St. Sam's and St. Bede's Recipe Pages
                Bon Appetit!
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Proper Cuppa Tea

Water should come just to the boil. 
Bring the pot to the kettle, not the other way around.

When kettle starts making noise, pour a bit of the hot water into the pot
and swish it around to warm the pot. Toss water.

As water continues to heat in kettle, put tea iinto pot. General rule is
"one teaspoon per person and one for the pot". In my experience, this means
an English teaspoon because using American teaspoons would make the tea
strong enough to trot a mouse on (YMMV). Loose tea is preferable to tea
bags. If you use a tea ball, make sure it's mesh otherwise the tea and the
boiling water will never be properly introduced. You can put the loose tea
in the pot; but remember to use a strainer, and to top off the pot after you
pour a round of tea. Otherwise you run the risk of stewed tea. Grace Tea
company offers small folded bags into which loose tea can be put; after you
finish brewiing the tea, fish out the bag and toss it. Very handy!

Brewing time for tea depends upon taste and blend. Generally 3 to 5 minutes.
One book advises reciting Psalm 51, which takes barely 3 minutes if read
ponderously, and will make one long for a cheery cup of tea even more. Blend
depends upon taste and perhaps time of day. Yorkshire tea (Hi, +Tony+) is
fine for the morning but maybe a mild Ceylon for the afternoon. There's one
blend out there called "Demitasse Tea" for after dinner.

Tea cozies are excellent for keeping the tea warm and, well, cozy! They also
make excellent bishop mitres, just ask the Rev.Ann Markle or visit the
photos of the PB Installation party on the St Sam's Web page. A whole host
of tea cozies in one picture, as I recall!

When making tea for the multitudes, best to make a concentrate; put a bit in
a cup and fill with very hot water.

Diana, daring to describe this process knowing there are British folks on
the list who have it ingrained in their psyche.

Date: Tue, 6 Mar 2001 
From: "Diana Smith" 
Subject: Re: I love coffee, I love tea....