American Ilxors: Do you use Kettles to make tea?

I drink my tea iced, and sweet enough to give you instant diabetes.

I use a kettle. I have to make sure that the water is exactly 205 degrees when I pour it in the press pot, or else the coffee flavor crystals won't be able to find their new homes in the new order of hot liquid and my entire day will be ruined.

The 13th Floor Elevators, a band from Austin, Texas, formed as an electric jug band, featuring Tommy Hall as electric jug player. A similar revival began in the UK in the 1960s, possibly as an offshoot of the revival in the United States.[citation needed]

Oops, this is about tea. I also use the kettle to make water for tea, in the 180 degree range

Electric kettle. Mostly for coffee.

Electric kettle for me.

I used a kettle on the stovetop for those rare times I'd make tea.

Then I married an Australian, whose mother occasionally visits and prefers to make her coffee with an electric kettle. So now I use that when I need it, but mostly it stays unplugged in the corner for most of the year.

Actually, when I made hot chocolate this winter, I'd use the Keurig without a cup.

stovetop kettle tho i've v nearly gotten an electric on a number of occasions

Once you get the electric you can't go back. The water is 118F...now it's 121F! How did I live before knowing this??

The electric ones don't seem to be any faster than the stove kettles, which may have more to do with the 120/240 volt difference.

Electric ones don't whistle a song of their people when they're done either.

Update: it's 139 now

Dang, mine's not that fancy. It won't even turn itself off when the water boils.

It's just a cultural difference, but it was weird for me to visit Australian relatives and have them pull out this steampunk contraption to make coffee.

I mean, yeah, I guess they've never heard of Joe DiMaggio either except for that one song.

A Nice Cup of Tea
By George Orwell
Evening Standard, 12 January 1946.

If you look up 'tea' in the first cookery book that comes to hand you will probably find that it is unmentioned; or at most you will find a few lines of sketchy instructions which give no ruling on several of the most important points.

This is curious, not only because tea is one of the main stays of civilization in this country, as well as in Eire, Australia and New Zealand, but because the best manner of making it is the subject of violent disputes.

When I look through my own recipe for the perfect cup of tea, I find no fewer than eleven outstanding points. On perhaps two of them there would be pretty general agreement, but at least four others are acutely controversial. Here are my own eleven rules, every one of which I regard as golden:

First of all, one should use Indian or Ceylonese tea. China tea has virtues which are not to be despised nowadays — it is economical, and one can drink it without milk — but there is not much stimulation in it. One does not feel wiser, braver or more optimistic after drinking it. Anyone who has used that comforting phrase 'a nice cup of tea' invariably means Indian tea.

Secondly, tea should be made in small quantities — that is, in a teapot. Tea out of an urn is always tasteless, while army tea, made in a cauldron, tastes of grease and whitewash. The teapot should be made of china or earthenware. Silver or Britanniaware teapots produce inferior tea and enamel pots are worse; though curiously enough a pewter teapot (a rarity nowadays) is not so bad.

Thirdly, the pot should be warmed beforehand. This is better done by placing it on the hob than by the usual method of swilling it out with hot water.

Fourthly, the tea should be strong. For a pot holding a quart, if you are going to fill it nearly to the brim, six heaped teaspoons would be about right. In a time of rationing, this is not an idea that can be realized on every day of the week, but I maintain that one strong cup of tea is better than twenty weak ones. All true tea lovers not only like their tea strong, but like it a little stronger with each year that passes — a fact which is recognized in the extra ration issued to old-age pensioners.

Fifthly, the tea should be put straight into the pot. No strainers, muslin bags or other devices to imprison the tea. In some countries teapots are fitted with little dangling baskets under the spout to catch the stray leaves, which are supposed to be harmful. Actually one can swallow tea-leaves in considerable quantities without ill effect, and if the tea is not loose in the pot it never infuses properly.

Sixthly, one should take the teapot to the kettle and not the other way about. The water should be actually boiling at the moment of impact, which means that one should keep it on the flame while one pours. Some people add that one should only use water that has been freshly brought to the boil, but I have never noticed that it makes any difference.

Seventhly, after making the tea, one should stir it, or better, give the pot a good shake, afterwards allowing the leaves to settle.

Eighthly, one should drink out of a good breakfast cup — that is, the cylindrical type of cup, not the flat, shallow type. The breakfast cup holds more, and with the other kind one's tea is always half cold before one has well started on it.

Ninthly, one should pour the cream off the milk before using it for tea. Milk that is too creamy always gives tea a sickly taste.

Tenthly, one should pour tea into the cup first. This is one of the most controversial points of all; indeed in every family in Britain there are probably two schools of thought on the subject. The milk-first school can bring forward some fairly strong arguments, but I maintain that my own argument is unanswerable. This is that, by putting the tea in first and stirring as one pours, one can exactly regulate the amount of milk whereas one is liable to put in too much milk if one does it the other way round.

Lastly, tea — unless one is drinking it in the Russian style — should be drunk without sugar. I know very well that I am in a minority here. But still, how can you call yourself a true tealover if you destroy the flavour of your tea by putting sugar in it? It would be equally reasonable to put in pepper or salt. Tea is meant to be bitter, just as beer is meant to be bitter. If you sweeten it, you are no longer tasting the tea, you are merely tasting the sugar; you could make a very similar drink by dissolving sugar in plain hot water.

Some people would answer that they don't like tea in itself, that they only drink it in order to be warmed and stimulated, and they need sugar to take the taste away. To those misguided people I would say: Try drinking tea without sugar for, say, a fortnight and it is very unlikely that you will ever want to ruin your tea by sweetening it again.

These are not the only controversial points to arise in connexion with tea drinking, but they are sufficient to show how subtilized the whole business has become. There is also the mysterious social etiquette surrounding the teapot (why is it considered vulgar to drink out of your saucer, for instance?) and much might be written about the subsidiary uses of tealeaves, such as telling fortunes, predicting the arrival of visitors, feeding rabbits, healing burns and sweeping the carpet. It is worth paying attention to such details as warming the pot and using water that is really boiling, so as to make quite sure of wringing out of one's ration the twenty good, strong cups of that two ounces, properly handled, ought to represent.

i microwave my water and i am too pretentious to even use teabags half the time (i have a spoon for looseleaf tea)

i have an electric kettle and it's very fast; like it boils the water in about a minute and a half, as opposed to 10 with my stovetop kettle, which is now on a shelf in the garage

Stove kettle, whistles and everything

be interesting to compare the orwell with commentaries on japanese tea-making ceremonies -- orwell writing it (knowingly?) as if such didn't exist tho i feel he likely knew they did, via arts & crafts movement ppl

(bernard leach had invited hamada shoji over to st ives on his own return from japan in the 1920s: japanese rituals of teaware making and tea-making were intimately folded into one another -- orwell wasn't very kindly disposed to the arts & crafts movement but also wasn't very distant from it, class-wise and politics-wise)

pity skidmore isn't with us to talk about this :(

as soon as I read that first sentence I thought how much I'd love to talk about this with Martin.

George Orwell kind of a Nazi when it came to tea, ironically.

Only thing I know about japanese tea-making ceremonies is that they always pour away he 1st cup undrunk.

My mum still does the hot water in the teapot then pour it out despite the fact it's bags she uses not leaves so it defeats the purpose and it wastes water.

Also if making it in a cup she will stir the bag in the cup ARGH.

also they put milk in my dads cup first. That is so wrong. It ends up far too often as too much or too little.

If you have milk with darjeeling you only need a splash. If it's assam or a strong builders tea you need more.

the handy thing for me re tea protocols of all and various stripe is i hate tea so i can ignore everyone one

But I bet you still know how to make it for friends and family.

Milk in the cup first is correct. Prevents cup staining.

But it doesn't prevent it staining

I am American, I drink tea every morning, and I use a kettle. I drink it with soy milk and I would never pour the milk before the tea.

how I handle mug staining: I wash them

Why Only Fascists Wash Their Mugs
George Orwell
Evening Standard, 6 April 1944

Bonavita electric kettle. I was also given a Breville automatic tea maker that's pretty awesome but it's still easier to just use the electric kettle.

i use a saucepan (for coffee anyway)

even my anglophilic mom who is absolutely obsessed with old english shit has upgraded from stove kettle to electric

Oops, this is about tea. I also use the kettle to make water for tea, in the 180 degree range

― Karl Malone, Saturday, 11 March 2017 16:02 (three hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Let's get one thing straight buck

In a poll about tea, water is steam at 180 degrees

U clear now?

American Ilxors: Do you use Kettles to make tea?

Kettle electric.

Teapot stainless steel.

Water poured scalding hot onto bags (one per mug and one for the pot) and then onto the stove top until the bags develop sentient thought and pop out to remind you that the tea is now ready

Three sugars, added to mug with milk in advance.

The whistle in the morning is for instant espresso, Cafe Bustelo usually. The whistle in the evening is for tea, any kind of tea.

i do not make or drink tea

microwave

can't imagine ever buying a kettle

didn't we just do this

You're thinking of POLL: ILX Puts the Kettle On. As polls go, they are fraternal, not identical, twins.

US electrical mains are rated about 100 V lower than those in the UK, which is why US kettles come to a boil slowly enough that we might as well just use granny stovetop kettles (which I do).

lol @ microwaves

American and use a stovetop kettle -- I put the kettle on, go outside and smoke a cigarette, come back in, water is ready for tea

i tell the replicator 'tea, earl grey, hot'

xxpost A decent explanation of this phenomenon.

electric kettle is the way to go

ours is still rocking after like 13 years

American, rare but occasional tea drinker, electric kettle. I intend to brew a cuppa right now, bcz of this thread.

personally, I don't see a reason to devote one of the precious few electrical outlets in my kitchen to a kettle, when I have a perfectly serviceable stove and stovetop kettles can be come by at the thrift store for $2. Being able to make tea during an electrical outage was a proud moment in my life.

I want one of the fancy electric kettles that will heat water to the right temperature for green tea and opposed to letting it boil and then cool

Wait, there are electric kettles?

