Ma Do Tea

Cù Mông Peak. Photo: Trần Thanh Hưng

According to the Đại Nam nhất thống chí (Comprehensive Gazetteer of Đại Nam), the Cù Mông mountain range has Mã Vụ mountain, where tea is grown, formerly known as "Mã Vụ green tea". The Chinese text of this book writes "vụ" as meaning fog. The elders in Phú Yên call it Mã Võ, because from afar the mountain resembles a dancing horse. Vũ is also pronounced vụ. So, is it Mã Võ (Mã Vũ) or Mã Vụ?

According to legend, when Nguyen Anh was being pursued by the Tay Son army through this area, he saw a plant resembling a tea tree. He ordered his troops to stop their horses (ma do, in the local dialect, means to stop horses). Then he picked the leaves of the plant, brewed them into a drink, and the entire army felt much better before continuing their journey. Upon ascending the throne, the king remembered this story and ordered the governor of Song Cau to encourage the people to drink this tea, as it was good for their health. That tea forest became known as Gia Long King's Tea Hill, and the tea was called "chè đảnh" (peak tea) by the locals.

Explanation based on shape: it's called "owl's beak tea" because when dried, the tea leaves curl up like an owl's beak. People in the Nẫu region find it difficult to pronounce "owl's beak," so they pronounce it as "owl's beak" (similar to wife = dợ, or vu = dũ...).

In terms of preservation, it's called "basket-bundled tea." After harvesting, the tea leaves are bundled together like a basket, hung in the kitchen attic, and consumed gradually.

Ma Do Tea Experimental Garden. Photo: Research team

Recognizing the value of this tea variety, in 2020, Phu Yen province approved the project "Research, application and development of Ma Do tea plants in Song Cau", assigning it to the La Hieng Center for Agricultural and Biological Sciences for implementation.

According to surveys, the Ma Do tea plant belongs to the Camellia family and grows abundantly in the Cu Mong pass, at an altitude of 500-700 meters above sea level.

After three years of implementation, the team has successfully propagated and planted hundreds of trees in the garden, and has begun harvesting and perfecting the production and processing process.

(Entry for the "Impressions on Vietnamese Coffee and Tea" contest, part of the "Celebrating Vietnamese Coffee and Tea" program, 2nd edition, 2024, organized by Nguoi Lao Dong Newspaper).

Source: https://nld.com.vn/che-ma-do-196240329105923769.htm