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Yorkshire Harrogate is a good reading companion tea!
Our collection of Agatha Christie paperbacks isn’t complete but is sizable and, sadly, unread. So, I decided to plow through them all with the help of tea. Not in one sitting, of course.
Some how Agatha Christie skipped the notice of my professors in university where I was an English Literature major. Rather high-fallutin’ of them. In the ensuing years, though, I became quite a fan through the various movies and BBC episodes available on TV. From Monsieur Poirot (portrayed by Peter Ustinov, Albert Finney, Tony Randall, and others up to the quintessential performance by David Suchet) to Miss Marple (portrayed by Margaret Rutherford, Angela Lansbury, Helen Hayes, and more) to the Tuppences, and so on, their sleuthing always held my rapt attention.
Then I met hubby. And hubby had all of these Agatha Christie paperbacks, which he had read most of. Time for me to play catch-up!
But first, as with any good book, a pot of tea was needed as companion. And some McVitie’s digestives or Walker’s shortbread. Reading can build up quite a thirst and appetite. Best to be prepared.
My tea options:
- Barry’s Tea Gold Blend — The company’s flagship brand, this tea has a uniquely refreshing taste and a bright golden color. It leads the pack in the Gold blend sector of the market, comprised of the finest quality teas from the high mountain slopes of Kenya and the Assam Valley of India, skillfully selected.
- Yorkshire Harrogate Tea — Full bodied with a deep, rich flavor, this tea is blended from a luxury black tea. Harrogate, Yorkshire in England is famous for its water – and that’s a key ingredient in a great cuppa! The city is also famous for its tea shops, and the annual Harrogate Crime Writing Festival. A perfect tea to sip while you’re curling up with a good crime novel (especially Agatha Christie), this tea takes milk well and delivers a lightly astringent infusion. For the best brew, steep for 2-5 minutes in water that has been brought to a rolling boil.
- White Monkey Paw Green Tea — White green tea with very delicate but intense full green tea flavor. Originates from the famous Wuyi Mountains in Fujian Province, China. Grown at 2,500 to 5,000 feet above sea level. White Monkey Paw is made from the top two leaves and the bud of new season growth (late March /early April). These delicate leaves are gently and gingerly steamed and dried so the end result is an exquisite hand made green tea. You will see that the leaves still have the “hairy down” on them which indicates that these leaves were plucked very early in the morning and within the first two weeks of the new season of growth. When you infuse these teas you will witness the delicate two leaves and a bud uncurl in your cup almost coming back to life!. The dry leaf appearance of these teas is tending white and said to resemble a monkey paw. Even though this is a green tea, the visual appearance and cup liquor is so delicate that is can also be almost considered a white tea.
- Monks Blend Flavored Black Tea — A very popular tea, full of flavor. The dramatic combination of vanilla and grenadine make a very satisfying drink. You would almost think it had a dash of the real Grenadine. This is a naturally flavored black tea comprised of high-grown Ceylon tea (more than 5,500 feet above sea level).
I’m thinking of starting with the Yorkshire Harrogate tea and going from there. Got the shortbread ready. Time to dive into to the Christie brand of mayhem!
See more of A.C. Cargill’s articles here.
© Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog, 2009-2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this article’s author and/or the blog’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Tub Tea sachets — oversized tea bags filled with dried herbs, flowers, and citrus peels. (Source: screen capture from site)
As much as I marvel at the creativity of mankind, especially when it comes to tea as seen in all the tea gadget reports that have been posted on this blog, there are times when I have to think that things have just gone too far. At least as far as I am concerned. But, hey, you might like that strange steeper or other doo-dad.
The item that sent me crying “Enough!” was a bathtub tray with a special holder for a teacup. It was advertised in an ad from a local department store (sadly, I got rid of the ad). Something about the tray yelled out “Rube Goldberg!” It just seemed unnecessarily complicated. Plus, I had this image come to mind immediately of spilling tea into the bath water. Better to keep things simple with a side table next to the tub.