I was trying to figure out the difference between "I use a kettle to boil water" and "I use an old fashioned stove kettle to boil water like your granny used." If I just said "I use a kettle," would people assume that it is electric?

in the uk absolutely

yes, I believe the non-americans typically use electric kettles the majority of the time, and due to the higher voltage of their electrical systems, they boil faster than they do here

so, not being a big tea culture and having a lower voltage, they haven't caught on as much here

I used an electric kettle to boil water for instant noodles earlier today

Electric kettles are perfect for work where you don't have stoves, or if you live somewhere that doesn't have a stove. I don't want to completely dismiss the value of the electric kettle.

not a tea drinker but being able to boil water quickly in a kettle is v useful

my stove just isn't that efficient, it's an electric non-induction range

if it was a gas range I'd boil water stovetop for sure

water boils faster in my stovetop kettle than in an electric one -- do you people just have really wussy stoves?

idk in an electric kettle the heating element is directly touching the water, so if you're able to make water hotter using a non-inductive electric stovetop you are performing wizardry or something (or do stoves plug into a 240V outlet, I forget )

I stand corrected they are 220 and I rescind my wizardry accusations

220, 221, whatever it takes

it is your electric kettle that is wussy

btw boiling small amounts of water in the microwave is more energy efficient than the stovetop

shhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I've just thought of something more energy efficient than posting itt

back when the uk only had two or three TV channels and some much-watched evening show or match was being shown on channels with adverts, there'd be huge grid-spikes in electricity usage during the ads, bcz so many people chose that moment to pop into the kitchen to put the kettle on

I make coffee with a stovetop kettle and a Chemex, so if you come over to my place and want coffee, be prepared to wait.

xp I remember the doc where the guy at the power station had to have corrie on so he knew when to pump up the power

back when the uk only had two or three TV channels and some much-watched evening show or match was being shown on channels with adverts, there'd be huge grid-spikes in electricity usage during the ads, bcz so many people chose that moment to pop into the kitchen to put the kettle on

― mark s,

It still happens occasionally

Electric kettle, obvs. I had a fantastic vintage Swan that had been operational since the early '60s and now have a tall Russell Hobbs. Both are metal kettles - I don't like the plastic ones.

Electric kettle, obvs. I had a fantastic vintage Swan that had been operational since the early '60s and now have a tall Russell Hobbs. Both are metal kettles - I don't like the plastic ones.

Electric kettle, obvs. I had a fantastic vintage Swan that had been operational since the early '60s and now have a tall Russell Hobbs. Both are metal kettles - I don't like the plastic ones.

can we just all agree that it's 2017 and we should have a machine that instantly provides hot water

and yeah I know those exist (and I secretly covet the zojirushi hot water contraption the fancy local tea shop has) but I feel I should be able to select a temperature of water that comes out of the tap and it just happens

alexa give me two cups of 180 degree water

Sorry for post in triplicate.

wait fuck i voted "kettle" but then apparently that's some kind of electric appliance in australia? a kettle for me (american) is a metal thing with water in it that i put on the stove and it whistles when the water's boiling. is that the thing they're calling "old fashioned"? it's.... how you boil water!

(oh ok i see this has been addressed above)

yes thank u!

i assume the metal ones -- i had one when i was a student in rooms but i don't remember this aspect -- use a metal that doesn't fur too badly? my mum's stove kettle was all fur and p much unuseable -- this isn't so much a problem with plastic kettles (which most electric ones are now i think) as the fur doesn't stick to plastic

maybe this is only a problem in hard water areas

First time I stayed with my mother-in-law (in the US) I was slightly shocked she didn't have an electric kettle because it had never occurred to me that that was a thing that could happen.

tbh i liked the whistle on the kettle that came with the room when i was a student, it was like something from one of the original thomas the tank engine books in the old days

I remember in the late 70s/early 80s my Gran had the stove kettle that whistled when ready. I also remember she used tea leaves until the mid 80s when she was persuaded to move to teabags and she never changed back. She died 9 years ago and was nearly 95 and she loved her tea (always ordinary teabags) no milk no sugar although she used to take a tiny tiny spot of milk that never seemed worth the effort of putting in.

She also had a coal fire until mid 80s. The heat from it was unbearable even when you put the fireguard round it.

But if it was snowing and -5 outside it was fantastic.

yeah it's not just tea , it's instant coffee, and cup a soup and pot noodle !
now I need to go time my kettle

not to open a whole new kettle of worms, but weird seeing Americans ask "why would I need an electric kettle when I have a stovetop" because IME most British people boil the water for vegetables etc in the kettle before pouring it into a saucepan, otherwise you wait a week for it to reach the boil on the hob

"things you were shockingly old when you learned" for me includes the previous existence of stovetop kettles (obvious but I'd never thought about it) so I was extra confused when a friend mentioned that their elderly aunt had nearly burnt her house down by putting an electric kettle on the hob, thinking it was designed for the stovetop

because IME most British people boil the water for vegetables etc in the kettle before pouring it into a saucepan,

yup

if it was snowing and -5 outside it was fantastic

those were the days you could get a mutton fat dinner and a pipkin of porter and still have change out of an old penny mind you

hah I'm not as old as you grandad

I dont know if you saw the post on my FB about black leaded ranges (which I never saw) do you remember them?

I just cant imagine how anyone kept those clean. Both my Grannies probably had them spotless.

I dont think they ever cooked a chicken like they did in Withnail & I mind :D

Why does a British hob/burner take longer than an electric kettle to reach its boiling point?

Stove

Right.

So electric kettles can boil water faster than a stovetop?

odysseus you mean like these?

http://www.handfenterprises.ie/uploads/products/2/aga_trad_2o_crm_2_rp.jpg

stovetop heats the metal from the outside, element in an electric kettle is directly in the water and not losing any to the kettle (esp. if plastic and non-conducting)

aye but the ones I remember seeing in All Creatures Great And Small or The Good Life were pure black.

http://i.imgur.com/BJNCNfc.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FcwRYfUBLM

the hot top you cook on are matt and you don't really clean them, except for wiping spilled chunks of stuff off with paper towels -- anything that's spilled liquid or grease or whatever will just basically burn off when the lids are down

the other surfaces is shiny and easy to clean

and the fireplace you dig the ash out with a little shovel i guess, same as any other fireplace

lol my plurals went a bit wonky there but you get the point

did you ever heat up your boots and socks in one?

Or do this?

http://i.imgur.com/Nyd3uEp.jpg

the clothes pulley was over what you call the black-top stove (it wasn't black and did't have a little fireplace) so yes we dried and warmed clothes there -- not boots though that would be strange

just once that i remember i was bathed in a tub like that, my parents were away somewhere and i was being looked after by someone who worked with them, who lived in a little rural cottage without a plumbed-in bathroom -- i was a little older than that or i wouldn't remember it (maybe four)

My gran missed her clothes pulley when she got renovated in the 80s.
TBH I think, as long as you had a high ceiling in the kitchen, like you did in old houses/tenements, nothing was better. Much better than the clothes horses that collapse if you go near them like we have

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Andrew-James-Lumiglo-Kettle-Capacity/dp/B0158T4AN0/

I quite fancy that kettle, fast boiling and quiet. The one I keep in my bedroom is slow and noisy

i like that it has little blue lights, i prefer blue or green lights to red lights

Hah, you would love this one then
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B010SSED24/

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/41fJnwl7s4L.jpg

Transparent glass kettle
Lights up blue when heating
Easy to fill with flip-top lid
Concealed element and washable limescale filter
360° base

😍 😍 😍

brit in the us... i drink tea occasionally and use a saucepan. growing up, we always had a stovetop kettle but i think my mum has an electric one nowadays. i've always felt a weird distrust about electric kettles. something about the element being in the water rubs me the wrong way.

it's a bit expensive at £45

xp

Element in the water? Americans aren't even wild about fluoride.

want one of the fancy electric kettles that will heat water to the right temperature for green tea and opposed to letting it boil and then cool

― mh

mr h u need this

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B005YR0F40/

it is expensive, i would need someone wealthy to buy it me as a present

a secret ilx admirer perhaps

I have a bag of this. I heat up half a mug of milk in a saucepan but heat up the water in the kettle for the other half!

https://www.twinings.co.uk/app_/responsive/TwiningsUKI/media/product/GPBCL1014-12/1-F12444.png?w=640

https://www.twinings.co.uk/tea/loose-leaf-pyramids/bollywood-chai-latte-pyramids

How to Prepare The Perfect Chai

Use a tall glass mug
Add the tea bag and cover with 1/3 of hot water
Leave it to brew for 3 - 4 minutes
Top up the mug with hot frothed milk
Tipp: Sugar will enhance the Chai flavour

tbh it was too milky for me and I didn't enjoy it. I love chai tea but only with a normal amount of milk

This Breville kettle's the one I covet. Mum has one. It makes a nice little beep when its done.

https://thegoodguys.sirv.com/products/50020882/50020882_90959.PNG?scale.height=505&scale.width=773&canvas.height=505&canvas.width=773&canvas.opacity=0&format=png&png.optimize=true

I mean its overkill really.

how much is it? I had to lol at mark s & I calling a £45 kettle too expensive then clicking on that link by the late great

3 new from £269.19

I got a similar (VonShef) version of that glass kettle for £25 and I was thinking that was too pricey!

Ive seen some brand name stuff (whats Russell Hobbs and why is he so pricey?) in the hundreds of dollars! A toaster is not worth $120 gtfo.

ISO 3103 vs orgoodwise

This one costs £1900.08 not including delivery
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/71JXeqRD28L._SL1181_.jpg

i don't think it's electric though

This is what I imagine mark would have

https://www.fortnumandmason.com/t/categories/homeware/tableware/teapots

along with his weekly delivery of this
https://www.fortnumandmason.com/products/the-expeditions-hamper?taxon_id=755

i could find a use for the hamper obviously but i don't drink tea and those fortnums teapots are all hideous

i quite like this one by jill crowley from the crafts council collection

(sadly i don't work there any more and when i did we weren't allowed to brew up in the collection, and anyway i don't like tea)

http://collections.craftscouncil.org.uk/assets/9/72/2279/v0_cc_web2.jpg

Remember watching this Onion video and being utterly mystified by how this normal household object was being mocked

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgL-tJ1fqDI

The hamper may well be £1000 but there's very little there I'd like tbh. You're a veggie, right? I'll take the Wiltshire ham and the turkish delight off you

xp

i'm not so you'd have to fight me

also veggies are allowed turkish delight

you would be too drunk to fight after all that alcohol

not if its made with animal fat?

btw I order tea from Fortnum & Masons once a year and they're no more expensive than Twinings really.

