'You can't instagram tea': is trouble brewing for the classic cuppa?

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'You can't instagram tea': is trouble brewing for the classic cuppa?

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1John5918
Gen 30, 2020, 11:28 pm

'You can't instagram tea': is trouble brewing for the classic cuppa? (Guardian)

Cafes in Manchester say customers are shunning builder’s tea in favour of coffee and herbal varieties...

Sad.

2WeeTurtle
Gen 31, 2020, 7:00 am

I probably agree with the article with the idea that tea is something I make at home rather than get when out, but that is in large part because the places to get tea that isn't just a bag (usually a Red Rose bag) in a cup are few and far between. There is one in the city where I live, formerly two but the other went out of business a few years back.

I'll get a tea at Tim Horton's now because of the steeped tea they make that has it's own taste and I don't need to deal with the bag, which is annoying since, chances are, that if I'm buying tea at Tim Horton's (or anywhere else) I'm getting it to go and then have to pause and wait for it to steep before adding my milk and sugar (assuming those are even present). It's that, or leave the place and fix my tea en route while the bag string leeches tea down the side of the cup. Other to-go joints just flat out put the stuff in for you and that makes me cringe when I see the bag trying to steep with the milk.

Is Builder's Tea a blend or some sort?

3John5918
Gen 31, 2020, 7:52 am

>2 WeeTurtle:

Builder's tea is a generic term for bog standard tea usually served in a mug, hot, strong, milky and sweet. It could be any brand of normal cheap tea, loose leaves or bags. Its name comes from its popularity with workers such as builders (I believe they are referred to as construction workers on the other side of the Pond), but other manual and semi-skilled workers such as plumbers and electricians also lap it up, and if you have them working in your house you are expected to supply them with copious amounts of it. It has other names in other industries, and on the railways I have heard it referred to as railwayman's tea or footplateman's tea. It also used to be served in the old "greasy spoon" transports cafes, poured out of giant two-handed teapots, but sadly there are few such caffs left nowadays, having been replaced with fancy places that serve expensive snacks and coffees. If they do serve tea it is usually also fancy and expensive, and suffers from the same indignities which you mention make you cringe.

4bnielsen
Modificato: Feb 2, 2020, 2:56 pm

I won't miss it. We went out eating at a local sushi restaurant and asked for some green tea. All they had were some pickwick scented stuff and earl grey. So I chose a Japanese beer instead. The sushi was rather good, so I might return for that sometime. Maybe as takeaway, so I can brew my own tea and save the beer.
(But I don't get the title: You can't instagram tea. Use a glass cup and serve some jasmine pearls :-)

5John5918
Feb 2, 2020, 11:42 pm

>4 bnielsen:

I also don't really get the title - I have heard of Instagram, but don't really know what it is. It was the second part of the title, "is trouble brewing for the classic cuppa?" which caught my attention. I really miss that it's become almost impossible to find a decent mug of builder's tea in any cafe.

Reminds me of something I saw on Sky news a few years ago. At the end of the news programme, the newsreader, a very well known middle-aged man, faced the camera and said, "I've been told to inform you that Sky news is now available on Snapchat". He then turns to a second camera and confides, "Whatever that is..."

6gmathis
Modificato: Feb 3, 2020, 8:54 am

Oy. What doesn't photograph attractively is no longer valued. My son told me the same thing about black shelter cats--they don't Instagram well.

I am a lover of all tea varieties, foofy ones included, but there will never be a replacement or improvement on Monday mornings for extra strong PG Tips with milk.

7lesmel
Feb 3, 2020, 3:17 pm

The title refers to the last line of the article which refers to the fact that fancy espresso drinks often have foam art:

But Dunwoodie also conceded that trendy and aesthetically pleasing coffee had overtaken their orders for tea. “A lot of people need a tulip or a heart or whatever in their coffee now – you can’t Instagram a cup of tea, can you?”

Everything that makes tea instagram-y has to do with accoutrements -- the setting, the cup, whatever -- and not the liquid in the cup...unlike espresso drinks

8LolaWalser
Feb 3, 2020, 4:54 pm

Something tells me that all the "classic cuppa" needs to be Instagrammed is a shirtless fit-built builder wrapped around it.

9WeeTurtle
Feb 4, 2020, 5:07 am

>8 LolaWalser: Well, I did find this: https://mendrinkingtea.tumblr.com/
Tumblr is a blog site that has just about everything imaginable on it.

Builder's Tea sounds like something you'd get at a truck stop if coffee wasn't the default over here. Lonely restaurants on the sides of highways and such, usually with at least a gas station or a shop of some kind attached. My mom would comment the times we were driving cross-Province that you could spot good food by seeing how many semis were pulled up to a particular restaurant. We used to go to the gas station restaurant in town a lot because they had the good coffee and steaks for cheap.

It also sounds like my usual morning beverage. ;)

I'm sure there are people out there who post their tea on social media with a caption like "foam art THIS!"

10LolaWalser
Feb 4, 2020, 11:47 am

I loved Tumblr back when it was wild and free and had lots of pictures of naked people. Can't stand the bowdlerised version, too sad.

That's a nice memory of roadside cafés. Makes me want to go to a greasy spoon somewhere but alas most have died out around here.