How to make tea

[Steve H]

Arising from the "What have you missed during lockdown?" thread, this thread is to argue about how to make tea.

This is the correct way to make tea:

Use a teapot - a standard two-pint one will make three mugs of tea, and you can get smaller and larger ones. The traditional British design is best, with a handle on one side and a spout on the other, and a more-or-less spherical body (The best shape for retaining heat). Oriental ones are very pretty, but less practical. You will also need a tea-cosy and a strainer. Use loose tea, not tea-bags. I recommend Yorkshire tea, but there are other good makes.
Heat the pot by swilling a bit of hot water from the kettle as it comes to the boil, and discard. Add four heaped teaspoons to a standard quart pot (teaspoons vary greatly in size; I use a large one). When the water boils, pour it on as it boils, to the rim of the pot, stir, cover the pot with the tea-cosy to keep it warm, and leave to brew for five minutes, giving it a stir mid-brew. While it brews, add milk (not too much) and sugar, if wanted (ditto - not more than one teaspoonful per mug (I wish I could give up sugar, and have tried, but I just can't get used to unsweetened tea)). After five minutes, pour through the tea-strainer, and drink.
And that, my friends, with a very few allowable variations, is the only way to make tea (black, everyday, Indian-style tea, that is: China tea is a whole different subject). Any other method just produces discoloured water.
George Orwell on tea-making. A few of his strictures are unnecessary - I don't think that there's anything wrong with metal pots, except that they lose heat faster than earthenware ones, so an efficient tea-cosy is required - but in general, he was, as always, spot-on.

[Steve H]

This forum could do with a 'Food and Drink' section.

[Owlswing]

The very best way to make tea is to make it the way that produces  tea the way you, personally, like it and not as someone else tells you it should be made

[Steve H]

The very best way to make tea is to make it the way that produces  tea the way you, personally, like it and not as someone else tells you it should be made

Wrong!! The only way to make tea is that used by me and George Orwell. Teabags in mugs are only for anarchists, because they think that proper tea is theft.

[Aruntraveller]

I'd just like to inform you all that I don't drink tea. So this thread is unimportant to me.

(Not unimportant enough not to comment though  )

[wigginhall]

Doesn't everyone dry their tea-bags on the line overnight? 

[ad_orientem]

I use teabags. Able to get Yorkshire Tea in one of the supermarket chains here. Anyway, teabag in the cup, pour water 100C over it, stir and leave for a few minutes. Teabag out and a drop of full fat milk.

[Roses]

We don't like strong tea and only leave the tea bag in for a few seconds. We have semi-skimmed milk not the full fat stuff.

[Outrider]

Wrong!! The only way to make tea is that used by me and George Orwell. Teabags in mugs are only for anarchists, because they think that proper tea is theft.

I don't think that word means what you think it means...

Proper tea, of course, is Lapsang Souchong

O.

[bluehillside Retd.]

There’s a theory that in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams’s famous answer to the "Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything" of 42 was to do with tea. He was a big tea drinker and the idea is that it’s a pun on “tea for two, and two for tea” though in interviews he always said it was just a mundane number that took his fancy.

True or not, I like the story.

[Owlswing]

Wrong!! The only way to make tea is that used by me and George Orwell. Teabags in mugs are only for anarchists because they think that proper tea is theft.

Your arrogance is truly monumental! My Dad liked it so weak it couldn't get out of the pot with the aid of crutches - My Mum liked it so strong that the dregs could be used to creosote the garden fences!

To each his own - your post as Tea Making Dictator is redundant.

)O(

[Roses]

Your arrogance is truly monumental! My Dad liked it so weak it couldn't get out of the pot with the aid of crutches - My Mum liked it so strong that the dregs could be used to creosote the garden fences!

To each his own - your post as Tea Making Dictator is redundant.

)O(

Nice one.

[Owlswing]

Nice one.

Why thank you, Ma'am!

