“I’m a great lawyer, but I’m also a great chai walli,” said Uppma Virdi, who is certain that her parents did not intend to name her after one of India’s most popular tea-time snacks – uppma, she said, is a word from the Sikh holy book, that actually means “praise of the supreme being”.
Names are important to Virdi, 26, who was recently declared “businesswoman of the year” at the India Australia Business & Community Awards for her tea venture, Chai Walli. Virdi chose the brand’s name as a tribute to the scores of Indian women who can make the perfect cup of tea in their sleep.
“You hear the term ‘’chai walla’ [used for a male tea-seller] very commonly,” said Virdi. “I wanted to acknowledge the female tea makers who are constantly brewing tea at home or even in shops. Deep down, every India woman is a chai walli.”
Offering three blends of tea with different combinations of spices, Virdi’s Chai Walli brand has made a space for itself in a land of coffee drinkers by conducting tea workshops, called Art of Chai. At these sessions, Virdi teaches Australians how to correctly brew a cup of tea, while delivering a message Indians have long wanted the West to understand – that the term “chai tea” means nothing.
“You’re just saying tea twice! That must stop,” she said.
Virdi appreciates a good cup of coffee since she is also a certified barista.
“Coffee is like my on and off boyfriend, but I think tea is my husband,” she said with a laugh.
Chai Walli’s signature tea is an 11-spice mix, which includes cinnamon, star anise and turmeric among other spices, blended with a deep bodied organic black tea from Assam. But Virdi does not pick favourites: “Everyday is a different tea day for me. As my life changes, so do my tea preferences.”
Along with the signature 11-spice tea, Virdi also offers an organic black tea (with and without caffeine) and chocolates flavoured with tea.
Tea, according to Virdi, is more than a hot beverage, it is the very fabric of relationships in most parts of India.
“Tea garners a sense of union and community among people,” said Virdi. “No matter what the time or occasion is, there is tea being made and served. We gossip over tea, we offer it as way of comfort, tea becomes our companion in happiness and sadness.”
Virdi’s tryst with tea began at an early age under the tutelage of her grandfather Pritam Singh Virdi, a homeopathic doctor dealing in Ayurvedic treatments.
“When I was young and unwell, or had a stomach ache, Dadaji would brew his medicinal tea with different herbs and spices and I would drink it without appreciating it,” said Virdi. “It was medicine to me then.”
She does not remember when tea became her drink of choice, but has memories of being allowed to dunk her Parle-G biscuit into her mother’s steaming cup of tea, and brooding over the soggy half of the biscuit drowning in the tea.
“I learnt the different mixes and blends from my grandfather, and perfected it over the years,” said Virdi. “I was learning more as a way of preserving something that I had developed such a deep connection to. Chai Walli started when I had this deep sense of not honouring something inside of me. I wanted to do something cheeky and spicy and Chai Walli was born out of that desire.”
A video on how to make the masala chai on Virdi’s channel is almost like watching visual poetry in motion. The grinding of various spices with tea and the water coming alive with a rich dark colour, lightened to a perfect warm brown with milk is enough to make anyone crave a cup.
As a first generation immigrant, Virdi related tea to her Indian heritage, but never thought of it as a career. “After graduating I was given a choice between becoming a lawyer or a doctor. I grew up in a family where we never talked about boys, relationships, going out, so career choices were pretty straightforward too. My parents were strongly opposed to me becoming a chai walli. It was really difficult to convince them. Almost comical! Like telling them about a secret boyfriend or hiding one. Who will want to marry a chai walli, they would ask.”
Even now that Chai Walli has taken off, Virdi continues to practice. “In an ideal world, I would love to work on Chai Walli full time, but I still have a few people to keep out of jail,” she joked.
Virdi’s grandfather is now 96 and suffers from short-term memory loss. “I send him letters and pictures regularly,” she said. “When I had told him about it, he was so proud that someone in his family was carrying on his legacy.”
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