In other news, I decided to give up sugar in tea this weekend.
When I started drinking hot caffeinated drinks as a lad I, like many young persons, didn’t really like the taste at all but having gotten hooked on the drug that fuels our nation I smothered it away with sweetness. Initially I just drank tea with three sugars and stayed away away from coffee which was disgusting. Then, when staying with my dad in Houston, I was unable to get hold of any tea whatsoever, the Americans being somewhat retarded in that department, so I was forced to drink coffee to get my fix. Coffee with six to eight sugars of course.
Having discovered this crack cocaine of beverages I was hooked and drank absurdly sweet coffee on a regular basis throughout my early 20s, saving less-absurdly sweet tea for calmer moments. After a few years it occurred to me multiple mugs of this treacle might not be the best of things and I cut out the coffee save for really bad hangover days. Over the last few years my sugar-in-tea dose has gradually gone down from 3 to 2.5 to 2 to 1.5 to 1 spoonful. Of late I’ve occasionally been drinking tea without any sugar at all, usually because there wasn’t any in the places I’ve been working, and I’ve started to find that I actually like it, prefer it even. The taste is still a shock but I’ve come around to that bitterness as a virtue, plus it doesn’t leave my mouth all sticky, which is nice. And so, this evening I made a cup of tea and, despite there being a jar of sugar sitting there right next to the bags, didn’t put any in. And it was good.
Coffee, however, is still disgusting.
i can’t believe that you couldn’t find any tea in america. that said, i am american, loathe coffee (i make it into the sludge you describe), and buy imported tea from the uk.
i put three tablespoons of sugar in it. i applaud you.
Three tablespoons? You don’t really mean tablespoons do you? With that amount of sugar you wouldn’t be able to tell if it was tea, coffee or muddy water.
And no, I couldn’t find a decent cup of tea anywhere when I was in America either.
English tea is now available in Texas – it wasn’t in ?1988 as I recall. Personally, a cuppa in the afternoon will satisfy my daily tea intake; I have now stopped drinking tea in the mornings and have never put a grain of sugar in it. So sugar taste is probably not a genetic trait. Coffee in the USA varies enormously in taste and strength. Typical coffee served in roadhouses and small town stores is so weak you would need a gallon to get a caffeine fix. But then that’s what the locals do, spending an hour or two discussing politics and the price of cotton! In the rest of America, where they grow coffee, now that’s where you can taste the caffeine! Colombian coffee drunk at high elevation will get you bouncing off the walls (and there’s no coca in it!) while a small cup of Venezuelan “Cafe Maron” kick starts my mornings when in that lovely but politically distressed nation. And I do put a teaspoon of sugar in my coffee, it brings out the flavo(u)r!
I dropped sugar for Canderel (sp?) last week – which doesn’t enhance the tea at all. I’ll drop Canderel this week and see how I manage it.
One of the most shameful moments of my life was drinking tea in Sri Lanka and asking for milk + sugar – the look of horror on the faces of the locals was priceless. “How do you taste the actual tea?” I was asked.
One day the sky will be filled with a burning liquid, and it will rain down and the infidel tea drinkers will be outcast to a place where tea bags are bountiful but water doesn’t exist.
The coffee drinkers of the world will take their rightful place as the bestest people in the world.
OR
I just can’t stand tea, never have. Coffee for me (with one sweetener and a dash of milk please).
I drink 8 to 10 cops of strong coffee every day, have done for 30 years. No sugar, often black. My favourite is Douwe Egberts Red Label, as I used to live near the factory in Utrecht, but some of the Fair Trade stuff now on the market is excellent.
Filter only.
I generally drink leaf Yorkshire Tea to start the day. Tastes better than T bags.
Pete the Trucker – have you tried EqualExchange’s Sumatran Takengon? It’s bloody marvellous.
It’s simple. Coffee is rock’n'roll. Tea is cosy (no pun intended). After many years spent despising tea’s inherent insipid quality, I find it useful on certain rainy afternoons in a cardigan-wearing Val Doonican (ask your dad) rocking-chair frame of mind. Must be getting old.
One of my favorite tea moments was in an up market hotel in Paris, having “afternoon tea” with a Dutch couple, Hans and Pia. The tea arrived but it was hot water and add your own tea bags. Pia remonstrated to all in earshot with her best Gabonese/Dutch/French that that was NOT the way to make English afternoon tea! After much fuss we got the real thing.
It never ceases to amuse me. I post something long and thoughtful that took hours to get just right and I get a wave of silence. I casually mention my tea drinking habits and the comments stream in.
SDN / Dad: there was proper tea in Houston in 1988. It was found in the international foods section of the supermarket. For some reason turning it into a drinkable cup of tea just didn’t work. I forget the details now but it was a non-starter.
