There's Tea, and Then There's Tea

Boy, has it been hot! We love unsweetened ice tea with mint in my house, and brew our own from loose tea because it tastes better (especially with mint from the garden)...and have been consuming nearly two gallons every day among us! So I thought a little background on tea, both the beverage and the meal, might be fun. This post first ran in April 2009.

Don't forget that next week the Young Bluestockings will be visiting the cinema (preferably air-conditioned!) and discussing the movie Bright Star. Have you had a chance to watch it yet?

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Ah, tea…that most English of meals...but which meal is it?

Well, that kind of depends.

Tea was introduced in England as early as 1635, but didn’t become fashionable until the 1660s, when King Charles II married the Portuguese princess Catherine of Braganza. Tea drinking was already established in Portugal, and Catherine brought tea and her beautiful porcelain tea services to enjoy in her new home…and soon, drinking tea was the height of fashion. It remained an extremely expensive luxury item for several decades, but by 1725 a quarter of a million pounds was being imported annually, and tea shops had begun to make their appearance. Tea also began to replace beer and ale as the usual drink of the poor; the abolition of import duties helped this, so that by the beginning of the 19th century, tea was well on its way to becoming the national beverage.

In the 18th and early 19th centuries among the upper classes, tea was often drunk in the evening after dinner, around 9 pm, and served with light refreshments like cakes and sandwiches. When you were eating your dinner at 4 pm, this made some sense…but as hours changed for meals and dinner moved later and later, this habit made a switch…and at some point around the 1830s or so, it started to become fashionable to have tea and light refreshments in the afternoon instead, to sustain one between luncheon at one or two and dinner at 8:30 or 9. At first it was simply something one did as a quick, informal pick-me-up, but gradually sociable ladies figured out that drinking tea and nibbling delicate cakes with friends in the late afternoon was the perfect opportunity for reviewing the gossip of the day and preparing for the gossip of whatever party or ball would be taking place that night. And thus was born the afternoon tea.

That’s one kind of tea…but there is another—namely, high tea. Most Americans hear this term and assume it means an especially fancy, formal kind of afternoon tea, perhaps with extra-elaborate munchies, but in fact it means the exact opposite. High tea was and is more or less a supper-ish kind of meal consumed by working class families. Tea was certainly drunk, but the food was of a hearty, filling nature like toasted bread and cheese, or kippered herrings, or bacon and eggs, or sausages, all served with copious amounts of bread and butter—no tiny delicate pastries here!

So if you were a young lady in London for the season, your tea would probably be drunk at a friend's house some time around four, while you nibbled seed cake and planned the evening's fun...and if you were an apprentice seamstress, you'd have your tea when you got home from work at around six, while you rested your tired feet and enjoying something warm and nourishing.

And that's tea!

Not Exactly Fast Food

Please give a warm Nineteen Teen welcome to Mandy Hubbard, author of the adorable Prada and Prejudice, which hit stores this week! Mandy offers us insight into some of the more interesting aspects of mealtime. Enjoy!

First of all, thanks so much to Regina and Marissa for hosting me! Research is never my favorite part of writing (unless it’s watching a movie like Pride and Prejudice and drooling over Colin Firth) so I love Nineteen Teen, because I can get a little research in at a time.

In Prada and Prejudice, Callie Montgomery is a modern girl who ends up in 1815. One of her biggest challenges is navigating meal times, because she’s never sure what it is on her plate! I myself am not a very adventurous person when it comes to food—I’d be out of place at a fine dining establishment, never mind 1815!

While writing, I saved a number of recipes that I thought might disgust Callie, so I thought I’d share one of the more, em, interesting ones. (Courtesy of: http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~awoodley/recipes/order.html)

A Calves Head Hash
Your calves head being slit and cleansed half boiled, cold cut one side into thin slices, fry it in a pan of brown butter then toss pan on the stove with a pt of gravy, as much strong broth, a quarter of a pt of claret, as much white wine, a handful of savory balls, 2 or 3 shivered pallats, a pt of oysters, cocks combs, lambstones, and sweet breads boiled and blanched, sliced with mushroom truffles, Murrells, 2 or 3 anchovies, as many shallots, and faggot of sweet herbs tossed up, stewed together. Season it with savory spice, then scotch. Ye other side cross, cross flour baste, and broil it.

The Hash being thickened with brown butter, put it in the dish. Lay over and about it fried balls of the tongue sliced, larded with bacon, lemon peel, and beetroot, then fry in batter of eggs sliced sweetbreads, sippets, and oysters and lay in the head and place these on and about the dish and garnish it with sliced orange and lemon.

