Tea...a beverage that puts the "steam" in Steampunk.

[Gazongola]

I am a fan of Cha, orChina tea. Anything from Oolong, green, to red tea. I must say, I am not fond of Jasmine however. But generally, it is either D tea, or red label. Or just squash. I admit I do not drink alot of tea, just a bit every now and then. I prefer my herbal coffees.

[Pnakotus]

My favorite is Apple Cinnamon Spice

[wisdom_of_trees]

Yes, you could say that I like tea.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Dear god...

Could that be the first recorded instance of an aether-peen?

I'm sorry, but what is an aether-peen?

[Demetrius Forward]

I've never actually tried tea myself, but I do intend on doing so!

[The Lone Cat Charmer]

Goodness tea, cover me with it please! (actually don't... hot hot). Love green tea, those morning train rides won't be the same without a thermos of tea!

However, as of late I have been drinking this fantastic green tea I brought back from China

What a coincidence, you mean THIS tea from China?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

(Not really a spoiler, but there isn't much to see)
But its seriously nice tea!

[Albrecht]

I've never actually tried tea myself, but I do intend on doing so!

what? is your flag a lie? i think i have to lie down now...
englishman, no tea... great nyarlathotep...

[Raoul]

I have to say that my favourite tea is oolong. I also quite like earl grey. I dont like it with milk though, but a spot of sugar dosnt go astray.

I think this might be my first post also.

R

[Flynn MacCallister]

I've never actually tried tea myself, but I do intend on doing so!

what? is your flag a lie? i think i have to lie down now...
englishman, no tea... great nyarlathotep...

Aah, no, he's but a young'un. They don't all get introduced to it early (a good thing, too; children insist on sugar, and then you get adults who abuse their tea with sweeteners.)

[Mechanik]

There are two sorts of tea drunk around here, Normality and Novelty. The latter being the coloured waters called Roybosh, peppermint, stomach ease, chamomile, nettle etc.
For me, refreshment is only...Normality, made from the Tea plant and infused from loose tea. Lovely.

[Lilith-Nighthawk]

yummy i want a nice chai, massala chair especially. i think i need my own tea pot, so i can make more tea when ever the fancy strikes me.

[Seaton Begg]

I'm drinking Twinings Jasmine Green Tea at the moment.

[Jemima Annabelle Clough]

Aah, no, he's but a young'un. They don't all get introduced to it early (a good thing, too; children insist on sugar, and then you get adults who abuse their tea with sweeteners.)

I don't remember ever not drinking tea - thankfully, I weaned myself of the sugar in it around age 11.

[James Harrison]

I've recently managed to wean myself off sugar in tea, mainly by ensuring I don't leave the tea to 'stand' for too long before pouring it. 

However.... my parents alas are in the habit of leaving it to steep for, as a conservative estimate, 14 hours, thus ruining the taste and leaving the tea more like creosote, or coal tar, in colour and texture.  In which case I simply have to have sugar in it to make it palatable. 

No matter what though, I have not taken milk with my tea for the past three years, and if ever I am given tea with milk in it now the mere smell of it makes me wretch. 

[Orlando]

I am reposting this with the actual text inserted as I've just reread it and it is mostly my thoughts too.

If unlike Mr. Harrison you do take tea with milk, which way round do you do it?

I was told that it is better to add the tea to the milk rather than the other way round, as pouring a small amount of milk into the larger volume of hot tea may cook the milk and produce an off-flavour.  Adding the tea to the milk raises the temperature of the milk slowly.  I've tried it both ways many times to see if I could tell the difference, but can't say that I've ever noticed any.

My girlfriend tells me that pouring the tea into the cup first was a originally a way to show your guests that you had really good China able to withstand the high temperature.

I never used teabags until I went to college and brewed so much tea for myself and friends that I got into the less elegant way of brewing from a teabag in a mug and then lifting the bag out and adding milk to taste.

Orlando.

A Nice Cup of Tea
by George Orwell
Evening Standard, 12 January 1946


IF YOU look up ‘tea’ in the first cookery book that comes to hand you will probably find that it is unmentioned; or at most you will find a few lines of sketchy instructions which give no ruling on several of the most important points.

This is curious, not only because tea is one of the main stays of civilization in this country, as well as in Eire, Australia and New Zealand, but because the best manner of making it is the subject of violent disputes.

