The Little Teapot That Could
Sep 24th, 2007 by lisa
Not long ago, I went on at some length about tea. I love tea. I don’t think I could get through my day without it. But until recently, I’ve had to forgo using my teapot because, as I am home by myself all day, it’s just not feasible to use regular size teapot for making one cup of tea at a time.
For the past few years, I’ve been drinking less coffee and more tea. The usual method for making a cup for oneself is to simply pour hot water over a tea bag in a cup. Tea has to steep for several minutes to bring out the full flavor. The problem with this method is that I like to add milk before I drink it, and if you let the cup sit long enough to steep properly, much of the heat escapes in steam. By the time you’ve added milk you have a lukewarm beverage. I like my tea hot, thank you. I’ve been setting a saucer on top of the cup, but then I have to contend with tea-stained saucers and, let’s face it, there’s nothing aesthetically pleasing about a mug with a saucer on top. I enjoy my tea almost like a ritual, and this sort of improvising was just not making me happy. (Even the kitty looks grumpy with that thing on his head.)
Then I happened upon a lovely solution.This little teapot is from overseas. A few years a go, some friends were living in Japan a while, and they sent us some tea-making items along with some premium loose green tea. At the time I drank more coffee than tea, and after trying the little set, I packed it all away.
So when I was going through my kitchen cupboards the other day, I rediscovered this little teapot, and realized I could use it to make individual cups of tea for myself. Even though I haven’t been using loose leaf tea, I just put the teabag in the metal strainer.
And there’s even a bonus. If any bits of the tea leaves escape the teabag, as they sometimes do, the strainer catches them. So now I don’t have to endure bits of tea leaf floating in my tea. So now I can make a nice cup of tea for myself, put my feet up, and all is right with the world once again.
Thank you for the reminder! I was talking to a friend yesterday who mentioned she loves the raspberry quince tea made by Republic of Tea, but can’t find it anymore. I just got up to check, yep I have a whole can of it It was too ‘quince-y’ for me, so I think I’ll pass it along to her.
Oh yeah, the teapot is adorable and a wonderful solution to your tea time dilemma! It’s definitely a much better solution than image A.
When I was reading this I thought ” hmm I wonder if she has one of those tea pots Derek and Donna gave us a while ago” I have to say that I had also forgotten about that tea pot but now that I am going to the “land of tea”- England I should take that tea pot along with me. I am going to add it to my list of stuff to take.
I hope you enjoy your tea!! Thanks for the reminder!
Cheers!!