Congou () is a description of a black

Chinese tea Chinese teas can be classified into six distinctive categories: White tea, white, Green tea, green, Yellow tea, yellow, Oolong tea, oolong, Black tea, black and Post-fermented tea, post-fermented. Others add categories for scented and compressed t ...

variety used by 19th-century tea importers in America and Europe. It was the base of the 19th-century

English Breakfast tea English breakfast tea, or simply breakfast tea, is a traditional blend of black teas, typically sourced from Assam tea, Assam, Ceylon tea, Ceylon, and Tea production in Kenya, Kenya. It is one of the most popular blended teas and holds a prom ...

blend.

Name

The etymology of the tea is the same as

kung fu Chinese martial arts, commonly referred to with umbrella terms Kung fu (term), kung fu (; ), kuoshu () or wushu (sport), wushu (), are Styles of Chinese martial arts, multiple fighting styles that have developed over the centuries in Greater Ch ...

, from the Chinese for "skill" (工夫 gongfu), via the

Hokkien Hokkien ( , ) is a Varieties of Chinese, variety of the Southern Min group of Chinese language, Chinese languages. Native to and originating from the Minnan region in the southeastern part of Fujian in southeastern China, it is also referred ...

pronunciation ''kang-hu''. This is the same word as in the Gongfu tea ceremony (工夫茶, sometimes 功夫茶), and ''congou'' is locally drunk in this style. The popular variety ''Panyang Congou'' (or ''Panyong Congou'') is a corruption of Tanyang (), the name of a small village in

Fu'an (; Foochow Romanized: Hók-ăng-chê; sometimes ''Fu An'') is a county-level city of Ningde prefecture level city, in northeast Fujian province, PRC, some North of the provincial capital Fuzhou. Fuzhou and Fu'an of Ningde prefecture along with Ca ...

Fujian Fujian is a provinces of China, province in East China, southeastern China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its capital is Fuzhou and its largest prefe ...

that popularized the style. Once the most expensive style of black tea in the West, with exports to over twenty countries and a gold medal at the

Panama–Pacific International Exposition The Panama–Pacific International Exposition was a world's fair held in San Francisco, California, United States, from February 20 to December 4, 1915. Its stated purpose was to celebrate the completion of the Panama Canal, but it was widely s ...

in 1915, a state-owned factory established in 1958 continues to produce small amounts.

Identification

The source the importers called "Cangou" was

Amoy Xiamen,), also known as Amoy ( ; from the Zhangzhou Hokkien pronunciation, zh, c=, s=, t=, p=, poj=Ē͘-mûi, historically romanized as Amoy, is a sub-provincial city in southeastern Fujian, People's Republic of China, beside the Taiwan Stra ...

Kanghu tea, or Teochew Kanghu tea, the 'espresso' of Chinese teas (Chaozhou Gongfu cha, 潮州工夫茶 or 潮汕工夫茶), or

Keemun Keemun ( zh, t=祁門紅茶, p=Qímén hóngchá, l= Qimen red tea, c=, cy=Kèihmùhn hùhngchàh) is a famous Chinese black tea. First produced in the late 19th century, it quickly became popular in the West and is still used for a number of c ...

Gongfu or Congou (祁門功夫) made with careful skill ("gongfu") to produce thin, tight strips without breaking the leaves.Kit Boey Chow, Ione Kramer - All Teas in China - Page 179 1990 "for promotion purposes, many non-Chinese companies borrow names from Chinese teas, such as Bohea, Congou, Hyson, Souchong, Chunmee, Sowmee, Pekoe, Keemun, etc. Such labels may contain little or no tea of ..."

References

{{teas Black tea Chinese teas