Tea - a constant in life

For me anyway, and I suspect for thousands (millions?) of other English bods.

This morning, I was beyond dismayed to discover there was NO tea left. I knew this point had been approaching but was unaware of quite how soon . . .
You can buy tea in France; it mainly comes in yellow boxes, marked, not surprisingly 'Yellow Label' and you can order it cafés where it is generally served thus: tea bag placed next to a cup of almost hot water, with, if you have asked for milk, a small jug of boiling milk. Occasionally you may have the luck to be presented with the bag IN a teapot containing very hot water, in which case you're heading vaguely in the right direction of 'a nice cup of tea.'
A Nice Cup Of Tea.
Oh, those words . . . how many times have I heard them spoken in so many different situations.
A stressful day - kettle on, 'let's have a N. C. O. T'. Just about any police drama where someone is being conveyed bad news - 'would you like a cup of tea, dear?' Visiting friends, visiting strangers, someone's come to fix your sink, - would you like a . . .  standing on a windswept, damp train platform, trapped in an endless meeting or weeping into a sandwich at a funeral wake; if tea is available everything somehow seems bearable.
Tea is an addiction; one that started for me at around the age of twelve. I can recall the sound of the kettle being put on the ancient green enamel stove we had in the flat; the weedy whistle and the occasional swearing if my mother had forgotten and had come back to a white hot, boiled dry vessel.
Tea has accompanied me through life in its various forms, from builder's creosote in London Cafés through to occasional indulgences in Fortnum and Mason's and other hallowed tea emporiums.
The apex cup must have been in a National Trust Tearoom in Corfe Castle, Dorset: white cup, accompanying scones, clotted cream, strawberry jam, log fire and slanting rain outside.
So, back to our dog and onion-smelling kitchen; no tea, other than Lapsang - I like this but it doesn't fill the N.C.O.T desire. I might have to go and buy a box of yellow label . . .

                            Our tea canister (sadly empty) and Butlin's caddy spoon, circa 1948

                             A link to a great site all about a nice cup of tea and a sit down

Mugs

Where did mugs come from?
Like duvets, they just somehow crept into everyones' lives and took over: feathers in a bag rather than blankets, tea in a small bucket as appose to a cup and saucer.
They are practical I suppose, and sometimes comforting - cold hands wrapped around a steaming MUG is a different thing to cup, saucer, index finder, thumb and, if you like, little finger extended in manner of Vicar partaking of tea, in Sunday afternoon dramas.
Over the years, I have kept a small (very small) mental study going, of what makes the mug experience good, bad or indifferent. As an ardent tea drinker - now restricted to three cups a day, sadly, due to caffeine (or whatever the tea equivalent is) making me more than usually removed from sensible behaviour.
So the findings of this non-funded study:

White china is good. Non-white inside of mug, not good; whether it be buttercup-yellow, acid-green or homely terracotta.
Shade of white: (yes, there are hundreds) friendly off-white, or ivory – if you are feeling Interiors magazine-ish, bordering on cream, best.
Shape: Ah, now, probably the most important thing.
Slightly rounded, good, but nothing silly like a barrel shape; no 1980s severe, cone-shaped things with painful spiky handles. Good honest greasy-spoon café type shape is great - off white, with a nice round handle that you can tuck your index finger into, while you wait for the egg, bacon, beans and buttery white toast.

These are our present mugs.
No one else seems to give a poop what they drink out of in our house, but to me it does make a difference, so from the left:

1/ Silly mug that came from a sex shop in Bournemouth - think I just went in because I'd never been in one. Why they had mugs in there next to the pink and purple rubbery things, I don't know.
Two much colour on it for me, but fun to give to vegetarians. (I love animals - they taste so good).

2/ Probably my favourite: old now, it came from a supermarket for two euros - the embodiment of comfort-mug, to me anyway: off white, gently rounded, quite chunky china, but not too chunky.

3/ Cheap offering from supermarket, recently. I thought I liked it, but it's too small, and too Persil- white.

4/ Good café shaped one, but a bit too small, and a blue-white that feels distinctly cold - not good.

5/ This is actually my favourite one: from a second hand shop, just a bit too small for the times of really needing a 'nice cup of tea and a sit down' but I love it's friendly orange 1970s-ness.

6/ We have several of these; they came from an appalling shop somewhere on the outskirts of Toulouse, when I had gone to buy bed-linen and discovered that Ikea, was SHUT!
Basically, a good colour, interesting ridgy effect, but dangerous, in that they are lacking in base-weight and liable to fall over . . . usually on this computer keyboard.


Link to a very wonderfully silly site all about tea and biscuits.

http://www.nicecupofteaandasitdown.com