Speaking of tea in the bath water, how about an herbal bath? A company called Tub Tea uses an oversized version of the classic — ugh! — teabag design to hold aromatic dried herbs, flowers and citrus peels for you to steep in the tub. There are numerous blends, all herbals and not true teas (Camellia Sinensis steepings), that create a delicious and sensual experience in the bath or that can be used in the shower (get the bag wet and then squeeze it over you, including your freshly washed hair). Either way will give you a light, natural perfume all day or evening. Store them in with your towels as sachets to impart their scent.
Amelia Rhino: The World’s Ugliest Teapot (Source: screen capture from site)
You’re probably thinking “What’s so silly about that?” Well, just think. This is pure marketing gimmick. First, calling it “Tub Tea” instead of something like “Herbal Bath Bags” (hm, that sounds even worse, but the best I can come up with at the moment). Second, using that teabag shape would make it unappealing to us loose leaf tea devotees!
Let me be a bit curmudgeonly here — okay, a bit more curmudgeonly! Some teapot designs I have been seeing lately are so over the top that they’re just totally silly. Or weird. Or even downright ugly. A quick search online popped up these:
A teapot from the book “The Eccentric Teapot: Four Hundred Years of Invention” by Garth Clark (Source: Yahoo! Images)
- A rhino-shaped teapot that has been proclaimed the world’s ugliest teapot.
- A bellhop carrying suitcases, featured in The Eccentric Teapot: Four Hundred Years of Invention by Garth Clark along with some that are even odder.
- The fairy hobbit cluster house teapot — well, actually, our house fairies live in one of these. Gotta keep ’em happy or who knows what mischief they’ll get up to.
A couple of pretty silly items I’ve tried in the past:
- The totally-overcomplicated-and-senseless Copco steeping mug (I tried to donate it to charity and they wouldn’t take it)
- An aromatic tea pillow that over the past couple of years, despite having been stored in an airtight package, has totally lost that aroma
Miniature Fairy Hobbit Cluster House Teapot (Source: Yahoo! Images)
I guess there are folks out there thinking that if they make a product that in some way is related to tea, it will sell. In other words, there’s a tea sucker born every minute? Well, let’s just say that some of us are so devoted to tea that anything — and I do mean anything — related to tea will appeal to them.
That brings to mind the questions: Are there really any silly ideas when it comes to tea? From what I’ve seen, very likely not. It all boils down to, just as with all things tea, personal taste!
See more of A.C. Cargill’s articles here.
© Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog, 2009-2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this article’s author and/or the blog’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Part 1 and Part 2 recounted some tea adventures in Amsterdam. Part 3 takes us to Delft, a small town about an hour outside of Amsterdam. Delft is most famous as a centre for ceramic production, specifically as the origin of the iconic Delftware. The town is also known for being the home of painter Johannes Vermeer. Between these associations and its accessibility from Amsterdam, we decided it was well worth a daytrip.
Needless to say, at some point during a day spent largely walking around in the cold, we needed a cup of tea. Not wanting to spend too much time wandering around trying to find the perfect place, we settled on a café we had walked past earlier, the Stads-koffyhuis (Urban Coffeehouse).
Delft teatime (Photo source: article author)
As the name suggests, their forte is coffee. But we found that they have a decent range of teas, although all are bagged with the exception of fresh mint tea. Once I saw the brand, though, I didn’t mind as much. Legends of Tea, based in the Netherlands (from what I can tell), package their tea in little booklets that tell stories about the tea with a fun mix of narrative and fact (in their words, “tales with a foundation of truth, embellished by their narrators”). We went for the tea called “Smuggler’s Secret”, a “spicy and fragrant blend of black tea with cinnamon, ginger and cardamom”, whose tea packet told us the story of colonists smuggling tea to the New World to avoid British taxation. Not exactly news to me, but a fun way to bring the history of tea into a mid-afternoon cuppa. I am often one to vilify marketing, but even I recognise that, sometimes, you just have to have fun with your tea.
Novelty packaging aside, the tea itself was in nylon sachets consisting of whole leaf tea rather than leaves crushed to a pulp. In my book, these are both requirements for being on the tasty end of the teabag spectrum. And it didn’t disappoint. Nothing fancy, just a nice strong black tea with warming wintery spices. And with a dash of milk, it hit the spot. Added bonus: they serve their tea with a mini pastry! Should you be more than a little peckish, the sandwiches and baked goods at the Stads-koffyhuis are also excellent. I can personally attest to the fact that they are the ideal accompaniment to a cup of tea, should you ever happen to be in Delft.
