Tea time
This is a photo of the Burton House (built in 1893) in Old Town's Preservation Park. This is the location of Mrs. Burton's Tea Room where afternoon or high tea (I'm not sure of the difference, but I know a certain Englishman that may like to comment) is served. Click here for a nice round up of other locales that make a fancy to-do of serving tea and little finger sandwiches.
posted by at Tuesday, February 17, 2009
5 Comments:
Here comes the expected comment! The description of afternoon tea at the link is entirely correct, impeccable. HIGH TEA, however, is more than that -- it's a full meal including at least one hot dish, and is really only a reasonable thing to do if you've missed lunch for whatever reason (hanky-panky below stairs, perhaps?) I can only remember a few High Tea occasions in my youth. Kedgeree is one classic High Tea dish, which makes me think it has colonial connections.
Now for something strange. Many English people use the word "tea" to describe the evening meal -- as a synonym for "dinner", in other words. This used to be a North Country habit but lately, in chatting with my English online pals, I've noticed the usage in southerners too. It seems just as strange to me as I'm sure it does to you yanks.
We have several of these beautiful older homes that have been turned into tea rooms, some with antiques of gift shops. Great fun.
Nice photograph of a very nice house.
In Newcastle upon Tyne, the kids had tea (usually after Blue Peter's finished) and the adults had dinner once the kids were doing their homework. At least that's what the adults thought the kids were doing...
Interesting...
It's a lovely house and I wouldn't mind taking tea there, whether it's afternoon or high tea...
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