serving of mint tea can take a ceremonial form, especially when prepared for a guest. Whereas cooking is women's business, the tea is a male affair: the head of family prepares it and serves to the guest, usually, at least three glasses of tea.

Preparation is a rather complex and long procedure, and takes green tea

Green tea

Green tea is a type of tea made solely with the leaves of Camellia sinensis that has undergone minimal oxidation during processing. Green tea originates from China and has become associated with many cultures in Asia from Japan to the Middle East. Recently, it has become more widespread in the...

 (usually strong Chinese tea, e.g. gunpowder

Gunpowder tea

Gunpowder tea is a form of green Chinese tea produced in Zhejiang Province of China in which each leaf has been rolled into a small round pellet. It is believed to take its English name from the fact that the tea resembles gunpowder pellets used for cannon...

, chun mee, or zhu cha), fresh mint leaves in large quantity and a lot of sugar (approximately five teaspoons of sugar for one teaspoon of tea). The tea is first put in the teapot and "cleaned" by adding a small quantity of boiling water, that is poured out after one minute (this operation lessens the bitterness of the tea). Mint and sugar are added, and water at the boiling point

Boiling point

The boiling point of an element or a substance is the temperature at which the vapor pressure of the liquid equals the environmental pressure surrounding the liquid....

is then poured in the pot. After three to five minutes, a glass is served and poured back in the pot two to three times, in order to mix the tea. Tea is then tasted (sugar if needed may be added) until the infusion is fully developed. Tea is poured into glasses from height in order to swirl loose tea leaves to the bottom of the glass.

Several alternative preparation procedures exist, with different brewing times for tea and for mint. Touareg is sometimes sold as a ready-to-cook mixture of tea and dried mint, which is easier to store and to prepare, but with flatter taste.