See more of Elise Nuding’s articles here.
© Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog, 2009-2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this article’s author and/or the blog’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Many tea vendors have, in addition to their online store, a company blog about tea (pssst! you’re reading one now). Often, the goal is to increase the knowledge of tea among their customers so they feel more comfortable ordering teas outside of their normal selections. Considering the price of some of the more fine teas, this knowledge is a great convincer. Being able to link to reviews on external sources lends further credibility.
Great photos like this one are essential to a good tea blog. (Photo source: stock image)
Are all these blogs created alike, though? Do they give you reliable information? Or are they slanted in favor of their products? Well, no to the first question, and yes and no to the 2nd and 3rd questions.
1 Keyword Loading
Some blogs are geared more toward making sure their posts are loaded with the right keywords to trick search engines like Yahoo! and others into putting them at the top of the hits lists. One store’s blog touted as among the best at first struck me as good, too. Then, I wrote an article for the site owner and found out that this was one of those blogs more interested in loading up the keywords. He gave me instructions to include certain terms in the first 50 words, and the terms should be repeated at least once in that space. (If you ever wondered why some blog posts start out with words like “iced tea” being repeated several times in the first paragraph or two, now you know.)
2 Hidden Authors
Lack of bylines and heavy editing of anything submitted to the blog is another issue. Sure, store blogs are marketing tools. However, like any tool, they can be used for good or not. The item I wrote for that store blog was heavily edited and then posted without my name appearing. (I didn’t mind the lack of a byline since some of the blog owner’s edits actually changed meaning enough so that the article was no longer accurate.) It turned out that most of the items on that blog were written by people other than the blog owner, yet he made it appear as if he wrote them. Some blogs don’t even go that far in giving you any idea who wrote the stuff on their blog. For all you know, it could have been Cheeta. It is good to give proper credit to the writers and not to heavily edit their text. As a reader, I like knowing who is putting forth the information and if they are knowledgeable enough on the subject matter to have their content be taken seriously.
3 Unsubstantiated Health Claims
Not only do a lot of store blogs have no writer credits, they also have no medical study credits. The blog I wrote that article for was full of others making various health claims about tea, none being credited (that is, linked to actual medical studies). Even though I might not be able to fully understand the studies, I would still like to know that the claims aren’t something the writer just pulled out of the ether of his/her imagination.
4 Tunnel Vision
Contrasting viewpoints are not always presented on those store blogs, sometimes because they go against what products the blog owner is selling on the store site. And nothing negative gets presented unless it shows their own products in a good light. This blog has always followed a policy of encouraging different viewpoints from writers. For example, there were two reviews posted of the same style of steeping mug with very opposite takes. Both reviews were posted even though that product is an item offered for sale by this blog owner. Another example is that some writers promote bagged teas while I mainly promote loose teas; both viewpoints are posted. Some like milk in their tea, while others don’t. Vive la différence!
5 One-Note Tune
Most of these blogs stick to straightforward posts about tea. We go for variety. Our topics range from reviews of their products, to info on teas, to more in-depth looks at some of the companies producing the teas and treats they sell, to tea book reviews, to stories about enjoying tea as part of life, to the latest news tidbits and gadgetry, and more. Anything and everything related to tea!
Bottom Line
While tea vendor blogs have their place in your line-up of tea info resources, their content can vary. And seeing who is writing the info you are reading can be a good thing. Thanks for reading!
© Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog, 2009-2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this article’s author and/or the blog’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Imagine a truckload of tea being delivered… (Photo source: stock image)
It can always be exciting when your order of tea arrives. That box or padded envelope or other style package can seem like that genie’s lamp full of wonderful wishes come true. Just imagine how you’d feel if a whole truck full of tea were to arrive!
A little while ago, one of the writers on The English Tea Store Blog wrote about a visit from the tea fairy, describing his feeling of joy at the arrival of several tea samples. There’s a bit of magic in each one, a bit of possibility — will it be wonderful in aroma and flavor or a truly horrific experience? Either way can be an experience. But a truckload of tea is a revelation.