Can you imagine a girl who is used to McDonald’s and pizza sitting down and seeing a calf’s head staring back at her? EWWW.

Another interesting thing to note is that wealthy households cooked far more than they could ever eat—at least at the main table. It wasn’t uncommon to have ten items in each course! Callie had to learn to pace herself throughout the meal, picking at each course as she waited for the next one to arrive.

Lastly, I found it interesting that the kitchen and the dining room were never adjacent. Aristocrats did not want to smell the scents wafting in from the kitchen or hear the clanging of pots and plates. Servants had to race from the kitchen to the table to ensure it didn’t get cold before they served it!

I never envied the poor footmen trying to keep things warm and still get there on time! Thanks for joining us, Mandy!

There's Tea, and Then There's Tea

Ah, tea…that most English of meals...but which meal is it?

Well, that kind of depends.

Tea was introduced in England as early as 1635, but didn’t become fashionable until the 1660s, when King Charles II married the Portuguese princess Catherine of Braganza. Tea drinking was already established in Portugal, and Catherine brought tea and her beautiful porcelain tea services to enjoy in her new home…and soon, drinking tea was the height of fashion. It remained an extremely expensive luxury item for several decades, but by 1725 a quarter of a million pounds was being imported annually, and tea shops had begun to make their appearance. Tea also began to replace beer and ale as the usual drink of the poor; the abolition of import duties helped this, so that by the beginning of the 19th century, tea was well on its way to becoming the national beverage.

In the 18th and early 19th centuries among the upper classes, tea was often drunk in the evening after dinner, around 9 pm, and served with light refreshments like cakes and sandwiches. When you were eating your dinner at 4 pm, this made some sense…but as hours changed for meals and dinner moved later and later, this habit made a switch…and at some point around the 1830s or so, it started to become fashionable to have tea and light refreshments in the afternoon instead, to sustain one between luncheon at one or two and dinner at 8:30 or 9. At first it was simply something one did as a quick, informal pick-me-up, but gradually sociable ladies figured out that drinking tea and nibbling delicate cakes with friends in the late afternoon was the perfect opportunity for reviewing the gossip of the day and preparing for the gossip of whatever party or ball would be taking place that night. And thus was born the afternoon tea.

That’s one kind of tea…but there is another—namely, high tea. Most Americans hear this term and assume it means an especially fancy, formal kind of afternoon tea, perhaps with extra-elaborate munchies, but in fact it means the exact opposite. High tea was and is more or less a supper-ish kind of meal consumed by working class families. Tea was certainly drunk, but the food was of a hearty, filling nature like toasted bread and cheese, or kippered herrings, or bacon and eggs, or sausages, all served with copious amounts of bread and butter—no tiny delicate pastries here!

So if you were a young lady in London for the season, your tea would probably be drunk at a friend's house some time around four, while you nibbled seed cake and planned the evening's fun...and if you were an apprentice seamstress, you'd have your tea when you got home from work at around six, while you rested your tired feet and enjoying something warm and nourishing.

And that's tea!

Nuncheon, Anyone?

So, after that sumptuous breakfast Marissa described, how could you possibly be hungry for lunch?

The answer is that many folks weren’t all that hungry in the middle of the day, at least at first. As Marissa mentioned, breakfast was often later in the morning (around 10). At the beginning of the nineteenth century, dinner was often around 1:00 in the afternoon, so people didn’t need lunch. But as dinner got pushed back later and later (from 3 to 6), people needed a little something in between.

And thus luncheon was born! According to some experts, the term lunch was considered vulgar, and the term most often used early in the century was nuncheon, which may have been pronounced noon-shine. Whatever you called it, the food was laid out on a sideboard in the dining room, and you could pick from cold meats like ham and roast beef, pickles, fruit preserves (like jelly only you ate it with a spoon instead of spread it on bread), and dessert-type items like cakes, buns, and tarts, all washed down with ale or tea. You might even grab up a sandwich of bread, meat, and cheese.

At least in some circles, however, luncheon was considered the resort of old men, young mothers, and children, in other words, those who were not strong enough to make it through the day without a little pick-me-up. And it was definitely a family affair—one did not invite guests to lunch as one did to breakfasts or dinners.

One might, however, offer callers something to eat. Sometimes that included tea. But British high tea as we know it was a whole other affair. Come back Tuesday when Marissa tells us the torrid truth about tea.

In the meantime, I had to point this out, just in case you hadn't heard: Marvel Comics has issued Pride and Prejudice as a graphic novel! The beloved story was adapted by Nancy Hajeski aka Nancy Butler, an absolutely amazing writer and winner of the Romance Writers of America’s coveted Rita award for best Regency romance. I haven’t found a copy near me yet, so if anyone reads it, tell us what you think, please!