Their Rose Pouchong is to die for.

https://www.fortnumandmason.com/t/categories/tea-and-coffee/tea-collections

Not sure what exactly the white witch has been plying you with Kerr but I don't think Turkish delight is ever made with animal fat?

shhhhh

I want that turkish delight from his hamper

say no more

I'm nearly out of Russian Caravan so I will need to save up and make an order from them soon. I might treat myself to some turkish delight too!
Then I wont share it when mark comes to tea

tradtionally TD is made from cornstarch

(non-turkish version sometimes uses gelatin for speed, which comes from animals but is very much not fat)

I've never tried the proper turkish stuff but its very much on my bucket list. Is it nice?

I cant imagine paying £75 for 50g of Cornish tea or £115 for 50g of Scottish Smoked White tea although first flush darjeeling can go into the several hundred quid range

https://www.fortnumandmason.com/products/tregothnan-cornish-tea?taxon_id=100

http://weeteacompany.com/scottish-tea/dalreoch-white-scottish-smoked-tea.html

I'd love to try that rose smoked tea. I've had their Scottish Highland Xmas Chai before and it was great.
http://weeteacompany.com/scottish-tea.html

all the shops round me are turkish-run so they always have it (cheap rather than fancy but genuinely turkish)

i like most of the flavours except NEVER TRY CARROT FLAVOUR, it is nasty imo

ewwww that does sound awful

btw I think you may like this?
https://www.fortnumandmason.com/products/chivas-regal-royal-salute-21-year-old-whisky?taxon_id=939

not really, i don't like whisky much

can a mod pls edit title to "Britishers Going On About Things Again"

that used to be the board description

Mark that's a shame because I was going to start a fundraiser to get you this for your birthday

https://www.fortnumandmason.com/products/chivas-regal-royal-salute-62-gun-salute-whisky?taxon_id=875

I like to heat a red solo cup of 62 Gun Salute in a microwave and drink it hot! AMERICA

This one is even more expensive
https://www.fortnumandmason.com/products/l-or-de-jean-martell-cognac?taxon_id=875

Is fancy coffee as expensive as fancy tea?

kopi luwak can run $1/gram

so answer is no, not really

I was given a few small tins of F&M tea and a jar of F&M lemon curd.

How do YOU eat lemon curd because I don't want to waste it on a rainy day puff pastry pseudo-tart experiment.

probably straight out of the jar with a spoon (i finished some honey that had gone crystallised that way earlier this evening)

I've only ever had lemon curd on toast when I was a kid as my mum used to love it. But I like markie the poohs idea

Sixthly, one should take the teapot to the kettle and not the other way about. The water should be actually boiling at the moment of impact, which means that one should keep it on the flame while one pours.

The last ten words of this make absolutely no sense to me. Someone please explain how the kettle can be lifted to pour while simultaneously remaining on the flame???

see above pics of the old kitchen ranges

yes you just don't lift it very far from the gas ring -- far enough to pour but not so far it's allowed to cool

A relative used to own a Soviet era electric samovar.

Congrats Brits you've pootled on long enough to have distracted from the yanks having disgraced themselves again

Granny stove kettle!

i assume the metal ones -- i had one when i was a student in rooms but i don't remember this aspect -- use a metal that doesn't fur too badly?

I am in the dark unless you mean lime scaling up on the inner surface? Oh no, my kettle's got limescale all over the inside. Doesn't affect function.

that's why my answer to POLL: ILX Puts the Kettle On is the correct one, btw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTuXBoA688Y

the breville looks good, the styling is a little retro

http://www.zojirushi.com/app/category/water-boilers

these are what I covet

oh wait I meant bonavita, the one tlg linked

1 electric kettle at home and 1 in my trunk for use during class when I share tea/coffee/hot chocolate with my students.

I mix lemon curd into whipping cream (prior to whipping) for lemony whipped cream

Oh god

Hot chocolate......with.....*water*?????

My students have low standards, don't be a snob!

Paxton not far enough gone yet to not still be able to come back for one quick last "game over"

american hot chocolate packets have powdered milk in them

Tbf one did complain about the lack of milk but only one

They are getting free hot beverages

I have no idea why people keep doing the "omg with water, you animals" without noticing that using american swiss miss or w/e hot chocolate mix with milk is basically double-milk

We're all snobby about different things so no doubt I'm as guilty as anyone under different headings but oh god.

I get shirty if I've only got low fat milk for hot chocolate tbh

what are you mixing with the milk to make hot chocolate?

It's not really that bad, there's powdered milk in there and I buy Abuelita brand instant hot chocolate for extra flavor.

It is true that i haven't considered that the American version simply wasn't worth getting snobby over either way this is a good point

I guess i just had more faith in LL as a person of high quality from all other evidence, crushed tbh

what are you mixing with the milk to make hot chocolate?

― mh 😏, Sunday, 12 March 2017 02:05 (fifty-eight seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

How can this not be a trick q

I'm going to uncharitably assume other countries have powdered milk in instant hot chocolate too and you milkboys are just double-milking

Pfft assume away buck

The word assume makes an ass out of u and you make hot chocolate out of ass ime

I thought maybe you're actually grinding up chocolate bars or using cocoa powder, sugar, and milk together? both are valid but it's very seldom done around here

there's this weird internet thing with "you use water?!?" but I know of no one who uses hot water and cocoa powder/sugar, or even hot water and chocolate syrup. If it's water, it means you're using a mix that has powdered dairy in it!

if there is someone out there just blending hot water and chocolate let me know

I assume you're just melting cadbury bars and drinking the molten liquid straight xp

There may be cause for a truth & reconciliation forum in this matter yet

Next time someone's all "You white people eat mayo on your hash browns," I'm gonna yell BRITISHES BOIL THEIR VEGETABLES IN TEA KETTLES! and then run away, crying.

"Did that guy just say 'britishes'?"

I made hot chocolate from milk, cocoa powder, and sugar once recently, but only because we were out of hot chocolate mix. It was okay I guess. It's not like I have a milk steamer or a supply of ganache around.

Don't want to know what the brown sauce in ass hot chocolate is

Which reminds me of

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_55d792d8e4b0a40aa3ab0d4a

My hot chocolate: two heaping spoons of Green and Black's cocoa powder, one of sugar, capful of vanilla. Add a dash of milk to the powders and make a paste. Slowly add the rest of the milk (the fattest milk you can find) and whisk as you go. Let it get hot but do not allow the mix to boil. No lumps, rich chocolate taste, Vanilla rounds the sweetness in a nice way.

Descaling the kettle? Get a bottle of cheap white vinegar, unload into kettle, boil the kettle. Leave it for at least an hour before reboiling and most of the furry limescale will go. Rinse thoroughly, then make unfuzzy tea.

to eephus up-thread, yeah, "fur" is limescale -- is that a local usage also?

suzy's of course right that you can descale a kettle p easily, metal or plastic, but this entire thread is abt abt differential evolution dependent on culturally varying attitudes to convenience (which is quicker? which is handier? where do the costs arise? how do we best wire up a nation electrically?) and i was mildly interested whether local geological variation (re erm limey water, haha) was a contributing factor -- probably not, w/my fresh morning head on, tho britain is a small rocky island with a median water chemistry likely off-centre compared to us median

another trivial UK/US difference to kick off a blood sausage beef, if so (tho tbf to ilx's other britishes, itt is mostly just me and odysseus back-and-forthing over quasi-sociological minutiae sorry not sorry)

When I've been home, my mom's kettle provisions are: one Disney stovetop kettle, which I HATE and the tea was not as nice as the tea I was served after school nearly every day by my best friend's British dad. BFBD used an electric kettle and a very tannined-up trad teapot. Didn't matter much whether we had bags or loose tea unless BFBD required 'crickets' (teabags from earlier that day, reused - obvs you can't reuse loose).

Oh god

Hot chocolate......with.....*water*?????

― brat_stuntin (darraghmac), Sunday, 12 March 2017 02:01 (ten hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

My students have low standards, don't be a snob!

― weird woman in a bar (La Lechera),

My mum doesnt drink milk and she actually makes cocoa with ater. Not the type you are supposed to make with water but the one you make with milk. But I suppose she has an excuse in that she cant use milk.

I prefer hot choc with milk myself BUT i keep a jar of wispa hot choc THAT YOU MAKE WITH WATER in my room for convenience late at night.
If I have it during the day i use the proper stuff with milk made in the kitchen

I'd NEVER put water in the stuff you are meant t make with milk like my mum does though. That is just savagery unless you're lactose intolerant

Descaling the kettle? Get a bottle of cheap white vinegar, unload into kettle, boil the kettle. Leave it for at least an hour before reboiling and most of the furry limescale will go. Rinse thoroughly, then make unfuzzy tea.

― syzygy stardust (suzy), Sunday, March 12, 2017 3:29 AM (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

came here to post exactly this, white vinegar is magic

just dont put it in yer tea

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/01/map-the-countries-that-drink-the-most-tea/283231/

results may be surprising

i have an electric kettle

i used to have stovetop but the whistling drove me crazy & i feel v strongly that they take too bloody long to boil. electric means i can have a thousand cups a day like my peeps back home

Hey deems next the Americans will be telling us they dont use these

http://i.imgur.com/g2RR8xb.jpg

Rank Country Tea consumption
1 Turkey 12.54 kg (442 oz)
2 Morocco 4.34 kg (153 oz)
3 Ireland 3.22 kg (114 oz)
4 Mauritania 3.22 kg (114 oz)
5 United Kingdom 2.79 kg (98 oz)
6 Seychelles 2.08 kg (73 oz)
7 United Arab Emirates 1.89 kg (67 oz)
8 Kuwait 1.61 kg (57 oz)
9 Qatar 1.60 kg (56 oz)
10 Kazakhstan 1.54 kg (54 oz)

idk what all turks or Moroccans we have here lads but obv any questions are to be directed to the next most qualified experts

we have a silver breville cordless job & it boils in less than 5 minutes, it RULES

According to a few friends on my FB deems Tea is practically a religion in Turkey

5 mins??? my mums kettle takes about 90 seconds

what do i look like, an electrician

idk what to tell u

At full level my kettle will boil in the same time it takes to brush my teeth. Fact.

