A confusing aspect of English culture for Americans is how to interpret the meaning of “tea”. A drink, yes? But no, tea can also be a meal. And then there are teatimes with food as well.
 |
| Biscuit tin advertisement: "Morning Tea with no biscuit is not satisfactory" |
Let’s start with teatimes with food. There are tea and biscuits, which can happen even as a wake-up call in the morning (photo), or more normally in the afternoon. Then there is cream tea, which is not tea with cream in it (no, never!). Cream tea is tea with at least scones, butter and jam; but if you’re really lucky, it’s together with scones, clotted cream and jam (clotted cream is like frothy butter and just as rich). Or if you are in southwestern England, it is tea with scones, clotted cream, jam and cake (preferably a large piece of death-by-chocolate-cake).
Finally there is High Tea, which is tea with scones, clotted cream, jam, cake AND cucumber sandwiches (with the crusts cut off, of course). High Tea is usually around 4 or 5 pm, to hold you over until dinner at 7 or 8. So what if you are invited to tea at 5 pm. Will it be High Tea or a meal? Tea at 5.00 is children’s supper. No tea drink is served. So you will often hear parents say that they have to get the kid’s tea ready, or have them eat their tea early so the parents can go out for the evening. But we were invited to tea once at 5 pm and got supper with no children present, no tea drink, and most disappointingly, no scones, clotted cream, jam, cake or cucumber sandwiches. Just a nice supper. Very confusing indeed.
I think one solution to the problem of whether tea means a meal or teatime with food is to follow the English custom of elevenses. Coffee time in England is 11 am (to last you until lunch at 1.00 pm [note that the British do not use a colon for time designations]). So coffee and a snack are called ‘elevenses’. Now, why can’t we have ‘fourses’ for the 4.00 pm tea and snack? If four o’clock teatime was called fourses, then ‘tea’ could be reserved for ‘supper’. Perfectly logical, eh?
2 comments:
An observant reader has noted that my discussion of teatimes is partially contradicted by a Wikipedia article [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_(meal)]. It is always difficult making generalizations, and I wonder if there are some regional differences here in how things are defined. I stand by my informants...
Post a Comment