Tea Tips

Have you ever had to calculate the appropriate sum for a tip after dining out? Did you know that tips and tea go together?

Tea came into high fashion in England after King Charles II took the throne with his wife Catherine de Braganza. Both growing up in other parts of Europe conditioned them to the taste and tradition of taking tea. As time passed, consumption of the beverage increased greatly (going from 40,000 pounds to 240,000 pounds in a ten year span).

Tea was defined as either "low" (or "afternoon") tea or "high" tea. Ironically, "low" tea was held by the upper class and served around 4:00 pm. This was viewed more as a snack and consisted of only light refreshments(it should be noted that they typically only had two meals previous to this trend, dinner being held at 8:00pm). Whereas the middle and lower classes held the "high" tea at either 5 or 6 in the evening and served with a wide variety of foods. Why the difference in "height" for the teas? It was determined by the table at which teas were offered: the "low" table of a coffee table or the "high" table of the dinner table.

Interestingly enough, tea gardens came upon the scene and boxes were made to hold monetary contributions for a waiter in order to gain faster service as the kitchens were far removed from these gardens. These boxes were marked "T.I.P.S": an abbreviation for "To Insure Prompt Service."

This is just a summary of an article found at The Jane Austen Centre. Poke around through the rest of the site to find interesting tidbits of the era, including fashion and history!

I hope you will join me for a "high tea" (minus the tea) this Tuesday at 7:00pm at Amanda Hall(I know, extremely inventive, isn't it?)