Imperial British minutes were the length of time the king took to close iirc

Purely notional measurement obv

Hey deems next the Americans will be telling us they dont use these

http://i.imgur.com/g2RR8xb.jpg

― Odysseus, Sunday, March 12, 2017 8:02 AM (forty minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This is a prank right? Set up to make doofuses look silly?

All public bogs here have them.

Do you not wash your hands after?

We don't need to?

Tony explained it in Men behaving Badly

http://metro.co.uk/2013/06/18/be-honest-do-you-wash-your-hands-after-you-go-to-the-toilet-3844526/

The latest statistics on handwashing – or the lack of it – are even more damning. Research from Michigan State University, published last week, showed that 95 per cent of us don’t know how to clean our hands in the correct fashion.

The study, which examined the bathroom habits of more than 3,700 people in public toilets in the US, found that just 1 in 20 is washing properly. The remainder are either doing it incorrectly or not doing it all – 1 in 10 did not bother.

Most people are only washing their hands for six seconds when they should be spending three times that amount of time on the task.

Health experts warn that failing to wash our hands properly can lead to diarrhoea, vomiting, food poisoning, flu and the spread of MRSA.

Dr Ron Cutler, senior lecturer in biomedical sciences at Queen Mary, University of London, has carried out a number of studies on handwashing habits in Britain.

He said his research indicates that about 70 per cent of people here do not wash their hands properly after using the toilet.

‘Every survey we’ve done so far has shown that a good percentage of the population have contaminated hands,’ he told Metro.

So what are the majority of us doing wrong?

‘As far as I’m concerned, as long as you can wash your hands with a nice soap and water, then you can get a nice clean hand after about 10 or 20 seconds,’ said Dr Cutler.

However, that isn’t the end of the process. Drying is just as important as washing.

‘If you wash your hands with soap and warm water and then dry them properly, you get the maximum benefit,’ he said.

‘You see people go in and they’ve not washed their hands properly – they just dip them under the water, sort of shake them and then go out. All that’s going to do is aide the transfer of any bacteria that’s on their hands, because the bacteria will be transferred by the wetness of your hands.’

We have all come across different kinds of bathroom behaviour. There is the non-washer, who doesn’t even glance at the water taps on his way out of the toilets. There is the non-committal ditherer, who goes through the motions of half-heartedly splashing some water on his hands before making a hasty exit. And then there is the not-so-smart smartphone bathroom user, whose device spurts out a series of bleeps from the cubicle while he goes about his business. He goes to the toilet too.

Read more: http://metro.co.uk/2013/06/18/be-honest-do-you-wash-your-hands-after-you-go-to-the-toilet-3844526/#ixzz4b890hGmP

http://metrouk2.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/1806-washing-hands-part-1.png?w=620&h=992&crop=1

now would you open a door with the handle after reading that?

at work we have this large coffee machine that has a large tank of filtered water

it has two options for hot or cold

used to use a regular tea kettle but i avoid drinking tea at night when i'm home

I tend to have a decaf tea, rooibos or fruit tea after 8pm

sometimes i'll have chamomile or peppermint at night but rarely these days

I dont like either of those. Only herbal tea I like is ginger. Peppermint tea was too grassy and disgusting like green tea.

Same problem with yellow tea.

I'm not making that up btw. This is the yellow tea I think i tried a few years ago

https://www.twinings.co.uk/tea/loose-tea/hua-shan-huang-ya

https://www.twinings.co.uk/app_/responsive/TwiningsUKI/media/product/LTHSY0614-75L/1-Loose-Leaf-Bag-Huo-Shan-Huang-Ya.png?w=640

that actually doesn't have any chamomile in it

yellow tea is a separate type of tea

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamomile#Tea_.2F_Herbal_infusion

in terms of chinese teas, chrysanthemum is amazing, especially boiling the dried flowers in a deep pot

jasmine is dece too

not making that up btw

one of my fave herbal infusions

http://www.mightyleaf.com/tea-pouches/herbal/chamomile-citrus.html

https://i5.walmartimages.com/asr/5d4f0e18-bf79-414c-bee3-dd9809f66900_1.2207541daea0826556368bf97e01c3d2.jpeg

still not making that up

I just found that the Chamomile I tried tasted like wet laundry and green/yellow tea tasted of grass

The Chinese call red tea what we call black tea btw. Whereas we call red tea what Rooibos is (redbush)

this is lovely
https://www.twinings.co.uk/tea/loose-tea/rooibos-flavoured-with-orange-and-cinnamon

only thing is it goes right through my built in infuser on my teapot and it ends up in the cup/mug

none of the chamomile i've had has ever smelled like my wet laundry

i'm not tasting it though i'll leave that up to you

twinings is okay i'll allow that

Aye, Twinings bags you can get in supermarkets which is handy but the real quality loose stuff you need to order online as nobody really sells the loose stuff except Earl Grey

https://www.twinings.co.uk/tea/loose-tea?sort=price_desc&quantity=96&page=1&view=grid

oh yeah i enjoy a good Pu'erh tea. My fave is the Spiced Imperial Pu'erh I got from Whittards of Chelsea shop in Glasgow a year ago. (along with an amazing Rose tea that smells like turkish delight and Im not sharing that with mark s so nerr )

Pu'erh missus

I have this White tea as well. I only paid a tenner for it and now its £20.
https://www.twinings.co.uk/tea/loose-tea/darjeeling-okayti-estate-white

I have a really nice Oolong with orange blossom too but its not something i could drink all the time.

odysseus u hav good taste after all

not shaking yr hand after that infographic tho

lol

I like a nice Yunnan tea and I have none left but this is a bit expensive

https://www.twinings.co.uk/tea/loose-tea/golden-rose-hearts-caddy

but it sounds really nice

Luckily I still have 100g of Keemun Best left.
Orwell is wrong about Chinese tea (admittedly it does have less caffeine)

That tea in the link is the cost of that fancy kettle we spoke about upthread

http://uk.businessinsider.com/why-americans-dont-use-electric-kettles-stove-top-2015-12

https://www.buzzfeed.com/candyowl/americans-dont-have-kettles-and-britain-is-freaki-1c3lb

Inspired by some mention in some link from some post on this thread, I just boiled my glass kettle with a teaspoon of citric acid in the water, the brown shitty scale utterly vanished while I watched. So I recommend that if anyone has a cruddy looking kettle.

Much as I like good greens and whites, the vast majority I make now is dirt cheap iced Red Zinger hibiscus tea. Two bags to 8oz water then poured over ice. It's like drinking healthy koolaid.

perfect for when you want to commit healthy group suicide

https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/nintchdbpict000307751585.jpg?strip=all&quality=100&w=650

Two types of tea lads

Two types

Lyons
Barrys

That's it

Thanks,

#3 tea drinking country in the world

Barrys White tea?

50 left

Never tried Yorkshire Gold?

They don't sell those brands in murica

Deems is in Ireland though.

I know you can get Twinings is the USA

we can even buy some of the stuff you guys get specifically for your market here
https://www.twinings.co.uk/tea/international-blends

Ya they probs sell it at the british/irish market but too lazy to drive there

I got some tea from the twining site last week as there was a free shipping offer and im annoyed now I didn't see this https://www.twinings.co.uk/gifts/discovery-collection/orangery-of-lady-grey

Lady Grey is my fave twinings tea. I have teabags and a 100g loose caddy but these pyramid ones are a lot less hassle than loose, especially if i just want a mug of tea and not a pot.

baffled by the #3 tea drinking country preferring its tea in bags of anonymous blends

who do you think drinks more coffee, the people drinking single-source fair trade stuff out of a chemex, or old church ladies who drink coffee sun-up sundown?

my friend's grandma (god rest her coffee-soaked soul) went to the doctor in her 80s after acting confused and having a couple incidents of feeling faint. the doctor asked, "so, do you keep hydrated during the day?" "i drink coffee" "do you ever drink water or juice?" "no, just coffee"

she'd gone probably a couple decades just sipping commodity coffee all day, nothing else. doctor told her to have some water from time to time

same for tea i'd guess, the majority of tea inbibed is little old people who pound through a box of PG Tips every couple days

baffled by the #3 tea drinking country preferring its tea in bags of anonymous blends

― softie (silby), Monday, 13 March 2017 00:14 (ten minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

My guess is that you're focusing on the part here that is your own value judgement rather than the part that puts us inarguably and verifiably in a superior position from which to instruct on this topic

But for the benefit of clarity

If you can't make the perfect cup of tea from a Lyons bag then you are the problem and a salary's worth of fetish objects and shampoo flavours ain't changing shit about that

do you taste your shampoo?

deems you're missing out by not trying all the different flavours.

Variety, spice, life, etc

Sometimes i accidentally get shampoo in my mouth btw

Take yr varia tee and all your spices and gtfo my life imo

A meat n potatoes lad

Wow did u just

Thread taking a pleasing turn for the vituperative

All in good fun

so anyway is an electric kettle a "kettle" for the purposes of this thread or is it "other"

A kettle is a kettle until it's a drum

Thread taking a pleasing turn for the vituperative

― attention vampire (MatthewK), Monday, 13 March 2017 00:58 (thirteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

T-urn for the worse

10/10 dm

Sorry dmac

It sounded funnier in my head

What Tea do you drink? Can Tea form worldview?