When I look through my own recipe for the perfect cup of tea, I find no fewer than 11 outstanding points. On perhaps two of them there would be pretty general agreement, but at least four others are acutely controversial. Here are my own 11 rules, every one of which I regard as golden:

    * First of all, one should use Indian or Ceylonese tea. China tea has virtues which are not to be despised nowadays—it is economical, and one can drink it without milk—but there is not much stimulation in it. One does not feel wiser, braver or more optimistic after drinking it. Anyone who has used that comforting phrase ‘a nice cup of tea’ invariably means Indian tea.

    * Secondly, tea should be made in small quantities—that is, in a teapot. Tea out of an urn is always tasteless, while army tea, made in a cauldron, tastes of grease and whitewash. The teapot should be made of china or earthenware. Silver or Britanniaware teapots produce inferior tea and enamel pots are worse; though curiously enough a pewter teapot (a rarity nowadays) is not so bad.

    * Thirdly, the pot should be warmed beforehand. This is better done by placing it on the hob than by the usual method of swilling it out with hot water.

    * Fourthly, the tea should be strong. For a pot holding a quart, if you are going to fill it nearly to the brim, six heaped teaspoons would be about right. In a time of rationing, this is not an idea that can be realized on every day of the week, but I maintain that one strong cup of tea is better than twenty weak ones. All true tea lovers not only like their tea strong, but like it a little stronger with each year that passes—a fact which is recognized in the extra ration issued to old-age pensioners.

    * Fifthly, the tea should be put straight into the pot. No strainers, muslin bags or other devices to imprison the tea. In some countries teapots are fitted with little dangling baskets under the spout to catch the stray leaves, which are supposed to be harmful. Actually one can swallow tea-leaves in considerable quantities without ill effect, and if the tea is not loose in the pot it never infuses properly.

    * Sixthly, one should take the teapot to the kettle and not the other way about. The water should be actually boiling at the moment of impact, which means that one should keep it on the flame while one pours. Some people add that one should only use water that has been freshly brought to the boil, but I have never noticed that it makes any difference.

    * Seventhly, after making the tea, one should stir it, or better, give the pot a good shake, afterwards allowing the leaves to settle.

    * Eighthly, one should drink out of a good breakfast cup—that is, the cylindrical type of cup, not the flat, shallow type. The breakfast cup holds more, and with the other kind one’s tea is always half cold—before one has well started on it.

    * Ninthly, one should pour the cream off the milk before using it for tea. Milk that is too creamy always gives tea a sickly taste.

    * Tenthly, one should pour tea into the cup first. This is one of the most controversial points of all; indeed in every family in Britain there are probably two schools of thought on the subject. The milk-first school can bring forward some fairly strong arguments, but I maintain that my own argument is unanswerable. This is that, by putting the tea in first and stirring as one pours, one can exactly regulate the amount of milk whereas one is liable to put in too much milk if one does it the other way round.

    * Lastly, tea—unless one is drinking it in the Russian style—should be drunk without sugar. I know very well that I am in a minority here. But still, how can you call yourself a true tea-lover if you destroy the flavour of your tea by putting sugar in it? It would be equally reasonable to put in pepper or salt. Tea is meant to be bitter, just as beer is meant to be bitter. If you sweeten it, you are no longer tasting the tea, you are merely tasting the sugar; you could make a very similar drink by dissolving sugar in plain hot water.

Some people would answer that they don’t like tea in itself, that they only drink it in order to be warmed and stimulated, and they need sugar to take the taste away. To those misguided people I would say: Try drinking tea without sugar for, say, a fortnight and it is very unlikely that you will ever want to ruin your tea by sweetening it again.

These are not the only controversial points to arise in connection with tea drinking, but they are sufficient to show how subtilized the whole business has become.

There is also the mysterious social etiquette surrounding the teapot (why is it considered vulgar to drink out of your saucer, for instance?) and much might be written about the subsidiary uses of tealeaves, such as telling fortunes, predicting the arrival of visitors, feeding rabbits, healing burns and sweeping the carpet.

It is worth paying attention to such details as warming the pot and using water that is really boiling, so as to make quite sure of wringing out of one’s ration the 20 good, strong cups that two ounces, properly handled, ought to represent.