)O(

[jeremyp]

My parents had a stainless steel teapot for many years. You didn't have to warm it because, being metal, it got up to operating temperature quickly enough not to spoil the tea. You didn't have to use a tea cosy because it only held about four large mugs^* and by the time you get round to seconds, the tea is always too stewed to drink anyway. Better to make a fresh pot.

Making tea in a mug with teabags is acceptable in extenuated circumstances, but you must pour the milk in after the hot water.

^*No right minded tea drinker would drink tea out of a cup. The tea goes cold instantly and you have to do all that pretentious nonsense with your fingers whilst holding it. And the handle is too small to hold it comfortably. Cups also hold a pitifully small amount of liquid, but that is actually an advantage when you consider it went stone cold about a microsecond after it was poured into the cup.

[Roses]

My siblings and I didn't drink tea or coffee when children, neither did our children. Our grandchildren don't drink either of those beverages either as they don't find them to their taste.

[Steve H]

I don't think that word means what you think it means...

Proper tea, of course, is Lapsang Souchong

O.u

It was a joke, ffs! "Property is theft" is a quotation from Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, who was an anarchist beyond a peradventure.

[Aruntraveller]

My siblings and I didn't drink tea or coffee when children, neither did our children. Our grandchildren don't drink either of those beverages either as they don't find them to their taste.

That's not unknown amongst children. I didn't start drinking coffee till the devil tempted me at the age of 14.

[Roses]

That's not unknown amongst children. I didn't start drinking coffee till the devil tempted me at the age of 14.

Our grandchildren are 18, nearly 17, 16, 14 and 12, and still choose not to drink tea or coffee. Our eldest girl (50) has never drunk either of those beverages, so the term, 'More tea vicar?' is not appropriate in her case, She doesn't like alcohol either, which is a little awkward given her calling.

[Owlswing]

Our grandchildren are 18, nearly 17, 16, 14 and 12, and still choose not to drink tea or coffee. Our eldest girl (50) has never drunk either of those beverages, so the term, 'More tea vicar?' is not appropriate in her case, She doesn't like alcohol either, which is a little awkward given her calling.

Jesus bleedin' Christ woman! Just how old ARE you?

If you don't mind me asking, of course! I shall take a lack of response to this post as an indication positive that you do! In which case I apologise for offending!

[Roses]

Jesus bleedin' Christ woman! Just how old ARE you?

If you don't mind me asking, of course! I shall take a lack of response to this post as an indication positive that you do! In which case I apologise for offending!

What are you on about?

[Owlswing]

What are you on about?

My serious underestimation of your age from your posts (by at least twenty years)!

[Roses]

My serious underestimation of your age from your posts (by at least twenty years)!

I was 70 years YOUNG in January.

[ippy]

Our grandchildren are 18, nearly 17, 16, 14 and 12, and still choose not to drink tea or coffee. Our eldest girl (50) has never drunk either of those beverages, so the term, 'More tea vicar?' is not appropriate in her case, She doesn't like alcohol either, which is a little awkward given her calling.

The government should open special centres for the express purpose of treating anyone that likes to think of themselves a British whilst at the same time having the temerity to declare to all that they don't drink tea, stripped of their citizenship comes to mind first.

I wouldn't want to set a limit on any method used by a government agency as to how these people are cured of this dreadful malaise which is even worse if someone pretending to be English, can't say anymore it's too awful to write or think about.   

Apart from that have a good day all regards, ippy

[Roses]

The government should open special centres for the express purpose of treating anyone that likes to think of themselves a British whilst at the same time having the temerity to declare to all that they don't drink tea, stripped of their citizenship comes to mind first.

I wouldn't want to set a limit on any method used by a government agency as to how these people are cured of this dreadful malaise which is even worse if someone pretending to be English, can't say anymore it's too awful to write or think about.   

Apart from that have a good day all regards, ippy

 

[Owlswing]

I was 70 years YOUNG in January.

Damn! I was seventy-three and a half! Now 74!