An American scientist has sparked a trans-Atlantic tempest in a teapot by offering Britain advice on its favorite hot beverage.

An American scientist has sparked a trans-Atlantic tempest in a teapot by offering Britain advice on its favorite hot beverage.

Bryn Mawr College chemistry professor Michelle Francl says one of the keys to a perfect cup of tea is a pinch of salt. The tip is included in Francl’s book “Steeped: The Chemistry of Tea,” published Wednesday by the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Not since the Boston Tea Party has mixing tea with salt water roiled the Anglo-American relationship so much.

The salt suggestion drew howls of outrage from tea-lovers in Britain, where popular stereotype sees Americans as coffee-swilling boors who make tea, if at all, in the microwave.

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The U.S. Embassy in London intervened in the brewing storm with a social media post reassuring “the good people of the U.K. that the unthinkable notion of adding salt to Britain’s national drink is not official United States policy.”

  • Kraiden@kbin.social
    6·
    10 months ago

    Care to elaborate? I don’t see how having the leaves in a bag is inferior to having them loose

    • marquisalex@feddit.ukEnglish
      14·
      10 months ago

      A decent guide to tea grades here. Even with higher end teabags, any tea dust created (e.g. if the teabag gets squashed) gets trapped inside the bag. The tea dust makes for a more bitter cup.

    • Nacktmull@lemm.eeEnglish
      41·
      10 months ago

      With very few exceptions the tea used in teabags is of much lower quality than loose leaf tea. Often it´s just fannings and dust, swept from the floor.

      • prole@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        Somehow I doubt tea companies are sweeping dust off the floor and putting it in tea bags. C’mon.

        • Nacktmull@lemm.eeEnglish
          1·
          10 months ago

          I am not an expert but I have read about such practices again and again over the years. It´s also common knowledge that food companies do much, much worse things.

          Dust is what remains after the tea has passed through the grading machine. It is powdery in texture and is often swept off the floor. Dust is considered the lowest grade of tea.

          Source: https://teapeople.co.uk/pages/loose-leaf-or-teabags

    • stoly@lemmy.worldEnglish
      21·
      10 months ago

      Tea in bags is pulverized while loose leaf tends to be intact leaves. It changes the flavor.