According to George Orwell, “tea is one of the main stays of civilization,” and like many of his countrymen, Orwell had rather strong opinions on the proper method of its preparation. Realizing one day in 1946 that the cookbooks of the age gave scant instruction in how to make tea, he decided to remedy that deficiency and published his personal tea making regime in the Evening Standard in January of that year. The title of the article was, fittingly, “A Nice Cup of Tea”.
Comprised of “eleven outstanding points,” in which Orwell notes only two are probably without controversy, they are, in order:
1) Only use tea from India or Sri Lanka: Per Orwell “there is not much stimulation,” in cheaper teas. He further states that Chinese tea is otherwise fine, but “one does not feel wiser, braver or more optimistic after drinking it.
”2) Make tea in a china or earthenware teapot and only in small quantities: Tea made in anything larger than a small teapot and prepared in pots made of metal (excepting pewter) or containing an enamel coating, in Orwell’s opinion, produces poor tasting tea.
3) Warm the teapot beforehand: Towards this end, Orwell recommended placing it on “the hob” which was an area at the back of the stove. He felt that swilling hot water in the pot to warm it produced inferior results.
If you’re now wondering why people warm the teapot before making tea, there are two primary reasons, one practical in some cases and the other concerning taste. As to the former, the practice of pre-warming the teapot seemingly started in part as a way to ensure you didn’t break the china or earthenware by pouring boiling water into a cold container. Obviously today, this isn’t typically going to be a problem due to both higher quality manufacturing and that that average temperature inside a home is often kept much higher during cold times of year than the days of yore; so the temperature difference isn’t quite as stark.
On that note, rather than just use warm water or the like to avoid potential breakage, it’s common today for people to simply pour boiling water into the teapot, let it warm the pot, then dump it out, put the tea in, and pour a second batch of boiling water in.
As to the second reason people often pre-warm their teapot, tea enthusiasts usually argue that it improves the flavor, particularly of black teas, by keeping the boiled water hotter, longer, thus effecting how the tea steeps.
Of course, as with pretty much everything to do with tea, you’ll find people arguing on every side, with, for instance, many feeling that pre-warming the teapot hurts the flavor of lighter teas. Others argue it actually makes no difference, regardless of what type of tea it makes and it’s just all in people’s heads. Still others think even black teas taste better with the water quickly cooled a bit from boiling temperature via having to warm up the teapot too while the tea steeps.
4) Make your tea strong: On this point, Orwell was adamant, even though at the time Britain had been rationing tea to only 2 ounces of loose tea per person per week. How strong did he like it? About six heaping teaspoons worth for a one quart pot. While how much heaping is done will vary how much this actually is, following Orwell’s advice would have meant people would be using the majority of their entire week’s ration on a single one quart pot of tea. With regards to the issue, Orwell felt that “one strong cup of tea is better than twenty weak ones.” He also claimed that each year, true tea lovers almost always continued to increase the strength of their tea from what they steeped the year before.
5) Tea should steep loose: Orwell believed that any restriction on the free flow of tea leaves in the teapot, even those “dangling baskets under the spout,” prevents the tea from infusing properly. He also notes people shouldn’t be concerned with swallowing tea leaves as one can do so in “considerable quantities without ill effect.”
6) The water should be boiling…
The post How To Make a Proper Cup of Tea According to Famed English Author George Orwell appeared first on FeedBox.