Remember the 'reduce single-use plastics resolution? We are still on it. They have stopped buying tea bags sealed in crispy plastic stuff pretending to be a metal foil, and found a shop that sells real loose tea, in paper bags.
A pound of tea.
When did you last buy tea by the pound (or loose tea by any other weight for that matter)?
There is a wooden 5lb tea box somewhere amongst F's possessions. It's old.
Break out the tea pots.
Mr B drinks green tea, with or without flavours. Lemon, and Earl Grey seem to be his preferred. This shop has both. So when his teabags ran out we sauntered down there, I minded the Donkey (and Mr B stood by as my minder in case I drew a crowd) while F chose some tea. I could smell it all the way home.
F also bought these:
I think she has let us down. With Mr B, I watched a factory program on TV the other night. They were making teabags. Teabag paper is 25% plastic. It is made that way so they can heat seal the edges of the teabags. These empty ones have sealed edges.
Some tea bags come folded and stitched (with a string and a tag). There is an even chance those ones don't have plastic in them.
Did your grandma have one of those metal things on a chain (or a teaspoon-like handle) that had holes in it so you could trap tea inside and dunk it in your cup? Can you still get those things?
Guess who is filling and stitching teabags this week? It certainly ain't me.
I have one of those metal balls on a chain somewhere
ReplyDeleteI like lady grey tea I have it just plain no milk or sugar
Love your funky tea pots
No, neither of my grandmothers had the metal tea strainers funnily enough but my dad does drink redbush tea.
ReplyDeleteHari Om
ReplyDeleteooooooh a subject dear to my tastebuds; I am a real 'tea jenny'! The shelf above my kettle has eight tins/boxes each with something different. You ask, "When did you last buy tea by the pound (or loose tea by any other weight for that matter)?"... just before Christmas, as it happens! I bought 200gms of Lasang Souchong and savour a cup of that once or twice a week. My Earl Grey is also loose. My everyday tea is Clipper Organic... lovely tea and plastic-free bags in fully recyclable box... but bags are wrapped in the fake foil stuff!!! Really annoying. Lots of companies are getting the message and working on it though... Here's a good read! Hugs and wags, YAM-aunty xxx
...I forgot to mention a most delicious Rose tea (loose) by Twinings, in a gorgeous wee tin... and I had a ball and chain, that broke. You can still get them, but as I have three individual strainers of different types, couldn't really justify another item! Yxx
DeleteF used to drink lapsang souchong before tea starting doing bad things to her. She likes the smell. Funny how you can drink tea 6 times a day for years and never get tired of it. Herbal concoctions are nice occasionally but imagine drinking liquorice and nettle 6 times a day forever.....Thank heavens for redbush.
DeleteHari OM
DeleteI had redbush as my after midday tea for quite a while before I twigged that it was that which was giving me the heartburn and not anything I was eating!!! Yes, weird. I love the taste, but that tea does not like me. In non-caffiene selection at the moment I have Pukka 'Night', Twinings Turmeric and Ginger, Pukka Nettle and Fennel and a supermarket fruit-tutti something or other. Yxx
I always wander around Mandragora when we visit Piraeus. It has so many lovely smells and things you just can't find anywhere else, for us at least.
ReplyDeleteThat 'teashaker' is available. My daughter bought one for a friend who drinks loose tea. However, can't think where she found it. Jumbo often has odd kitchen stuff but it's a real hassle finding it in their huge stores....which are probably closed anyway.
Online?
Mr B can be relied upon to investigate, locate, order.... even before you have time to explain you were only musing about.... F hates supporting the empire of the world's wealthiest man and would rather wait until small shops open again.
DeleteI wonder why they don't put tea in big cans like coffee comes in. My coffee is 2.5 lbs in a large can. the only tea i used to drink was iced tea, in the south of USA iced tea was and is a staple. mother used to put the loose tea in a small pot and boil it and strain into the container and add water and lots of sugar.
ReplyDeleteI keep black tea bags for when i get a stomach ache, tea really helps with that. i had no idea the bags have plastic. ugh... we have a garden here, and inside they have a tea shop, and they sell loose tea of every kind, also little pots and the metal balls. my friend bought the pot, the ball and the tea.
Oddly enough I bought lots of loose tea in lockdown - I find the ritual of making it soothing and the 'real leaves' to be so much better than the 'dust' of tea bags. I'm lucky, there is proper 'tea merchant' in Brecon near where I live.
ReplyDeleteF can't drink tea any more - it does weird things to her mouth. She misses it and has been caught sniffing up the smell from tea leaves. Hence the switch to redbush (which isn't a tea - just a 'brew')
DeleteAs a child I remember we always had loose tea brewed in a big old brown teapot and poured through a tea strainer. These days I am ashamed to say that we buy tea bags for convenience, although I do think now and then that we should revert back to loose tea. I would have to buy a proper tea strainer though.
ReplyDeleteWe buy t bags for convenience and can't remember when (or even if) these tea pots have been used before. Teamaking becomes a time cosuming process, but it makes us realize that labour saving improvements just change the time you spend doing one thing (like brewing tea) into time you spend doing something else - like typing for instance.
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