Saturday 6 February 2021

A nice cuppa

Molly Chesney from Newark in Nottinghamshire, who's 48, claims she's never had a cup of tea in her life. Yes, she's tried a few herbal teas, but never an ordinary cuppa. She says just seeing it and smelling it puts her right off.

I must say it's hard to believe. Not a single cup of tea in 48 years? Surely she's pulling our legs?

But apparently it's not unusual. Quite a few people are revolted by tea and won't drink it. No doubt their friends try to persuade them it's delicious, but they don't get very far.

Personally I can't get enough of the stuff, and neither can Jenny. We drink at least six or seven cups a day each. It would be more if it wasn't for our two cups of coffee in the morning.

We don't drink much else in fact. No beer, no Coca-Cola, no fizzy drinks, no energy drinks. Maybe a glass of wine in the evening, that's it.

When we're staying in a hotel, with the usual stingy allotment of teabags per room (about four), the first thing we do is buy a large packet of teabags to allow us our customary daily quota.

Too much tea is said to be bad for you - you're liable to suffer headaches, anxiety, indigestion and insomnia. That may apply to others, but Jenny and I have never been afflicted.

The ex-Labour Cabinet Minister, Tony Benn, was renowned for his love of tea. He would drink it from massive mugs, claiming once that he drank a pint of tea every hour. Clearly it didn't do him any harm, as he was 88 when he died.

"I say let the world go to hell, but I should always have my tea" - Fyodor Dostoevsky

35 comments:

  1. Hello Nick,

    Well, we are divided down the middle over this. One of us is a tea drinker and the other a coffee connoisseur and never the twain shall meet at least in terms of hot drinks.

    We can both agree on wine and drinking chocolate but, even after decades together, our drink of preference divides us.

    Whatever the drink, we always feel that the cup one drinks it out of matters a great deal. Mugs diminish a drink we feel whereas fine china can elevate the humblest of drinks to the divine. Mugs of anything should be avoided in our view!

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    1. Jane and Lance: Hi, long time no see! Yes, it's lucky that Jenny and I are of one in our enthusiasm for tea. And we think mugs are fine, but a relative of Jenny's here in Belfast always looked on them with total disgust.

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  2. I never drink teabag tea, as honestly? I find the teabag taste revolting. I drink the real mccoy when I do drink it. Looseleaf. Rich, dark. But mainly I stick to coffee, dark beans, I grind them myself. Nothing like it.

    XO
    WWW

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    1. www: We're happy with teabags, but instant coffee is a no-no. Coffee we grind ourselves with beans from the famous tea and coffee merchant S D Bell, which is just down the road from us.

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  3. 2 or 3 cups of back unsweetened coffee a day, water, and lemonade are my regular "beverages." Karen had never drank coffee until she had a specialty flavored coffee a number of years back. Now she has several cups a day with flavored creamer and sweetener.

    Tea? Rarely, though I sometimes go through a spell. Karen has a cup or so of green tea almost every day

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    1. Mike: I used to have creamer in my coffee but I weaned myself off it. I still have a tiny bit of sugar though, to soften the coffee taste slightly. I tried green tea but didn't take to it at all.

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  4. I’m a water drinker, no tea or coffee or wine. I suppose that’s unusual, but it works for me.

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    1. Jean: Water is supposed to be the healthiest drink, so you're doing okay!

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  5. Tea to start the day, coffee mid morning, tea in th afternoon. I brought real tea from the U.K. when visiting mother, but am now reduced to teabags - luckily we can buy Ceylon teabags, so not reduced to the dreaded Liptons.

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    1. Fly: That's our drinking routine as well. At the moment we're on Tetleys.

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  6. Coffee starts my day with a single cup and during the day I drink water and at least 1-2 cups of tea, mostly during the colder months. I also enjoy a glass of wine in the evenings with dinner and the occasional beer especially with a burger.

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    1. Beatrice: I can't stand beer or lager. I just hate the taste. Give me some Australian pinot grigio any day.

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  7. I drink two cups of green tea after lunch everyday and sometimes a cup of chai or honey ginseng before bed. My husband hated tea (iced or hot) after trying it in childhood and has never had a cup as an adult. I think that’s ridiculous, but he can’t be convinced to try it again.