Sorry dmac

It sounded funnier in my head

― F♯ A♯ (∞), Monday, 13 March 2017 01:19 (six minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Dunno what yr apologizing for but rest assured etc etc

i drink yorkshire gold and barry's gold, not that hard to find in yankeeland, whole foods sells the former

Is Ahmad a big brand in the UK, my mother-in-law uses that (loose) and it makes a very nice tea, Assam I think

I feel compelled to let everyone know that Bigelow (a pretty good brand, in general) makes an "American Breakfast Tea." I got it and still have most of the box. After I first drank it my muscles started hurting and I got nauseous.

lol it's advertised as having 50% more caffeine (than what?) jesus we're the worst

I mean just microwave your goddamn diet coke

lol it's advertised as having 50% more caffeine (than what?)

sold

my friend's grandma (god rest her coffee-soaked soul) went to the doctor in her 80s after acting confused and having a couple incidents of feeling faint. the doctor asked, "so, do you keep hydrated during the day?" "i drink coffee" "do you ever drink water or juice?" "no, just coffee"

she'd gone probably a couple decades just sipping commodity coffee all day, nothing else. doctor told her to have some water from time to time

― mh 😏, Sunday, March 12, 2017 8:19 PM (three hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

you can get by on coffee, beer, and little else and look great doing it

bigelow is the default office tea, and is generally poor (at least the black teas)

BIGELOW!

https://media.giphy.com/media/mIBol5zKKGPle/giphy.gif

Bigelow tea is terrible, especially the orange pekoe.

Minnesotans: Lunds/Byerlys has a British section and Yorkshire Tea is sold there, along with PG et al.

lol it's advertised as having 50% more caffeine (than what?) jesus we're the worst

― El Tomboto,

Gotta real in the coffee drinkers?

*reel

American here, chiming in to say: many of the people I've known (mostly students) with an electric kettle in the home were Chinese- or Korean-American, and I kind of assumed it was an East Asian thing until I visited the UK on holiday a few years ago and was struck by their ubiquity there (... and, okay, throughout the entire rest of the civilized world, as I subsequently learned)

It seems to me the kettle style are less popular here than the dispenser style (like the Zojirushi linked upthread) but I could be biased by the fact that my current apartment came with one of the latter.

want you guys to know i'm drinking instant coffee i made in the stovetop kettle as i read this thread

ahoy time traveller

want you guys to know i'm drinking instant coffee i made in the stovetop kettle as i read this thread

Word. Cafe Bustelo instant espresso is king. Medaglia d'Oro is better but a bit pricy and the jars are too precious and small.

Anyway, I took the rest of the day off so I've already moved on to beer. I basically follow Treeship's "look good doing it" fluid regimen mentioned above, but with soda water at night.

I'm having a (china) cup of this
https://www.twinings.co.uk/app_/responsive/TwiningsUKI/media/product/OBCR0116-20/1-OBCR0116-20.png?w=640

https://www.twinings.co.uk/tea/flavoured-black-tea/china-rose-20-envelopes

i think of electric kettles as a workplace/office thing

would never microwave water for tea unless i was absolutely desperate

stovetop kettle is what i do when i make tea which is not very often anymore. coffee is better

everytime you boil water with your microwave you are being spied on too
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/mar/13/kellyanne-conway-trump-wiretap-surveillance-obama

https://i.imgur.com/NZFuFPM.jpg

myy kettle

Mark s will love that

I can hardly microwave soup without making a mess, much less water.

my friend's grandma (god rest her coffee-soaked soul) went to the doctor in her 80s after acting confused and having a couple incidents of feeling faint. the doctor asked, "so, do you keep hydrated during the day?" "i drink coffee" "do you ever drink water or juice?" "no, just coffee"

My parents, my inlaws, and my friends' parents are like this with tea. They hardly ever drink water through the day, just tea if they're thirsty. If I go there I have to specifically ask for water with meals.

Until this week, in my electricity-ignoramus state, I didn't really think of the difference between 120v and 240v as having any practical effect. Since learning that it (understandably) makes kettles boil more slowly, I've been wondering what else might be underpowered in the US. What else benefits from a higher voltage? Hair dryers?

xps lol I forgot to mention that I have historically been a water-microwaver. use a good pyrex measuring cup, so the handle doesn't get hot. we did it in the lab I worked in when we were pouring gels; and we did it at home growing up, probably under the influence of my mother (a cell biology grad student when I was born, & so also working in lab often)

as recently as 10 years ago, this was still the primary way I obtained water to make tea (or instant coffee, oatmeal, cup noodle, whatever)

when I switched I actually went *backwards* to boiling it in an "old-fashioned" kettle, "on the hob"/electric kitchen range, because I had moved out of my dorm room into a place with a real kitchen, and I think I thought of using the big kitchen appliances as a kind of ''adulting''

i think of electric kettles as a workplace/office thing

and hotel rooms?

my friend's grandma (god rest her coffee-soaked soul) went to the doctor in her 80s after acting confused and having a couple incidents of feeling faint. the doctor asked, "so, do you keep hydrated during the day?" "i drink coffee" "do you ever drink water or juice?" "no, just coffee"

My parents, my inlaws, and my friends' parents are like this with tea. They hardly ever drink water through the day, just tea if they're thirsty. If I go there I have to specifically ask for water with meals.

My parents only drink tea (my dad will have maybe one decaf coffee once a day) never water or juice, They insist only tea quenches a thirst.

Never really drank tea until I met my current partner, and we don't have a microwave, so old-fashioned tea kettle it is. I even noticed a new one in the kitchen the other day, it looks like a chicken.

What else benefits from a higher voltage? Hair dryers?

Bar heaters maybe? I know the ones we have here pull the full amount of juice but I get wattage/amperage/voltage all mixed up.

washers/dryers do, and in many (most?) US homes they are actually wired up to a 220v supply (somehow). well, 220, 221.. whatever it takes

I live in the UK but mostly interact with non-UK people who live here. Things they cannot fathom include why we never ever have electrical outlets in bathrooms. "Where can you plug in your hairdryer?" is always the question.

or your goddamn rechargeable toothbrush grrrrrrrr

yeah, US dwellings are required by law to have an electrical outlet for every 18 sq in of wall space, so it's weird to visit rooms in other lands

love an electrical outlet in the bathroom, i can hook up a fan and dry it out after my grueling toilette

no outlets in the bathroom? have they not got GFCI abroad?

We all need to go back to the days where the only available outlets were up in the light fixtures.

http://i.imgur.com/nXtsL17.jpg

yes we have GFCI, it's just really unusual for uk bathrooms to have electric outlets built in (except for electric shavers sometimes)

it's not really a problem, brush yr teeth using the power of yr wrists and elbows ya milksop

xp seeing as you brought ceiling light fittings into this, WHY DON'T YOU HAVE CEILING LIGHT FITTINGS??
Saw so many apartments without them whyyyy

It's 2017 and yet the richest nations on earth continue to live in squalor

who drinks juice? do adult people consume a sizable percentage of liquid via juice?

what else are you going to make bloody marys and mimosas with

juice is delicious. why would you not have of it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHNXUAwvFhg

juice as mixer for cocktails = A+
juice, preferably grapefruit, in a little 4oz breakfast cup served with coffee and eggs = A-
juice as additive to seltzer for 'spritzers' = B especially at work functions
juice qua juice in large 12 oz cup = B- to D-, depending on type.
juice starrring Omar Epps = C+, hasn't aged so well
juice in reconstituted little cylinders with a foil top served in caforiums = F

https://img.buzzfeed.com/buzzfeed-static/static/2015-07/13/14/campaign_images/webdr07/what-in-the-world-are-these-drinks-called-2-29111-1436811388-19_dblbig.jpg

I bought some tea thinking it was one of the brands darragh had mentioned but it appears to be "Taylor's"

Clown

Another fine mesh you've gotten tea into

laughed much too hard at that

Fruit juice smoothies that have about as much sugar as a Big Gulp soda but taste good anyway = B+

i do not have money to buy this tea kettle, but i would adore it:

http://demandware.edgesuite.net/sits_pod26/dw/image/v2/AAFV_PRD/on/demandware.static/-/Sites-Teavana_Master_Catalog/default/dwc1ac1320/images/Product%20Images/Merch/2000x2000_Full%20Res/30182_22ozhobnailteapotironblk.jpg?sw=1000&sh=1000

I believe that's a teapot, rather than a kettle

I saw a knockoff style one at world market today

I have a bee house one that needs a new strainer to use more frequently

wtf they changed their company name, these are the pots
http://www.zerojapan.info/en/

better teapot link, these are the business
http://www.zerojapan.info/en/catalog/teapot/

Long, long ago I owned that exact teapot. I can't recall how it left my possession.

You started microwaving your water

I had accepted that most Americans don't have kettles but what's really throwing me is that apparently the ones who do have a non-electric version that you stick on the stove?

Yeah, those are quite common over here. More owned than used tho.

That's what doesn't fly about the 120 vs 200+ voltage argument. Canadians and Japanese folks don't use stovetop kettles.

It's clearly the metric system that makes electric kettles desirable

Know plenty of canadians in Vancouver that own a stove top kettle

it's an anachronism, tea culture isn't big enough to keep up on kettle tech so old-timey folks use stove pot kettles and the system perpetuates itself

my grandmother had a stovetop kettle but died in 1987 or so, before this horrible debate

Apparently, Canadian Tire sells them but the Internet seems to think that Canadians mostly side with Brits and Aussies on this, which is my experience.

Ive got a teapot a bit like the ones in yr link mh! Mines red though because of course it is.

I rarely went to canadian tire

But I'm p sure i bought my now gone kettle probs in 2000 at london drugs or shoppers

My fave electric kettles are the very old ceramic ones from the 60s-70s. The element just hung there in the water exposed, I'm sure it was a bit dangerous.

http://thumbs.ebaystatic.com/images/g/WxgAAOSw5L9XESmV/s-l225.jpg

Thing about electric kettles is the toxic exposed plastic parts so not everyone likes to use them

Thats a thing, being wary of that? Huh.

I mean, yeah. A regular ol stovetop kettle is easier to use and store. I don't make ramen noodles in a crock pot either.

Here is just common to see them on the benchtop, I guess.

Trayce

Lots of people are very wary of plastics

There was a recent article saying that even the new "safe" plastics (bpa-free, etc) were not known to be safe because they have only recently been used in the market and not a big enough sample size has been collected

Sample size and duration used i should say

Yeah, thats a thing I'm aware of for sure, just never realised people thought it about kettles. I can see why they would though.

Have you SEEN the inside of any kettle that uses even the mildest of hard water? Urrgh.

My stove top kettle was stainless steel

Everything is carcinogenic; I can't be bothered to worry about anything less dangerous than a dental X-ray.

