English Breakfast Tea

Ingredients

• a cup and a half of water
• a heaping teaspoonful of tea

Method

1. 1

   Fill the teapot with boiling water and the kettle with cold water.

2. 2

   When the kettle boils, empty the teapot and add a heaping teaspoon of tea for each person, allowing a cup and a half of water.

3. 3

   Cover and let stand for five to ten minutes before pouring.

Nutrition per serving

As published

This recipe was extracted from Cooking and castle-building (1880) by Emma P. Ewing, Marietta McPherson Greenough, page 36. The excerpt below is the record exactly as published.

English breakfast tea and dry toast, wrote : — " When do you expect to find leisure for that long-promised cook-book? I do hope you will write it soon, and will give such minute directions in it for making both tea and toast, that no one can fail to understand them. Strange as it may seem, our best cook-books are ominously silent, or hopelessly bewildering, about the methods of making either ; and I pray you to step to the front, and furnish the much-needed information. It would appear, at first blush, as if any one might make good tea or good toast without instruction ; yet it is a singular fact, that at the average table one is about as great a rarity as the other. I con- fess to a weakness for Uhe cup that cheers but does not inebriate,' for, to my taste, no other bev- erage is so delicious as well-made tea ; but for the sloppy, bitter, or smoky-tasting decoctions that are foisted upon us at hotels, restaurants, and private houses, under that name, I have the most inefiable contempt. It is an insult to any decent stomach to force into it the wretched slops so barbarously extracted from the Chinese herb. I write feel- ingly on this subject, for it has been my privilege to drink tea properly made, and fragrant memo- 90 COOKING AND CASTLE-BUILDING. ries of the delicious flavor linger with nic, ellect- iially spoiling my relish for the common, vile decoction. " As for dry toast, I dare say no woman w^ould be willing to confess she did not know how to toast bread ; yet my experience is, that good toast is the exception. Bad bread, scorched or burned, and sent to the table cold and tough, is as unin- viting a dish as can be served ; while a, plate of crisp, hot toast, properly prepared, is more appe- tizing and tempting to the average man than the danticst of hot cakes or muifins. Give me a cup of nice coflce or tea, with a plate of crisp, richly- browned toast, and firm, golden butter, for my morning or evening meal, and I wdll be content with ayiy relish you choose to add — even chipped beef; or I will be satisfied with tea and toast alone, if both are at their level best. " Do make haste and enlighten the world about tea and toast. For so doing, you will deserve its everlasting gratitude, and shall have, at least, that of Cousin John." " Poor John ! it is too bad that a folorn old bachelor can't have the small comfort to be found in tea and toast," observed Emeline, as I finished reading the letter. " I hope you will comply with his requests. Your toast is always perfection itself, and I think even Cousin John would be quite satisfied with the English breakfast tea you BREAKFAST-TABLE GOSSIP. 91 give US here, Kate ; for I never drank finer, even in England. How long do you boil it, and how do you manage always to liaA'e it just right ? " " I do not boil it at all. And following precisely the same method of makhig every time, why should the quality of the tea vary ? I think it would be safer for a careless, inattentive cook to boil the tea, if it did not boil more than a minute, for to make it without boiling, three requisites must be faithfully observed. The pot must be as hot, when the tea is put into it, as boiling water can make it. The water must be boiling when poured upon the tea, and the tea must stand, before being poured, from five to ten minutes. This is the recipe I shall give for making English breakfast tea : Ten or fifteen minutes before mak- ing the tea, fill the teapot with boiling water, and the tea-kettle with cold water, freshly drawn. It makes a vast difference with the quality of the tea whether it is made of water freshly boiled or of stale water that has stood in the kettle and been re-boiled, until all the sparkle and life have gone out of it. As soon as the kettle boils, empty the tea-pot, rinsing it with boiling water. Put into it a heaping teaspoonful of tea to each person, allow- ing a cup and a half of water

Cook this with the app: pantry check, scaling, and the assistant.