Postings of the past III

Tea time!

Who among us has not gone to a tea shop or steeped your own at home? In fact with all the thingy-bobs to make your tea in or with, its a miracle that anyone even uses the stove still to brew their own leaves. Of course I still use a stove, call me old-fashioned, I know I am!

Back in the 1800s there were no thingy-bobs to plug in, no plastic drainey-bobs, and in fact there were no bobs at all, take my word for it. 

"Afternoon Tea is a tea-related ritual, introduced in Britain in the early 1840s. It evolved as a mini meal to stem the hunger and anticipation of an evening meal at 8pm.Afternoon Tea is a meal composed of sandwiches (usually cut delicately into 'fingers'), scones with clotted cream and jam, sweet pastries and cakes. Interestingly, scones were not a common feature of early Afternoon Tea and were only introduced in the twentieth century."

 Gasp! Okay, I am gasping at two things, 1) Eating at 8pm! Nobody in our household does that! (Correction: nobody in our household does that often enough for me to confess it). 2) How could you not have scones! For me afternoon tea started in my grandmother's kitchen, with lots of cousins and, of course, grandma. She would be baking cookies and such (scones) and we cousins would be salivating like little starving puppies, we weren't starving, but we were pretty adorable, like puppies.
Grandma always let us help when she was in the kitchen, and for me I always anticipated licking the spoon and then, finally, enjoying what we had spent the morning making.

Grandma had wonderful collections of tea dishes and linens, some that she crafted but most were made by my great-grandmother. The best part, some of them I've gotten through the years.

As a child, the tea and crumpets, as we grew up calling them, were the best. But today, I have a hard time picking favorites. Peach Iced Tea served with Cranberry & Turkey sandwich, Cucumber and Dill sandwiches, Cream Tuna over biscuits, Lemon Bar Cookies, scones, scones, and any other sweets that accompanied the meal (scones).

Looking back at the memories and keepsakes, of which there are many, the best keepsakes are the linens. Though they are well used and showing some age, it is remarkable how well crafted they are. The women who owned them before I wanted fine things for the home, but with the cost of life and living it was most often more economical to use leftover cotton and linen to make and embroider decorative linen for the home. 

As a child I did not realize the time, love, and effort that went into these items, but now that I'm grown I can see the treasures that they are. Feeling the tatted edges I can recall watching my grandmother rocking in her chair by the fireplace, her fingers working away at some beautiful creation. And how happy that I have both the creations she and my great-grandmother made and the rocking chair they made them in. 

May you find comfort in your tea cup (and scones)!