Dan: Canderell (or whathaveyou) is pointless, at least for me. I’m not worried about the health aspects, just the taste. In fact I’ve never understood all this diet stuff, and for that I’m grateful.
Gordon: You’re wrong. So there. (When do we start swearing at each other? Isn’t that what’s supposed to happen on the internet?)
Andy G: Tea is actually more hardcore than coffee. It’s a fact. And it has more caffeine. I’d say coffee is your three minute punk-pop hit while tea is more of a Slint album, or something by Nick Cave. In fact, coffee is crack while tea is heroin. Or some shit.
Next I’ll be talking about how I put my shoes on in the morning.
Yeah.
anything that involves the rights and wrongs of tea or coffee always rockets the stats. weirdness.
try posting “tea or coffee ?”
bloody deluged.
Very lovely but when you’ve spent two hours with your dual-blogger beloveds explaining why Unison isn’t striking on Wednesday after all. Yes I know. Don’t tell me. I know.
One sugar in coffee.
Ta.
Mostly gave up coffee after one too many ‘cold turkey’ days when I didn’t have any for some reason. I only drink it at my parents’ house now – they have a filter machine (though my mother drinks Asda-brand freeze dried granules – >sighMostly gave up coffee after one too many ‘cold turkey’ days when I didn’t have any for some reason. I only drink it at my parents’ house now – they have a filter machine (though my mother drinks Asda-brand freeze dried granules – >sighMostly gave up coffee after one too many ‘cold turkey’ days when I didn’t have any for some reason. I only drink it at my parents’ house now – they have a filter machine (though my mother drinks Asda-brand freeze dried granules – >sighMostly gave up coffee after one too many ‘cold turkey’ days when I didn’t have any for some reason. I only drink it at my parents’ house now – they have a filter machine (though my mother drinks Asda-brand freeze dried granules – >sigh<)
Of course, I’m best known for drinking Pepsi Max by the case full these days. Though I have Red Bull when needed – to stay awake AND keep that F1 team going.
The best bit is when, a year down the line, somebody accidentally gives you a cup of tea with a couple of sugars in it, you think it won’t be too bad, start drinking it, and spit it out because it tastes of syrup and oh my god, how did you ever drink this?
broke the sugar habit in tea a while back. still like one spoonful in coffee (at work, not allowed at home. Tend to have green tea more now, no sugar, no milk. great once your used to it.
BTW if (brown) tea is Nick Cave, Green Tea must be Rufus Wainwright :)
Bloggers love minutae (sp?).
One of my most commented posts was about toenails. Who knew!
Anyway, I should be swearing at you, right, you filthy tea drinker you, your mother is a hamster and your father smells of elderberries!!!
dave shelton: yes, i do mean three tablespoons. at the end there is 1/2″ of sugar sludge, which i do not consume (i just add more tea!).
there’s a place near my house that sells those pyramid pg tips bags. they are wonderful.
green tea? YIK.
Tea in the house. Coffee while out. It’s the natural way. I’ve lost faith in instant coffee, I think since taking my coffee black. Milk in first in tea. The sugar thing went out of the window years ago. I can appreciate some people’s reservations, but the coffee you can get on the high street in the UK these days is a million times better than the stuff that blighted our nation only ten years ago. Coffee made with hot milk where a layer of skin formed and stuck to your lip. Nasty stuff. There is such a thing as progress!
Ha ha ha Pete- I saw ’17 comments’ at the bottom of this post and thought the same thing as you- clearly we should all eschew our well-thought-out editorials on the state of the nation in favour of stories about Tea And Other National Obsessions. I once wrote a lovingly crafted and heartfelt post about Racism In The Workplace (go and find it, it really is good, it is called ‘the conversation’!) which garnered precisely one comment (and an obscure, tongue-in-cheek one at that)- while 500 words posted in haste about the pies at Stockport County might lead to a veritable round-table of erudite commentistas emerging from the shadows.
And I will have mine with 2 sugars please by the way- just ever-so-slightly heaped.
Pete, does this mean I no longer need to keep a bag of sugar at the back of the cupboard ready for your occasional visits? :)
Tea has more caffeine than coffee? I did not know that… I definitely drink more tea than coffee, usually a cup with breakfast. I only use one small teaspoon (if that) of sugar and a spot of milk. And as far as coffee goes, it all depends on what kind it is, sometimes I just put a bit of creamer in it, other’s just a small teaspoon (again if that) of sugar. I actually like to taste the coffee and tea so I could probably do without sugar at all and drink them just fine. However, 3 tablespoons of sugar is just insane! :)
This idea really works. Give it a try!