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    1. Bijoux: So there's another person who doesn't like tea! I certainly don't like iced tea or iced coffee. Apart from water, I like my drinks good and hot.

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  8. I'm not a fan of hot tea for the most part. Sometimes if it's really cold outside I'll get a taste for a hot cup of chai tea with lots of milk, but that's about it. Iced tea is the way 99% of the population in this area drink it, and I like iced tea but hardly ever make it for some reason. My husband won't drink iced tea because he says the taste turns his stomach and I'll bet he's never had a cup of hot tea in his life. Nor does he drink coffee or wine. I LOVE coffee and have 2 or 3 large mugs of it every morning. I grind my coffee beans for the best flavor. I also like wine.

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    1. Jennifer: So iced tea is the norm where you are - even when it's freezing cold? I've never taken to iced tea, I like my drinks hot - except for the occasional fruit juice.

      And there's another person who's never had hot tea....

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  9. My mother was a big tea drinker but she only had a cup or two of hot tea in the morning. The rest of the day it was iced tea. So I grew up drinking iced tea but I rarely do so now. I even had to throw out the last box of tea bags because it was too old to use.

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    1. Linda: I've never met anyone here who prefers iced tea to hot tea. My mother was somewhere in between - she could only drink tea when it was tepid.

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  10. I don't like tea, I can't bear the nasty coat it leaves on my teeth, unlike coffee, which I have drunk black since college.

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    1. Joanne: I don't notice any teeth-coating from tea. Perhaps it depends on the brand.

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  11. I drink coffee in the mornings, and then some days I have tea later in the day. Not every day, though. I like it fine, I just don't often make it. And when I do, it's most often green tea or chammomile. I don't much care for iced tea, especially the "sweet tea" that is so common here. It's so sweet it sets my teeth on edge.

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    1. Agent: I do have herbal teas occasionally, but I never liked green tea, despite its supposed health benefits.

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    2. If you've never had it Tazo's Zen green tea is what I like best. It has a little spearmint, lemon grass, and lemon verbena it in. Relaxation in a cup.

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    3. Agent: I'll give it a try. I'll look for it at our local tea and coffee merchant.

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  12. I am a tea person too. As was my late wife. Coming as we both did from the coffee drinking part of our country we had always been considered oddballs but, both of us came from families that had settled in the tea drinking parts of the country and that made us tea drinkers too. Both of us rarely had coffee. I hardly ever do even now. On the other hand, my son is a coffee addict but, my daughter in love is a tea person.

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    1. Ramana: I don't know if there are any parts of the UK that are generally tea-drinking or coffee-drinking. It seems to be entirely a matter of personal taste.

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  13. You must be permanently wired on all that caffeine! I have 3 cups in the morning and that's my limit, any more than that and I get the jitters.
    Never give it up, Nick, or you'll find out what a real headache is!
    Sx

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    1. Ms Scarlet: I don't feel permanently wired. And I practically never get a headache. But when I'm thirsty it has to be hot tea rather than something cold.

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  14. I drink tea all day. In the Summertime I make iced tea the southern way with lots of sugar. lol I drink maybe one cup of coffee a week.

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    1. Mary: I didn't know iced tea was a big thing in the States. It's a very minor thing in Britain.

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  15. My grandmother used to pour tea from her cup into the saucer to cool it for me as a tiny girl. I dont remember if I drank it from the saucer? how do I remember one part and not the other?
    Anyways, I have been drinking tea, at least occasionally, for most of my life.

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    1. Kylie: I remember lots of people pouring tea into the saucer, it was very common when I was young. Somewhere along the line it became shockingly vulgar!

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  16. I like tea and also enjoy coffee, partially I think because it’s hot as well as the taste. I don't use any sugar, cream or anything else in it. I don't drink either throughout the day as I once did for a number of years. I didn't deliberately stop drinking so much, it just seemed to evolve over time. I used to have coffee first thing in the morning but don't even regularly do that any more. Coffee seemed easier to make than tea as I had coffee pot with a timer or I might have been inclined to drink more tea.

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    1. I just remembered, when we moved to Arizona and then here I went through a period of making sun tea which I enjoyed, again without sugar or other sweetener.

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    2. Joared: I have a tiny bit of sugar in my coffee, but none in tea. I know water is supposed to be the most refreshing drink, but it's boring! There's not much chance of making sun tea here, we're lucky to see any sun at all!

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