Your ViewsKeep your e-mails pouring in, it's good to know that there are lots of you out there with views and opinions. To help you work out what is what, are now little icons to help you see biscuit related themes. And now you can see at a glance which are the most contested subjects via this graph (requires Flash 6.0 plugin). Please keep your mails coming in to nicey@nicecupofteaandasitdown.com | If you like, you can use this search thingy to find stuff that matches with any of the icons you pick, or use the fantastic free text search, Yay! | Your e-Mails |
Liz |
I've tried making my own chai before with a sort of loose mixture, and it ended in a (somewhat tasty) disaster. I've just moved to Wisconsin and it's cold enough to warrant a good cup of chai, something I rarely wanted when I lived farther south. Could you offer some sort of recipe?
Regards,
Liz, USA |
Nicey replies: Liz,
Sorry we drink PG Tips. |
| |
Sam |
Hi Mr Nicey,
First let me say that your website is amazing, this is what the internet was invented for. Keep up the good work.... Now my reason for writing.
As an asian born and raised here in the UK, it's fair to say that tea is destined to be in my system. So I would like to share with you my genius invention of making indian tea in less than 10 minutes (It usually takes about 20).
Step 1: Boil water in kettle
Step 2: Pop your teabag and sugar into an empty cup
Step 3: Pour boiling water into the cup and stir 5 times and squeeze the teabag against the inside of the cup to extract the flavour.
Step 4: Pop the cup into the microwave for 1 and a half minutes (700 watt microwave).
Step 5: Add milk and reheat in the microwave until the mixture looks like its ready to boil over. (This is what the light inside the microwave was invented for).
Step 6: Stir the tea and take the teabag out the cup.
Step 7: Open a packet of hobnobs and enjoy!
|
| |
Michelle Simkins |
Dear Nicey, Wifey, and Junior members of staff,
I read your website and newsletter with great delight from my cubicle in the primitive reaches of the Northwestern United States, generally whilst enjoying my afternoon cup of tea (perhaps the sit down bit is redundant, as my job is very sit-downy, but the tea is a welcome distraction, even more so if accompanied by biscuits). (Please allow me to apologize in advance for my tendency to wax verbose. I chalk it up to too much Dickens in college.)
In any case, I nearly lost control of my sip of tea when I read Sam Bushnell's letter on the apparent correlation between a freshly brewed cup of tea and an exuberant exhibition of gymnastics by junior members of staff. I, too, have noticed this phenomenon, but feel it necessary at this point to add that it is not exclusive to children. A hot cup of tea also seems to inspire a fit of unwonted affection in housecats. It never fails; the moment I settle comfortably into the sofa with a fresh cuppa, my lazy and otherwise apathetic Siamese cat is inevitably stricken with a wave of affection which he must immediately express by leaping on to my lap and rubbing his great whiskery face on my cup, and butting his nose against the hand holding said cup. (It also appears that books, magazines, and newspapers all exude an odor of catnip; or at least, this is the only explanation I can imagine for my cat's propensity to spread his substantial girth over the pages of anything I'm trying to read, but this perhaps ought to be reserved for another e-mail to a website about the feline anti-human literacy campaign.) In any case, I love the website, and keep searching for yummy English biscuits (thus far to no avail).
Speaking of biscuits, I must say that in theory I agree whole heartedly with your estimation of the Oreo, but due to excessive exposure at a tender age, I still find myself salivating at the sight of the little buggers. They should not, however, be allowed anywhere near a decent cup of tea. Milk is the only proper accompaniment, or possibly coffee. (Yes, I drink coffee too . . . I AM American, and therefore can't help it.)
Finally, I must express my distress over the ubiquitousness of Lipton "tea". It is, unfortunately, the only actual "tea" offered by my employer, although they provide a great variety of herbal pseudo-teas from a would-be respectable local "tea" distributor. Needless to say, I pack in my own Twinings, hoarding the treasure in my desk and carrying individual bags with my mug in to the break room for hot water. On optimistic days I can at least tell myself that even Lipton is superior to the dreaded beverage vending machine. On dark days--for example, when I've run out of Twinings and am nearly desperate enough to actually partake of Lipton tea--I consider quitting.
Anyway, three cheers for NCOTAASD! Keep up the good work.
Yours,
Michelle Simkins
Portland, Oregon, U.S.A. |
Nicey replies: Yes my old black cat Brian used to head straight for an open newspaper then somehow expand his whole body to cover all the bits you wanted to read. So I just stopped reading the papers. He never spilt my tea though. |
| |
Marilyn Audsley |
Dear Nicey,
I would like to reassure Mark Pennington about drinking tea in the USA. I have quite a lot of male English friends out here who drink tea, and none of them are 'special chaps'. It seems that this is acceptable to the American public because they are British. In fact it seems to be assumed that all British people, regardless of their sex, will drink tea - In an "Oh, your British, so you'll be having tea right?" sort of way. No need to think your masculinity will be slighted by your tea drinking. At least not in Chicago....
Marilyn Audsley |
| |
Rosemary Gault |
I'm not sure that Gavin Mist would be able to get nice cup of tea in germany even if he took his own teabags. I've always found the problem to be that when you ask for a cup of tea, you get given a pot of lukewarm water, a jug of cream and a teabag. If you can persuade someone to pour the boiling water directly on the tea and to replace the cream with milk, the tea is actually quite nice. If you can't do this, just drink the green tea or the stuff they do called kaminfeuer which is quite nice without milk.
Incidentally its worth going to german tea shops to stock up as they sell a huge variety of really really nice loose leaf tea which is tastes fantastic as long as its made in the proper (ie british) fashion. |
| |
|
|
|