Of course, there are trucks and then there are trucks. From a tiny pickup truck that could barely haul a few cases of tea to a mid-sized truck that could move a teashop full of teas to a semi-truck that can move a mountain of teas. At our house, the former would be welcome, but the latter two would be a bit of an issue. We’d need to toss most of our furniture and knickknacks and other household items on the curb to make room. Either that or rent a warehouse.
When we last ordered tea (actually, on the day it was to arrive), we heard a “beep! beep! beep!” — that insidious sound that makes me cringe but that was made a requirement on trucks when they went in reverse as a warning to anyone nearby. A truck was backing up in our driveway. Could it be a huge tea delivery? Ack! My mind started thinking of what items to start hauling to the curb to make room for these new arrivals. And no, we weren’t being unrealistic. Shipping errors have been known to happen. An extra zero or two or three have been known to be added to that quantity of “5,” resulting in 50, 500, or even 5,000 arriving instead. Out jumped the truck driver and rang our front doorbell. He handed us a small package.
That’s it? A whole truck sitting in our driveway and this one small package of tea was all we got out of it? Dang! The shipping clerk seems to have been too efficient. No problem, though. Hubby and I will make the most of this one package of tea. It actually contained about 16 or 17 samples of various Indian teas, mostly Darjeelings but a couple of Assams, an oolong, and a silver needle version. We can’t wait to dig in and try them all.
From now on that “beep! beep! beep!” won’t make me cringe but instead evoke a Pavlovian response of high anticipation that more tasty teas are being delivered.
© Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog, 2009-2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this article’s author and/or the blog’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
During the post-World War II years, the USA spent a great deal of money and manpower to help our former enemies rebuild their economies. One of these projects in Japan was the re-establishment of ceramics production.
An Occupied Japan cup and saucer that I found in a local antiques shop several years ago. (Photo source: article author)
While Japan had a centuries-old tradition of ceramics (stoneware, china, porcelain) ranging from functional to decorative before the war, many of the factories were damaged during the fighting and skilled workers were in short supply. At war’s end, former factory workers and artisans found their way home and began to take up their jobs in the ceramics industry.
At first Americans back home were reluctant to buy products from Japan. The main outlet for them was the PX, or post exchange: the store on the base where military personnel and their families shopped. Obviously our GIs felt that helping the Japanese rebuild their economies included being their customers. By about 1948 American ill will against the Japanese people had subsided enough that goods from Japan were once again welcomed in USA markets.
Ceramics produced in Japan between 1945 and 1952 were identified as being made in occupied Japan. Most of the pieces bear markings of this period: Made in Occupied Japan, or just Occupied Japan. Because this period lasted less than seven years, many of the pieces created during the occupation have become rare and quite valuable.
Briefly, ceramics require two firings (baking in a super-hot oven called a kiln): the first, or bisque, firing that produces a solid, semi-porous object; followed by the glaze firing, in which a combination of minerals applied to the object and then heated become vitreous, thus rendering the object impervious to liquids.
The ceramics created in Occupied Japan were generally made of a white clay, or kaolin, which is used to produce porcelain. Most of the objects, however, were produced as china, which is fired at a lower temperature than porcelain.
While the majority of Occupied Japan china comprised figurines or other figural items (mugs, salt and pepper shakers, vases, and the like), a great number of tea wares were also produced. Many of these took the form of miniature tea sets and children’s tea sets. You can also find a few teapots and full-size tea sets. The majority of tea wares produced in Occupied Japan, however, were teacups – and some very beautiful ones at that.
When shopping for Occupied Japan china, look for the identifying marks stamped on the bottom. Although there have been some forgeries, most objects carrying the Occupied Japan stamp tend to be genuine. On the other hand, some Occupied Japan china is, unfortunately, not marked as such, and requires a ceramics expert to correctly identify it. There are also some specific factory names you can look for: Ucagco is one of these. Other pieces are signed by the individual artisan.
Occupied Japan china can be found at antiques and collectibles shops, yard sales, and via online sellers, and vary widely in price. Once you find a piece that you love, it’s up to you to decide whether the asking price is worth it.
© Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog, 2009-2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this article’s author and/or the blog’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
If you happen to be wandering around the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St Paul and find yourself in need of some tea, I can direct you to The Tea Garden/The Steepery Tea Bar. This tea bar, or tea café, has 3 locations within the Twin Cities and 2 more in the greater metro. I patronised the one in Uptown—a vibrant neighbourhood with a lot of young people, alternative scenes, and delicious restaurants—where tea café format of The Tea Garden’s fits in well. It has a casual vibe and can be a place to a friend, get some work done, or just watch the world go by.
Ti Kuan Yin Slimming Oolong
Being a tea café rather than a traditional tea house, it offers a lot of tea lattes and bubble teas in addition to a good selection of loose leaf tea. Being a loose leaf tea person, I am sometimes hesitant about going to places that serve “tea drinks,” for fear that their loose tea will disappoint. Not so with The Tea Garden.
As far as the teas go, their selection of greens and blacks (both pure and flavoured) is the most extensive. They also offer several white teas, but only one oolong and one puerh. While this might be a disappointment for some, if they are going to have only one oolong, they picked a good one: Ti Kuan Yin, or Iron Goddess of Mercy, one of the most famous Chinese oolongs. They list Chais separately on their menu, so if you go in looking for a spiced tea, don’t despair when you don’t find it listed under the various types of tea. And if chai is what you like, they also offer a few tea drinks with a chai base (namely an Iced Chai and a Chai Shake).
The Tea Garden also offers tisanes on their loose tea menu (which, unlike so many other places, they actually refer to as tisanes!). An interesting category that is also on their menu, which I would perhaps class with tisanes, is guayusa. This Amazonian tree leaf, brewed similarly to the tea leaf, acts as a stimulant as well as being rich in vitamins and minerals (for a little more information on guayusa, see this article). If you are a Yerba Mate drinker, this might be worth a try.
At The Tea Garden, you can order loose leaf tea in a cup or pot, although a warning regarding this terminology is in order. Ordering a “cup” actually gets you a cup-to-go, so select this option if you need to grab a tea for being out and about but not if you want to sit down and savour your tea. Another confusing detail is that they specify that the pot or cup does not include refills, but this refers to refills of tea leaves; they do, in fact, refill hot water upon request (phew!).
I am quite partial to oolongs, and tend to order them at tea houses. This excursion proved no exception. I ordered my Ti Kuan Yin in a pot, and happily let it steep away. It is a tea I am fairly familiar with, so I knew what to expect, and I was not disappointed. After establishing that I could, in fact, get hot water refills, I settled back and proceeded to enjoy several steepings of this smooth, nutty oolong.
Although The Tea Garden might not be traditional enough for some tea drinkers out there, they manage to walk the line of trendy tea café and high quality tea house quite well. They offer a tea experience that reflects a new trend of tea drinking—one that blends the worlds of contemporary café culture with traditional tea appreciation.
© Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog, 2009-2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this article’s author and/or the blog’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
In late breaking news from China, here comes a report that claims that some of the more rare varieties of spring harvested tea are apparently fetching prices that literally make them worth their weight in gold – or even more. Among those varieties, a Longjing (Dragonwell) green tea from Zhejiang province, which is selling at just over $1,600 per ounce. Which, if my math is correct, works out to about $128 per cup.
Speaking of pricey, here’s a report on some really expensive teabags that were confiscated by police in Orlando, Florida, not so long ago. The catch: they were filled with a leafy substance of another sort entirely and one that will presumably land their owner in a different type of hot water than the kind used to steep tea.
For high tea of a decidedly more genteel and traditional sort, check out this report on Virgin Atlantic’s efforts to bring afternoon tea to the skies for their well-heeled Upper Class passengers. As the report notes, “passengers can now choose between a full tea service featuring ‘English’ Breakfast or Earl Grey tea plus finger sandwiches, scones and cakes served in their own purpose-made dainty cake stand.” Pinkies up!
If you just can’t quite seem to get enough of tea, you always have the option of wearing it. Or at least, as the case is with clothing from a British designer, you can wear clothing made from tea bags that have been used and thoroughly dried to make a kind of cloth. Among the items Grace Robinson creates in this unusual manner are dresses, shoes and accessories.