I bought some tea thinking it was one of the brands darragh had mentioned but it appears to be "Taylor's"

― mh 😏,

Taylor's of Harrogate? That is who owns the mighty YORKSHIRE TEA

http://www.oldjimbo.com/survival/kellyboil2.jpg

oh bums, sorry for large image. I thought ilx auto shrank stuff these days

Here is just common to see them on the benchtop, I guess.

Well I don't drink tea in the park, Trayce.

you a wine man?

Odysseus, yes, I am assured by the box
"By Appointment to
HRH The Prince of Wales
Suppliers of Beverages, Taylors of Harrogate
North Yorkshire"

so now I know for sure this isn't the tea darragh recommended

Because it's proper tea!

proper tea of the prince of wales

yorkshire is the shit, and my mom used to bring it back to the states in bulk before it was widely available here

It's easily the best of the 'builders' teas and Yorkshire Gold is better than Twinings breakfast/afternoon tea. (we consider Twinings as posh.)

http://www.worldmarket.com/product/taylors-of-harrogate-assam-tea.do

it's not yorkshire, but some differently-branded thing?

There's also a few other Yorkshire Tea variants. There's Yorkshire Breaktime Brew which has an orangey taste (a bit like Lady Grey which is my fave Twinings tea)

and there's a Bedtime Brew. Which is decaf and has nutmeg in it so it tastes and smells like Ginger Nuts. Perfect for having at supper (unless you're posh like Mark S and called supper what we call 'dinner' or 'tea')

xp

aye it's the same company who owns it though. I think taylors is the parent company. I think they are better known for coffee though?

probably some weird international branding

this tea is nice, though

Supper

Gtfo 'supper'

https://www.bettys.co.uk/tea/yorkshire-tea (the official place to buy yorkshire tea online)
http://i.imgur.com/awQTEDO.png

was it one of these?
https://www.bettys.co.uk/catalog/category/view/id/58/?limit=all

supper (unless you're posh like Mark S and called supper what we call 'dinner' or 'tea')

either this is as confusingly written as the original thread question or like parson woodforde mr slop has TWO main meals in the evening

slop ups meals

xp yeah, I think I linked it above -- it's the assam on that bettys page

Well some people call lunch 'dinner' and dinner 'tea'.
I know posh people call dinner 'supper'
but I also learned from On The Buses that working class londoners called dinner 'supper' too

supper in my house is a cup of tea and a biscuit. Maybe a bit of toast.

the deems way

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/nuncheon

^^^ the only meal i eat or indeed recognise

Wait, there is tea specifically designed for hard water?

yes, quite a few brands do that. the south east of england is a large market

Scottish Blend claims their tea works best with Scottish water.

btw my gran (dads mum) had dinner (main meal) at lunch but called it dinner and had a light meal at dinnertime called 'tea'. My grandad was a miner so it was quite common amongst working class east coasters to do it that way back then. Doubt many do it now.

My other gran was from the west coast and she didnt do it that way.

My grandparents were from a country that didn't accede to British rule and therefore couldn't afford two meals in the day

AVE IT

Not even at a moderately priced restaurant?

Not even on vouchers and money sent home from mericay

But they still bought Barrys tea?

kinda surprised that with the exception of milo z way upthread, we haven't discussed the incredibly, uh, diverse offerings from American grocery store tea-aisle-dominators Celestial Seasonings:

http://www.celestialseasonings.com/products

Ugh, it's an endless 1979 in Celestial Seasonings land.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4kpJWc9dU0

oh that's the stuff frobisher was talking about
xp

So much tea here

https://jingtea.com/shop/tea-type

american grocery brands, excluding those that are primarily britisher

bigelow - very run of the mill, in the market forever, anything other than plain old tea is suspect

celestial seasonings - lots of diversification, very middling in quality

republic of tea - some are decent, they have actual market segment sub-brands (packages focusing on legitimacy claims, the "get" whatever ones that throw stuff together to make health claims, some CS-style faux-hippie crap)

tazo - starbucks of tea, but maybe some of higher quality. includes both standard tea bags and some varieties in larger pouches that are somewhat ok. flavor profile good

rishi - varieties map to what you'd get in a legitimate looseleaf tea store, freshness and quality a little lower. less common to find, but probably one of the few looseleaf brands you'll find around

some brand I forget -- I need to figure out wtf this was, I bought a "morroccan mint" tea and it was some herbal shit that had mint and no actual tea in it, completely useless

Stash?

oh yeah

stash is fine, never had one that made me angry or extremely happy, I buy their moroccan mint one and it's acceptable. more accurate to the character of the blend than tazo's "zen" which is basically the same minus mint

now I'm sad because that is my actual favorite blend and I have a packet of fresh tea from the fancy shop at home

celestial seasonings is garbage

also ya i was confused as fuck with odysseus's supper word gymnastics

yeah I was being kind, afaik they have a zillion varieties that all offend me with dumb names and they taste like dried up paper

this is dece tho

http://www.traderjoes.com/images/fearless-flyer/uploads/article-1062/83548-irish-tea.png

w a bit of milk

hits the spot

i like red zinger. not tea so far as i know, but a good flavor of sour water.

Why is it always "irish" breakfast? Is it just a marketing thing because everyone claims to be Irish or does everyone infact think the Irish only eat warmed up corned beef & cabbage and washes it down with tea? (like deems)

ime, it's usually english breakfast

Yeah it's usually English

irish and english breakfast teas are both indian assam, strong and malty black teas that are served w/ milk right

Twinings English Breakfast got renamed for the international market
https://www.twinings.co.uk/app_/responsive/TwiningsUKI/media/product/IIBT0614-100/1-IIBT0614-100-F08931.png?w=640

well assam will be one of the blends used

About Irish Breakfast tea: Irish breakfast has in the past, simply been called 'Irish Tea' and was developed at the turn of the last century for the Irish market. Unlike its fore-runner English Breakfast, Irish Breakfast is much stronger, more intense in taste and bolder in colour. Twinings has created a wonderful blend of African broken pekoe and tasty Sri Lankan broken orange pekoe, and this tea, whilst not widely available in the UK, is extremely popular overseas.

irish breakfast is stronger than english you fools

i will crush your heads with my sword

didn't read what odysseus quoted but ya

basically youse better read up on it

It's an international blend so not sold here (except from twinings online )

The grading of tea is pretty nuts

Grades

Choppy contains many leaves of various sizes. Fannings are small particles of tea leaves used almost exclusively in tea bags. Flowery consists of large leaves, typically plucked in the second or third flush with an abundance of tips. Golden flowery includes very young tips or buds (usually golden in colour) that were picked early in the season. Tippy includes an abundance of tips.[17]
Whole leaf grades

The grades for whole leaf orthodox black tea are: Ceylon orange pekoe (OP) grades

OP—Orange Pekoe: main grade, consisting of long wiry leaf without tips
OP1—more delicate than OP; long, wiry leaf with the light liquor
OPA—bolder than OP; long leaf tea which ranges from tightly wound to almost open
OPS—Orange Pekoe Superior: primarily from Indonesia, similar to OP
FOP—Flowery Orange Pekoe: high-quality tea with a long leaf and few tips, considered the second grade in Assam, Dooars, and Bangladesh teas, but the first grade in China
FOP1: limited to only the highest quality leaves in the FOP classification
GFOP—Golden Flowery Orange Pekoe: higher proportion of tip than FOP. Top grade in Milima and Marinyn regions, uncommon in Assam and Darjeeling
TGFOP—Tippy Golden Flowery Orange Pekoe: the highest proportion of tip, main grade in Darjeeling and Assam
TGFOP1—limited to only the highest quality leaves in the TGFOP classification
FTGFOP[a]—Finest Tippy Golden Flowery Orange Pekoe: highest quality grade
FTGFOP1 or STGFOP or SFTGFOP—limited to only the highest quality leaves in the FTGFOP classification

Broken leaf grades

BT—Broken Tea: Usually a black, open, fleshy leaf that is very bulky. Classification used in Sumatra, Ceylon(Sri Lanka), and some parts of Southern India.
BP—Broken Pekoe: Most common broken pekoe grade. From Indonesia, Ceylon(Sri Lanka), Assam and Southern India.
BPS—Broken Pekoe Souchong: Term for broken pekoe in Assam and Darjeeling.
FP—Flowery Pekoe: High-quality pekoe. Usually coarser with a fleshier, broken leaf. Produced in Ceylon(Sri Lanka) and Southern India, as well as in some parts of Kenya.
BOP—Broken Orange Pekoe: Main broken grade. Prevalent in Assam, Ceylon(Sri Lanka), Southern India, Java, and China.
F BOP—Flowery Broken Orange Pekoe: Coarser and broken with some tips. From Assam, Ceylon(Sri Lanka), Indonesia, China, and Bangladesh. In South America coarser, black broken.
F BOP F—Finest Broken Orange Pekoe Flowery: The finest broken orange pekoe. Higher proportion of tips. Mainly from Ceylon's "low districts".
G BOP—Golden Broken Orange Pekoe: Second grade tea with uneven leaves and few tips.
GF BOP1—Golden Flowery Broken Orange Pekoe 1: As above, but with only the highest quality leaves in the GFBOP classification.
TGF BOP1—Tippy Golden Flowery Broken Orange Pekoe 1: High-quality leaves with a high proportion of tips. Finest broken First Grade Leaves in Darjeeling and some parts of Assam.

Fannings grades

PF—Pekoe Fannings
OF—Orange Fannings: From Northern India and some parts of Africa and South America.
FOF—Flowery Orange Fannings: Common in Assam, Dooars, and Bangladesh. Some leaf sizes come close to the smaller broken grades.
GFOF—Golden Flowery Orange Fannings: Finest grade in Darjeeling for tea bag production.
TGFOF—Tippy Golden Flowery Orange Fannings.
BOPF—Broken Orange Pekoe Fannings: Main grade in Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Southern India, Kenya, Mozambique, Bangladesh, and China. Black-leaf tea with few added ingredients, uniform particle size, and no tips.

Dust grades

D1—Dust 1: From Sri Lanka, Indonesia, China, Africa, South America, and Southern India.
PD—Pekoe Dust
PD1—Pekoe Dust 1: Mainly produced in India.

