Lemon and tea. They go together like, well, like birthday cake and mustard. But that's just my opinion. Yours may vary and for a lot of people lemon is an essential part of the tea-drinking experience. But how did this come to be? It might be a task for a mightier historian than yours truly …
Tag: History of Tea
Early American Tea Drinking
The United States and tea go back a long way, back to the time before there was a United States. The Boston Tea Party was, of course, a pivotal event in American history. But since we've written about this topic a number of times already there's no need to retread that ground much. Tea parties …
Green Tea: The Early Years
When I was a younger feller I was not particularly aware of tea. But I knew enough to know that "tea" and black tea were one and the same. I'm sure there must have been a few people here in the United States - even in those unenlightened days - who drank other types of …
A Very Brief History of Tea Smuggling
Once upon a time, as tea began to make its way to Europe, it was a commodity that wasn't consumed by anyone who was afflicted with shallow pockets. Much, if not most, of the tea shipped there in the early days came from China, which meant a voyage of several months. Add to this the …
Oolong Tea – A Historical Perspective
This will hardly be a thesis, but I thought it might be interesting to get a little bit of historical perspective on oolong, that type of tea that is generally less known than black and green but better known than relatively obscure teas such as white, yellow, and puerh. Needless to say it's not mentioned …
Myths and Legends of the Boston Tea Party
It's been a while since I've been a student, so I don't know what the curricula is like these days. But there was a time when anyone who had passed from the hallowed halls of elementary school had a fairly thorough grounding in that famous incident in American history - the Boston Tea Party. You …
Tea Time With Great Historical Figures
So which great people throughout history drank tea and which did not? This is hardly the place to do an in-depth review of the topic, but we can be pretty sure about the tea drinking habits - or lack thereof - of certain great historical figures based on where and when they lived. It's likely …
When Tea Was Brought to the Western Hemisphere and a Bit of History
We’ve all heard of the Boston Tea Party, but tea came to the Western hemisphere long before that. Time to follow that trail and see just when tea was brought here and by whom. Once upon a time (some say as long as 5,000 years ago), a studier of plants in China was boiling some …
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Green Tea Throughout History
Americans have probably consumed more black tea than any other kind over the course of the past few decades. But one of the more interesting facts I've run across in the years I've been writing about tea is that in earlier times we probably downed as much green tea as the black kind or perhaps …
Jonas Hanway’s Essay on Tea
It's probably not surprising that so many English commentators of yesteryear felt compelled to pick up a pen and share their thoughts about tea. After all, tea was a relative newcomer to their island nation, only turning up in the middle portion of the seventeenth century and not really hitting it big for at least …
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