[Jemima Annabelle Clough]

The RSC (the chemists, not the actors) holds that putting the milk in first also results in a better tasting cuppa, as aparently milk can react differenly if it is added to hot liquids, rather than the other way around.

http://www.rsc.org/pdf/pressoffice/2003/tea.pdf

I have noticed that if I use semi-skimmed milk the tea can taste greasier if I add the milk last. I've not noticed such a difference with skimmed milk, which is my preferred choice, but I still put the milk in first.

Besides, I have also found the cup is easier to wash if you add the milk first 

(And I've also heard the china theory of putting the milk in first)

[plum phlogiston]

 Just finished a nicely stewed cup of Tetley Extra Strong (may the gods bless whoever thought of that one).

 Has anyone tried the Yogi (I think) Chocolate Tea? Oh dear lord its heaven in a cup.

[hortoncrow]

I live on nothing but tea.  I drink Twining's, Tetley, and PG tips.

[Orlando]

The RSC (the chemists, not the actors) holds that putting the milk in first also results in a better tasting cuppa, as aparently milk can react differently if it is added to hot liquids, rather than the other way around.

The Royal Society of Chemistry: How to make a Perfect Cup of Tea (40kB, 3 page .pdf file)

I have noticed that if I use semi-skimmed milk the tea can taste greasier if I add the milk last. I've not noticed such a difference with skimmed milk, which is my preferred choice, but I still put the milk in first.
Besides, I have also found the cup is easier to wash if you add the milk first 
(And I've also heard the china theory of putting the milk in first)

Thank you so much for posting this. Absolutely brilliant.
I was half expecting it to be something in the style of a Heston Blumenthal
essay on Molecular gastronomy as applied to the making of a cuppa,
but it's much more tongue in cheek.

I particularly like this bit:

"Drink at between 60-65 degrees Centigrade to avoid vulgar slurping
which results from trying to drink tea at too high a temperature.

Personal chemistry: to gain optimum ambience for enjoyment of tea aim to achieve
a seated drinking position in a favoured home spot where quietness and calm will
elevate the moment to a special dimension. For best results carry a heavy bag of
shopping – of walk the dog – in cold, driving rain for at least half an hour beforehand.
This will make the tea taste out of this world."

Yes, I expect it probably would !

I'm pleased that it supports all the often repeated advice about freshly drawn water, pre-heating the teapot
and also the comment about UHT milk which we all know might just as well stand for "Ultra Horrible Taste." 

The chap who told me the theory behind adding the tea to the milk rather than the milk to the tea was a chemistry student.
I wonder if you happen to be a chemist also.  I have a tea related question that I think a chemist might be able to answer.
I'll not ask it now though as it might take a bit of explaining and I need to get out and do some gardening.

But maybe I'll just have another cuppa first...

Orlando.

[Jemima Annabelle Clough]

Glad you enjoyed the link

I'm not a chemist, although I have been mistaken for one.

(There is at least one chemist who shares my real life name. Some-one once replied directly to an e-mail I'd sent to a mailing list - they stated first that they never replied to people they couldn't find information about, and then spent a couple of paragraphs telling me about "me". I didn't hear from them after I pointed out I wasn't who they thought I was... This was 10 or so years back, though.)

[A.G.Morgan]

Here in the Indian Territories, like most of the southern half of this continent iced tea is not only a refreshing beverage but a nessesity of survival in the summer. For that I usually use Lipton lemon iced tea mix.

For hot tea I prefer Luzianne tea bags. Brewed about ten minutes with a little bit of milk and a spoonful of sugar, and consumed several times a day.

[Flynn MacCallister]

How is American-style iced tea actually made? It seems to be rather different from the (non-premade) sort I'm used to here...

[Gazongola]

I would imagine you make it wothout milk and add sugar and flavouring if you want, and then add ice. I believe.

[Flynn MacCallister]

How I'm used to it, you make a small amount of tea, add a teaspoon of sugar, then add a large amount of iced water and ice, and about a teaspoon of lemon juice and a slice of lemon. It seems to come out rather different to what the American (and the pre-made) sort does. The difference may just be the degree of sweetening, but I really don't know... and particularly when M. Morgan says he uses "Litpon lemon iced tea mix", I wonder...

[Gazongola]

I believe that is powdered tea mix.

[Flynn MacCallister]

Which is why I wonder.