Despite being British I grew up not liking tea at all. It wasn't until got fed up with constantly having to turn down offers of tea and coffee (I didn't drink either), and being bored with the usual things offered instead (orange cordial/juice or maybe hot chocolate) that I decided to force myself to expand and see if I could acquire a taste for both tea and coffee.
Coffee, as it turns out, was the easiest to jump into. Far easier. Addictive much?
I struggled to find an enjoyable tea, though, until one day, in a Japanese restaurant I ordered a green tea and instead of what I expected - having to force it down in the hopes of acquiring a taste for it - whatever they served me was exquisite! I genuinely enjoyed the tea. It was one of the best drinks I'd ever had.
So that was it. Off I went on a journey of finding teas that I might actually like. At first my tea drinking didn't really give me much help in common social settings because I found that I only liked green tea, and more specifically, good quality Japanese green tea. (Aside - there are so many awful green teas out there being drunk like some kind of weight-loss/anti-oxidant medicine that I find most people have no clue what a good green tea tastes like, and that's almost a tragedy.) Slowly though, I've expanded my tastes and found a good number of teas that I can enjoy. Coffee remains my go-to social drink because, sadly, most people only have 'British' teas which are almost always black teas and I'm just not a fan of most of them, so I go with coffee since it seems easier to find a palatable coffee at people's homes than it does tea. Nevertheless, it's been wonderful to begin exploring the pleasures of tea and I'm really only just beginning.
It's had me thinking lately, though. Tea is the quintessential British beverage, and yet, with the soaring popularity of coffee, coffee machines, different varieties of coffee, coffee shops etc. could it be that there's now more common knowledge about the preparation of coffee and the pursuit of 'good' coffee than there is tea? Has tea been relegated to only a single form of preparation - kettle, mug, milk, sugar, tea bag? The teapot seems to have disappeared from many homes, especially in the younger generations, and been replaced with a cafetiere, mocha pot, Nespresso machine and who knows what else.
There seems to be more awareness of blends of coffee, countries of origin, and methods of preparation etc. than types of tea and their preparation methods - which are, in general, far simpler, less technical processes but also requiring more patience than with coffee.
Is the art of tea making being lost, have people forgotten what it is to enjoy a really, really good cup of tea?
Anyone care to chirp in?
Anyone got any favourite tea types or preparation methods they'd care to share?