Steak and Ale: They're Not Just for Breakfast Anymore

Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. They seem so universal…so logical, don’t they?

But the fact is, the timing (and content!) of meals have varied throughout history, and our three-meal system of early morning breakfast, a light meal at mid-day, and a hearty one in the early evening is, relatively speaking, a newfangled invention. Today, as you might have guessed, I’m going to talk about breakfast.

The history of eating a meal upon waking up or shortly thereafter is a varied one. Often it was considered a meal to be eaten only by people who worked at farming or other hard labor, while gentlemen (who weren't going to be doing any labor much harder than coining witticisms) contented themselves with one substantial meal at about 11:00 am and another in the evening. But by the 18th and early 19th centuries breakfast was back in fashion, usually eaten sometime between 9am and 11am. What was served at it, though, varied. Earlier on, hearty foods were favored: pork chops with mustard are mentioned as a breakfast item in one Jane Austen novel, and a beefsteak washed down with ale was also popular. Yes, ale for breakfast…but don’t forget that the ale of the time was lower in alcohol content than today’s—and in an era when drinking plain water was considered possibly injurious to one’s health, beer, wine, and ale were what everyone drank until tea gradually replaced them.

Others preferred something similar to what we call a “continental” breakfast today: toast and/or other breads, cakes, or rolls with butter and perhaps marmalade; tea, chocolate, or coffee; and, season permitting, fruit. This lighter breakfast might be taken in the privacy of one’s bedchamber or in a small dining parlor called, amazingly, a breakfast room; in general, the mood was quiet and informal, and it was perfectly permissable to ignore other breakfasters and read the newspaper instead.

Later on, by mid-century, a more substantial meal was enjoyed by those who could afford it—and with the growth of the middle classes in England, more could. Isabella Beeton’s Book of Household Management, first published in 1861, suggests cold meat, ham, potted meat or fish (a sort of seasoned paste), cold fowl, game or meat pies, broiled fish or mutton chops, steaks, kidneys, sausages, bacon, ham, boiled or poached eggs, omelettes, toast, butter, and marmalade. Later in the century, they could get even more elaborate: here’s a suggested breakfast menu for 1881 from Things a Lady Would Like to Know by Henry Southgate: broiled haddock, potted ham, sheeps’ tongues, pig’s cheek, cold roast fowl, ham, cold grouse, rolled tongue, cold partridges, scalloped cod, kippered salmon, tea, coffee, or cocoa, bread and butter, milk and cream.

Gulp. Pass the cornflakes, will you?

Moving to the Big Table

Marissa and I are about to embark on a new series on something near and dear to everyone’s heart: meals! (Yes, meals. It will be fun--trust us!) But before we tell you all about the delectable foods and entertaining traditions surrounding breakfast, luncheon, tea, dinner, and midnight suppers for young people in nineteenth century England, we thought we ought to set the stage a bit.

You see, for much of her life, a young lady wouldn’t even have been at the table!

For many upper-crust families, and even for the burgeoning middle class, children spent their time in another part of the house entirely. A nurse, nanny, or governess would accommodate meals sent up from the kitchen and perhaps served by a nurse maid or under footman, and the children would eat in the schoolroom or nursery. An indulgent Mama and Papa might visit the nursery and take tea with their children, but the adults were sure to be at the big table for any major meal. So when you were invited to dine with them, it was a Big Deal, and served as yet another symbol that you were growing up.

Now, every family had its own rules on when it was time to graduate to the big table, and some families were far more forgiving than others. You might move up for family meals only when you were old enough to sit and behave properly at table. You might move up when you were in your early teens and needed practice in dining with Society. You might not move up until you were officially out. And in some families, you might not move up until you were deemed sufficiently interesting to provide good dinner conversation!


This painting of the Ruspoli family from Italy (1806) illustrates some of the reasons why Mama and Papa might think twice about inviting the urchins to dine. The young lad at Mama’s elbow cannot even stay in his seat and is ready to demand second helpings, the young lady across from her has crumbled her crumpets onto the damask tablecloth and is seriously considering feeding the remainders to Fidolphus the family pet, and things are generally in an uproar, something to be avoided at all costs by the elegant members of the aristocracy and those who sought to copy them. And when you remember that washing still consisted of the laundress brushing, rubbing, and beating the material into submission, you can see why a few spills could be a major tragedy.

Ah, but life at the big table was full of surprises and delights. Tune in next week when Marissa and I give you the dish on dining (okay, you probably saw that pun coming).