Fannings

Fannings are small pieces of tea that are left over after higher grades of teas are gathered to be sold. Traditionally these were treated as the rejects of the manufacturing process in making high-quality leaf tea like the orange pekoe. Fannings with extremely small particles are sometimes called dusts.[14] Fannings and dusts are considered the lowest grades of tea, separated from broken-leaf teas which have larger pieces of the leaves. However, the fannings of expensive teas can still be more expensive and more flavourful than whole leaves of cheaper teas.

This traditionally low-quality tea has, however, experienced a huge demand in the developing world in the last century as the practice of tea drinking became popular. Tea stalls in India and the South Asian sub-continent, and Africa prefer dust tea because it is cheap and also produces a very strong brew; consequently, more cups are obtained per measure of tea dust.

Because of the small size of the particles, a tea infuser is typically used to brew fannings.[15] Fannings are also typically used in most tea bags, although some companies sell tea bags containing whole-leaf tea.[16]

Some exporters focus primarily on broken-leaf teas, fannings, and dusts.

Tazo 'awake' is the only good US tea
Tea called 'English Breakfast Tea' over there is of varying i.e. shit quality
Worst tea experience of my life was Lipton tea bag (which split) in a mug of microwaved water, with HALF AND HALF

wow

mint tea is always just mint you crazy kids

Tazo 'awake' is the only good US tea
rong

Tea called 'English Breakfast Tea' over there is of varying i.e. shit quality
pretty right

mint tea is always just mint you crazy kids
EXTRA RONG
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maghrebi_mint_tea

I was already somewhat scolded this morning by my coworker ("assam is _indian tea_") for accidentally using a british lens for evaluating tea, might as well pass that one

Lipton does make a few pretty decent "upscale" teas. I had a white tea w/ berry infusion that came in pyramids from them.

This is one of the nicest teas I've had
https://www.fortnumandmason.com/products/darjeeling-ftgfop-20-large-leaf-tea-bags?taxon_id=102

lipton might be trying to fancy up but they're the most garbage brand

btw I have (AMERICAN OPINIONS INCOMING) many opinions on iced tea, but I believe the britishers might have a heart attack

one weird thing about murica is that most of their iced tea is sweet

the fancy or hipster places have normal iced tea i've found

that's a regional thing

the south and maybe east sweeten by default, I'm used to unsweetened

the convenience store nearest here has four varieties of iced tea in both sweetened and unsweetened versions

I have never had iced tea

my parents go through about a gallon of home-brewed iced tea per day

Mh im in california tho

I would do a nice big jar of sun tea if I could rely on plenty of British sunlight to get it going. Iced jasmine tea is available in some East Asian restaurants too.

suzy, I know this will be shocking (it was to me) but the sun actually has nothing to do with sun tea
http://drinks.seriouseats.com/2012/07/the-food-lab-the-truth-about-sun-tea-forget-the-sun-cold-brew-tea-is-better.html

there might be some magic but it's really just the slow cold (or somewhat warm) infusion of tea

Iced jasmine sounds refreshing

It's so hot today

Now I just have to find a giant jar, OH JOY.

anyway this is the tea I'm drinking at home right now

http://www.teapeople.us/black/boba-guys-blend-no1

I also like genmaicha a lot

same, it's got that grain flavor

I bought this for my dad last year and he still has a few left so I just made a cup of it

https://www.fortnumandmason.com/products/rooibos-infusion

Can you get Rooibos in North America?
It's caffeine free so perfect for my dad who has angina but is also a perfect drink for late at night

yeah, we have rooibos

It's quite a strong taste but my dad loves it,wont drink anything else now. I guess he's a creature of habit

verveine aka verbena is the king of herbal teas imo. closely followed by mint tea that has steeped in an old stainless steel teapot and then been poured from a mile off the table into your teacup by an old lebanese man.

lemon verbena! not easy to get in north america tho

is that true?? it is practically a weed in france. you can grow great bushes of it in the yard. it is so goddamn good. it is the 100% sure-fire go-to for a night curled up by the fire.

i tried to get lemon verbena tea in california a few years ago and i could not find it

i found verbena mixed with other things, but never just lemon verbena tea

had some peruvian lemon verbena tea and fell in love with it since

I like mint green tea etc but if you say mint tea or raspberry tea you would not expect any actual tea by default. At least not here.

i said "moroccan mint" which is a reference to a type of tea!!!!

"numi organic tea" was the offender

How the hell is this so expensive?
https://www.amazon.co.uk/T-fal-Electric-kettle-Shea-BF8054JP/dp/B0090EQMHC/r

and this one

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Dualit-White-Cordless-Jug-Kettle/dp/B001LEVWU6/

auto-pricing algorithms plus inattentive humans. there's a known issue with some amazon listing programs that price against other similar or identical items that fuck up when matches aren't found or amazon stops carrying something. then the programs just get in a feedback loop

there's still plenty of kettles at the £200 mark. I just cant imagine anyone paying that much for a kettle.

I suppose this was inevitable
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Smarter-iKettle-Kettle-Stainless-Steel/dp/B0179NGBT4/r

veblen goods, baby. everyone needs a kettle, but I need... a better kettle

I kind of hate rooibos tea

tastes grassy and blah

drink better rooibos amigo

No way does it taste grassy. I hate grassy tea as does my dad.

Its a more kind of earthy taste if anything

Maybe he scoops it right from the earth

Just a reminder guys

Two types of tea

both nasty

wrong and wronger

"Wronger Rites" could be a celestial seasonings blend

I'm pretty sure that's the true nature of their blends

i said "moroccan mint" which is a reference to a type of tea!!!!

― mh 😏, Tuesday, 14 March 2017 22:44 (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

ok, my mistake!

Does anyone here like fruit tea infusions? Twinings stopped making the best ever fruit tea Lemon Zest

last summer i got into making my own -- just put fruit/tea in a jar and put it in the fridge overnight, easy peasy lemon tea-sy

dont tell deems

I will occasionally have a fennel tea in the evening. don't @ me.

more generally will have breakfast tea throughout the day. most of my life i boiled water in an electric kettle, poured over teabag in mug, then added milk. electric kettles seem one of those quotidian domestic like peelers, where you can spend a lot or a little and it will make no difference to the quality of the thing. I lived with my brother for a while recently, and he 'invested' in a somewhat expensive transparent kettle, yes with blue lights. the first one, the switch you pressed to make it go broke within about a month. We got it swapped for a new version. After about six months, the lid started popping up when you boiled the water. So - obviously we didn't get a new one - we started balancing a book on the lid of the kettle. We used a book of modern-day apologetics called The Case Against Christ, which was given to my brother by his fatalistically Christian driving instructor, Viktor. We persisted in this arrangement for a year, which very much irritated regular visitors to the house. 'Just get a new one'. Eventually we did, a £20 one, which has been absolutely fine. (Incidentally, that 'price no indicator of worth' model does not apply to ironing boards, I found. or at least going for the very cheapest turned out to be a big mistake).

I still use a china teapot with a cosy, becuase I like the semi-stewed strong flavour. Occasionally, very occasionally this will be with tea leaves.

When I lived in Poland I had a stove-top kettle which had lost its whistle :(

Plenty of times went into the kitchen only to realise I'd put on the kettle a couple of hours before, the water had evaporated and the kettle was hotter than the core of the earth.

But probably now the way I make tea most commonly is with the free sawdusty teabags at work, with an 'elf and safety' scalding water dispenser, where you press a red thumb button to say 'yes ok i am happy this device will dispense scalding water' before pressing the lever that then does so. This is clearly f'ing inadequate but it's only bloody tea.

This scalding water business, which you get on trains and in coffee shops, when you add milk results in something almost totally unsatisfactory, barely worth drinking imo. I miss the tea urn in greasy spoons and 'tea' cafes, tho obviously there are still places you can go to get this. Again, tho, it's only tea.

During this post I was drinking tea from a large china blue teapot, bag per mug plus one of the pot as per deems, with full fat milk.

I knew i could rely on u fizzles

'price no indicator of worth'

Making a thread on this btw

what the hell is wrong with my punctuation is what I want to know. broken down like an expensive kettle. also - 'kettles seem one of those quotidian domestic *items* like peelers'.

re peelers: this is false in my experience, there are some useless cheap peelers out there

you really are older than I thought if you can remember Peelers :)

re peelers: this is false in my experience, there are some useless cheap peelers out there

oh god absolutely - wretched things that knack your wrist and then break. point is that there are also some useless expensive peelers (v much ime obv), and some very good cheap peelers and there seems no more than a bare preponderance one way or the other by way of mapping. that said i'm really cackhanded so this could purely be a matter of technique, as the b said to the a.

It is always the little blade retaining dimples that break on cheap peelers. I last bought a £5 culinaire one that has lasted 6 months now, and it does some hardcore peeling like sweet potatoes and butternut squashes quite often as well.

veblen kettles

As I eat my breakfast it occurs to me that I've never seen egg cups in U.S. shops. Do Americans not eat dippy eggs?

I cant imagine a life without boiled eggs and soldiers

my mum always used a lancashire peeler (note important orange string round handle) and disdained anything flimsier (she was a war baby though)

https://www.ceonline.co.uk/pub/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/560x560/e9c3970ab036de70892d86c6d221abfe/h/t/httpwww.zodiacspco.co.ukuserproductslarge90046.jpg

My mum has something similar to that but she doesn't use it, she uses her mums old knife. I'll take a photo of it later when im not ill.

saucepan guy

but i make tea maybe 4x a year

My mom used egg cups but with a flourish like that made breakfast "special." They're a bit fussy for US tastes unless your style is kind of formal. If you want runny centers, I think USians are more likely to fry over easy than to soft boil.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

I feel like a lot of people may have voted in this poll who didn't read the title

I'm an American who uses a kettle (electric) to boil water. I used an old stove-top, granny kettle up until probably about 10 years ago, but once I got my first electric kettle I couldn't imagine going back.

