CONTINENTAL TEA

This is going to irritate some people, but the fact of the matter is that continentals just don't know how to make tea.

Continentals. What a wonderfully pejorative English word, summing up a millennium of island prejudice! A famous, though probably apocryphal, 19th century newspaper headline was "Fog in Channel; Continent Cut Off". That gives a good idea of where British people view the centre of the European land mass. It's an open question whether Ireland, another island on the edge of Europe, should be lumped in with the continentals or not. If tea is anything to go by, probably not, since they make it as we do.

As I say, tea is not good on the continent. How many times have you been in a cafe or hotel, even good or very good cafes and hotels, and been presented with a cup of hot water with a tea bag hanging miserably over the edge? In Denmark they use a big long thing that looks remarkably like a condom, and which is just as yukky after use. My wife, a big tea drinker, has accepted after years of badgering from me that this object is not a good idea, and now religiously buys vast quantities of Yorkshire tea (fresh from all those Yorkshire tea estates?) whenever she visits the U.K.

The proper way to make tea is to start with a proper teapot. Teabags are OK, but fresh tea leaves are even better. One teaspoon per person and one for the pot is the saying from my childhood ringing in my ears. Then you let it brew. Meanwhile, you prepare a separate pot of hot water, which will top up the tea after the first round of pourings. If you don't like tea leaves getting in your teeth, then you can pour the liquid into your cup through a tea strainer. Personally, I like using my teeth, since you end up with a pattern in the bottom, which can be "read". My Aunty Betty, not a real aunt but my brother's godmother, used to read tea leaves, one of the reasons why visiting her was always quite exciting.

I don't know why this is so difficult for continentals, since they have no problems with coffee. Like the absence of Marmite and Branston Pickle, it is all a bit of a puzzle.

Walter Blotscher