For those who find themselves dreaming of tea, a mattress from Keetsa might be a great investment. The company’s Tea Leaf Dream, Tea Leaf Classic, and Tea Leaf Supreme models all include a product called EverGreen, which is “made from all-natural green tea” and which “is embedded into the memory foam for long-lasting natural odor control.”
© Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog, 2009-2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this article’s author and/or the blog’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Jonas Hanway's complete book where the essay on tea appears
It’s probably not surprising that so many English commentators of yesteryear felt compelled to pick up a pen and share their thoughts about tea. After all, tea was a relative newcomer to their island nation, only turning up in the middle portion of the seventeenth century and not really hitting it big for at least another half century after that.
Opinions among these commentators tended to be rather mixed, if the truth be told. While some of them did everything short of running through the streets (tea) drunkenly singing the praises of tea, there were probably just as many who felt that it was a vile substance that, if left unchecked, would contribute to the breakdown of law and order and the end of humanity as we know it.
We could safely put Jonas Hanway (1712 – 1786) in this latter category, at least based on the thoughts he expressed in his 1757 An Essay on Tea. The piece is actually part of a larger work, a two-volume book that he published in that same year, called A Journal of Eight Days Journey from Portsmouth to Kingston Upon Thames.
Hanway, if we’re to believe Wikipedia, was an “English traveller and philanthropist” and was apparently the “first Londoner, it is said, to carry an umbrella.” The unwieldy title of his diatribe on tea, excerpted from the even more unwieldy full title of the book, gives a pretty good indication of his not so complimentary opinions about tea, An Essay On Tea, Considered As Pernicious To Health, Obstructing Industry, And Impoverishing The Nation: With An Account Of Its Growth And Great Consumption In These Kingdoms.
The author devotes no small amount of his work to detailing the assorted and sundry evils that tea had already wrought in England. Among the various maladies he blames on its consumption are distempers, scurvy and weak nerves, just to name a few.
Today, tea is more popular than ever!
Though Hanway’s dry writing style doesn’t exactly make this a book that you’ll want to take to the beach, at least one of his contemporaries read enough of it to get his back up and write a lively rebuttal. That would be the infamous Samuel Johnson, who was proud to be a self-proclaimed “hardened and shameless tea-drinker.” More on his throwdown with Hanway in this article, which includes a link to the review he wrote of Hanway’s book.
© Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog, 2009-2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this article’s author and/or the blog’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
I’ve written a number of articles at this site and my own about the many and varied things you can do with tea and alcohol. This is no time to rehash the topic, which you can read more about here, for starters. Suffice to say that tea and alcohol come in two main forms – tea mixed with other ingredients to make a cocktail of some sort or one of a variety of alcoholic beverages actually produced with tea as a flavoring agent.
On the flip side of the coin is the relationship between tea and teetotalism. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines teetotalism as “the principle or practice of complete abstinence from alcoholic drinks” and a person who engages in this practice is known as a teetotaler. Both words are thought to date from about 1834, but despite the resemblance to the word tea and popularity of tea with some teetotalers, one apparently has nothing to do with the other. Look for more on the origins of these words here.
An article of this scope is not sufficient to adequately examine the relationship between tea and teetotalism, but a few examples will help to demonstrate that relationship. As one author noted, in an essay on the history of drinking practices in Great Britain, “the availability of safe and nonintoxicating beverages, a large per capita increase in tea consumption after 1840, and the establishment of eating and drinking places besides the public house all contributed to reducing the significance of alcohol as beverage and nutrient.”
In his fascinating book, A History of the World in Six Glasses, author Tom Standage not only credits tea with improving the health of the British public as far back as several centuries ago (due to its antibacterial properties and the fact that the often unsafe water had to be boiled) but also notes that with the rise of industrialization tea was favored over the beer often given to agricultural workers due to the fact that it increased alertness and had no intoxicating qualities.
Finally, as one student noted in her thesis on tea, “A new emphasis on morality included a popular temperance movement in the middle of the nineteenth century, and the working classes needed to find a cheap substitute for alcohol. Inexpensive tea arrived at exactly the right moment in history to take this place…The temperance movement had become a powerful movement among the working class in the 1840′s when per capita tea consumption rise sharply.”
© Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog, 2009-2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this article’s author and/or the blog’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Online Stores, Inc., and The English Tea Store Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
