Tej is a honey wine, similar to mead, that is brewed and consumed in Ethiopia and Eritrea. Often called the national drink of Ethiopia, it is made from just three core ingredients: honey, water, and a medicinal shrub called gesho. Sweet, aromatic, and deceptively strong, tej is one of the oldest alcoholic beverages ever produced and remains central to Ethiopian social and ceremonial life.
History and Cultural Significance
Tej has been consumed for generations across Ethiopia and Eritrea, with roots stretching back centuries. Excavations at Beta Samati, an ancient Aksumite site, have uncovered evidence of wine consumption that suggests tej (or something close to it) existed long before written records began documenting it. By the 16th century, tej had become a drink of honor. Emperor Sarsa Dengel reportedly allowed the war hero Aqba Mikael to drink tej in his presence as a mark of distinction.
For much of its history, tej was a drink of the ruling class. Honey, the key ingredient, was collected as a form of tax and land rent from working communities, which kept production concentrated among the elite. That exclusivity has long since faded. Today, tej is brewed in homes across the country and served at social gatherings, weddings, festivals, and religious celebrations like Enkutatash, the Ethiopian New Year. Similar honey-based fermented drinks exist elsewhere on the continent, including Tanzanian wanzuki and Kenyan muratina, but tej remains the most widely recognized.
The Three Key Ingredients
Tej’s ingredient list is short: raw honey, water, and gesho. The honey does the heavy lifting, providing both the sugar that fuels fermentation and the flavor that defines the finished drink. Quality matters here. Raw, unprocessed wildflower honey produces the most complex results, while pasteurized or adulterated supermarket honey falls flat.
The traditional ratio is roughly one part honey to three parts water. That mixture forms the base, but it’s the gesho that makes tej distinctly Ethiopian rather than a generic mead.
What Gesho Does
Gesho (Rhamnus prinoides) is a shrub native to East Africa that serves as tej’s bittering agent, playing a role comparable to hops in beer. It contains a compound called geshoidin, which gives the drink its characteristic mild bitterness and balances the sweetness of the honey. Beyond flavor, gesho has antimicrobial properties that suppress unwanted bacteria during fermentation while leaving yeast unharmed. This dual function, flavoring and preserving, makes it essential to the process. Brewers use it in two forms: gesho sticks (dried stems) and gesho leaves, sometimes ground into a powder for additional bitterness and complexity.
How Tej Is Brewed
The brewing process is simpler than most people expect, relying on wild yeasts rather than commercial cultures. It unfolds in two stages over roughly two to three weeks.
First, honey and water are combined in a 1:3 ratio and left to undergo a primary fermentation for two to three days. After that initial phase, the mixture is strained through cheesecloth. Then boiled gesho leaves and stems are added to the filtered honey water. Some communities use fresh gesho leaves instead of dried ones, and some producers add small amounts of malt powder at this stage. Regardless of the variation, the blend then enters a secondary fermentation lasting anywhere from 8 to 21 days. When it’s ready, the mixture is filtered one final time and served.
Traditional brewing often takes place in a clay vessel called a gan. The length of fermentation determines both the alcohol content and the flavor profile. A shorter ferment produces a sweeter, lighter drink, while a longer one yields something drier and considerably stronger. No yeast is added deliberately. Wild yeasts present in the honey, the gesho, and the environment do the work on their own.
Alcohol Content
Tej is stronger than most people assume from its sweet taste. Alcohol content typically starts around 19% and can climb higher depending on how long the batch ferments. That puts it well above most beers and closer to fortified wines in strength. The sweetness can mask the alcohol, which is worth keeping in mind if you’re trying it for the first time.
Flavor and Food Pairings
Tej has a sweet, syrupy quality with floral notes from the honey and a mild bitterness from the gesho that keeps it from becoming cloying. The texture is smooth, varying in thickness based on fermentation time and ingredient ratios. Overall, it’s warm and inviting, with a flavor profile that appeals to anyone who enjoys sweeter beverages but wants something more complex than dessert wine.
In Ethiopian dining, tej pairs naturally with bold, spicy food. It complements doro wat (a richly spiced chicken stew) and kitfo (seasoned minced raw beef) particularly well, with the sweetness cutting through heat and richness. Drinking it alongside injera, the spongy sourdough flatbread that serves as both plate and utensil in Ethiopian cuisine, lets the sweet notes balance the bread’s tangy, fermented flavor. Tej also works on its own as a standalone drink or with lighter snacks.
The Berele: A Vessel With Purpose
Tej is traditionally served in a berele, a bulbous, vase-shaped glass flask with a wide bowl and a narrow neck. The shape isn’t just decorative. The narrow opening is thought to concentrate the wine’s floral aroma, turning each sip into something more deliberate and sensory. The berele has become an enduring symbol of Ethiopian heritage in its own right. Abel Assefa, director and curator of the Yimtubezina Museum and Cultural Centre, has described it as “more than just a drinking vessel,” calling it part of a traditional Ethiopian way of living. Even as tej is increasingly served in ordinary glasses at restaurants and tej houses (known as tej bets), the berele remains a recognizable cultural emblem.
Where to Find Tej Today
In Ethiopia, tej is served everywhere from home kitchens to dedicated tej bets, casual establishments where locals gather to drink and socialize. Outside the country, Ethiopian restaurants in cities with large diaspora communities regularly stock it. In the United States, cities like Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Seattle, and Minneapolis have Ethiopian grocery stores that carry gesho sticks and leaves for home brewing. A growing number of commercial meaderies have also begun producing their own versions, though purists note that the use of gesho is what separates authentic tej from ordinary honey mead.