XP fake brews

https://78.media.tumblr.com/78441ea8b4a0478224c4f699a05319f7/tumblr_p4awwuhDZx1u1vkloo1_1280.jpg

A+

Sorry but this is important I'm being attacked: how do you heat up water for tea

— Ashley Feinberg (@ashleyfeinberg) December 10, 2021

THE MICROWAVE?!

I'm only more horrified after reading how

https://www.wikihow.com/Boil-Water-in-the-Microwave?

Are these steps overkill? yall just be SUPERHEATING?? my word.

that entire thread is really something else

literally nobody I know in the US boils water with a microwave fwiw

I've only done it for swiss miss as a child, but I also don't see the problem.

if ive learnt one thing from this thread abt americans and kettles its that literally anything goes

I can't even try to put myself into the mindset of someone who thinks a kettle is pretentious and also I'd rather die than have a microwave oven in my kitchen - which probably does sound a bit pretentious, but I genuinely fucking hate them.

to be clear "(pretentious)" is ashley trolling her followers to goose the numbers and get ppl voting

even as trolling tactic it makes no sense

I bought an electric kettle because I felt stupid using natural gas to boil water.. it's not like you sauté water for tea

(I don't have and don't want a microwave)

you get a nice rapid boil with an electric kettle and it switches off when done. It's a product design classic like the rice cooker or the pressure cooker - it's a perfectly conceived invention. A classic case of the shock of the old or something like that.

my ex-gf's roommate used to constantly boil kettles dry on the stove, scorching them so they had to be tossed. Then she'd get a new one and do it again

there's some nice ones upthread

it's a good thread, just me and odysseus disagreeing pleasantly about tea (which is horrible)

you get a nice rapid boil with an electric kettle and it switches off when done. It's a product design classic like the rice cooker or the pressure cooker - it's a perfectly conceived invention. A classic case of the shock of the old or something like that.

― calzino, Friday, December 10, 2021 6:42 PM (nine minutes ago)

this is otm

microwave measuring cup for 3-4 minutes

My mum told me when she first moved to England she lived in some slum shithole on a street which was demolished to make Hudds bus station. They had no cooker but did have an electric kettle which they used to keep on persistent boil to warm up tins of beans. And the most apocryphal sounding bit of her story was that once her twin sister didn't pierce or open the tin and somehow it went up like a rocket and embedded itself in the ceiling! Lol I'm not 100% sure that never happened, but I just don't think it really happened like that!

got the HOT HOT tap now. cup of tea? boosh, there it is baby.

Few months ago went to a mate's house and they were shaking their head at using boiling water for tea because you're meant to switch it off at like 86 degrees or something and there are posh kettles that do this now and they are the proud owners of one such kettle.
(I don't really drink filter coffee often but if I do I boil the water and leave it a bit.)

xp I am pretty tempted with one of them taps

"twin sister" is a nice detail :)

the actual spooky cause of the incident in my scientific opinion

Are microwaves too melty for you Calzino?

Too Labour-saving.

My stainless Bonavita died so I bought an angular black kettle like a prop from a Michael Mann movie. It’s the best looking thing in my kitchen.

don't sell yourself short milo, but do post a pic

xxxxp
she's always had to look out for her twin sister who is about 2 ft taller than her, still is now while she's got 3 different cancers attacking her :(

got to do a privilege check on microwave slagging because some just simply don't have time to cook, but I really despise them. And also they remind me of a horrible nightshift job I had when I went through a period of warming up muller rice pots on my lunch break.

my ex-gf's roommate used to constantly boil kettles dry on the stove, scorching them so they had to be tossed. Then she'd get a new one and do it again

This was absolutely my problem. I've ruined five kettles in three years. The last time it happened was in my previous apartment, which had a glass-topped stove. I left a rather-nice kettle on it for hours, having forgotten about it while I was working in the other room. I came in, saw what had happened, grabbed an oven mitt and lifted the kettle-- it was stuck. I wrenched it, and it cracked the stove top entirely and exploded shards of flaming glass around the room. The repair cost me $800.

I use a Cuisinart electric now. You can pick the temperature you want it to boil to, and it'll generously keep the water at that temperature for fifteen minutes in case you get distracted. Life changing!

yeah stovetop kettles are a menace, the piercing whistle can gtfo too

I use a kettle but no whistle, it's for pour over coffee so it has a thermometer and a weird long curved stem

that sounds like work!

coffee culture has convinced me the more laborious and annoying it is to make coffee the better it tastes

i have been converted since my birthday (when a friend gave me one) to the AEROPRESS, which is perfect for making one (1) cup of coffee

i brought my electric kettle to class today to share some tea and coffee with my students and they were agog at my ability to boil water in the classroom lol

fucked up with the fancy kettle today. it was set to 96 not my usual 91. i pressed on. French press tasted like death. i didn't know i was like this.

i used to have an aeropress, those rule

i like the happy little sigh they make

No
I use a pot to boil water

years ago I worked briefly with an Argentine intern who had a sick hand-tooled leather thermos for his yerba mate... I really want one

https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xZV8McRU09o/Tn4HUVH9bzI/AAAAAAAABB8/DoMYjBlzdEQ/s1600/argentina+mate.jpg

I think a more interesting question would be, what knot do you use to tie the string of your bag so the tag doesn’t fall into the cup when you pour the water in

yall ain't microwaving the bag too r u?

Only savages itt

coffee culture has convinced me the more laborious and annoying it is to make coffee the better it tastes

I believed this until I discovered that I could make Japanese iced coffee (Chemex pourover over ice in the reservoir) automatically with a Bonavita coffee maker.

We switched to a stove top because hard water ate three electric kettles in a year

You’ve got to descale it with a mix of white vinegar and water and boil about once a month if you live in a hard water area - or use filtered water when filling up.

I think a more interesting question would be, what knot do you use to tie the string of your bag so the tag doesn’t fall into the cup when you pour the water in

― calstars, Saturday, 11 December 2021 1:02 PM (seven hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Strings on bags are absolutely infuriating and unnecessary. (Individual wrapping too)

It’s very hard to buy unstringed bags outside of the UK and yet I have seen teaspoons all over the world.

yep hard water is a killer. I feel like a huge ponce filling up from filtered water, but it has prolonged the kettles.

hate it when the tags on stringed (strung?) tea bags are stuck to the bag with a tiny bit of glue, too.

String/tag out and one loop around handle whats the problem

Not so good in a pot.

You wouldnt use strung bags in a pot you savage

I was given some CBD hemp teabags and let me tell you they are awful in every way. They are in individual sachets and have strings attached and you might as well have a cup of brewed dishwater.

had an aunt in Ireland who would boil the kettle on her coal-fired range (what a lovely thing) but she would break out the electric kettle in the afternoon while the range was cooling down. they drank like 5-7 cups a day. definitely saw the boil from the electric come super fast and didn't notice any difference in the quality of the finished tea. i'm a yank so always did stove top (gas) boil and only fucked with electric kettles in workplace situations, still prefer the stovetop but if i had the non-us current boiling water super fast i suppose i would be converted thusly. microwave is not something i ever go near these past 30 years except again in the workplace and i have some leftovers, would never boil water in one.

The range has the benefit of the teapot going on for a few minutes while the brew draws

they drank like 5-7 cups a day.

Not big tea drinkers then?

oh god this reminds me my current company would provide an insane amount of unprepared food in the various kitchens throughout the complex, lots of eggs so i developed a microwaved egg thing for my english muffin (toasted in conventional toaster). never super satisfying but good enough to kick start the day. Haven't been in the office in 20 months and no idea if they'll continue the larder. not an avocado person but the rush on that to make avocado toast and the supply being cleared out before 10am was such a weird thing

Xpost we're talking 40+ years ago they probably did drink more than that it's all a blur. remember the bigs mugs with lots of milk and 2-3 spoons of sugar. also, toast made on the coal range was so amazing, the toaster oven shit i make now is so inferior i can't even

my grandma's turf burning range has taken up mythical status in my memory bank. I used to think how come we accept having a shitty little gas cooker in a poky little kitchen in the UK and they have this!

they seemed to cook very well in both boiling and roasting if you were in the know, i guess not super efficient but the rituals of tending/cleaning/manipulating the thing was super fascinating to me as a boy

(all hats off to oor neechy this turns out to be an unexpectedly expansive and heart-warming thread topic)

(as revived by the unpretentious ashley feinberg so hats off to her too)

According to my mum I was always a bit of a tea jenny.

drinks a lot, or fussy?

Both probably.

Kettle on a gas range, thanks, I know we should be using induction burners but that's not what we have in the house.

I don't understand all the general-use microwave hate! Not for boiling water, obv, that's for unrepentant savages. But for melting butter and warming things up it's invaluable. Also for the Trader Joe's butter chicken and saag paneer frozen dinners.

We use an electric kettle for our tea and pour over coffee, but I am not above microwaving a single cup of hot water if it's just me.

i used to microwave water in the office, it worked ok. i didn't know it was considered an american thing to do.

they seem evil to me and I don't like the texture of food that has been heated in them it just isn't right.

they’re perfect for reheating coffee or leftovers or making microwave popcorn. most of their other qualities are oversold or nonexistent imo but for those things they really are hard to beat.

I love heating things in the dish and not using another pan. labor saving ftw

leftovers do taste better reheated on the stove, but yeah

Sometimes you just want to gently heat something and not re-cook it!

Honestly before we got our rice cooker we would cook rice and vegetables in a microwaveable steamer and it was great. Microwave popcorn is obviously great.

Sorry but reheating coffee (or tea) as my in laws do is all kinds of wrong and I won’t be moved on it, why would you do this?!

that's true, in orbit

gyac, would you then do something additional to the vegetables? I think my aversion to microwave cooking comes from a childhood of microwave-defrosted frozen vegetables that tasted like mush, though idk maybe this has improved since the 80s or fresh vegetables are that much heartier?

I would also rather drink cold coffee than reheat it, though I'm not sure that is defensible or rational

The Microwave is the root of all evil today

makes sense, I do keep hearing bad things about waves

i reheat coffee because i don’t drink it fast enough tbh

Microwaves are good for corn, yams and winter squash - any veg like that with an outer skin or husk, you can basically just steam it in the microwave and it works really well.

im gnna drop this like "i dont even own a TV": i dont even own a microwave

(i do own a TV tho, im not a weirdo)

I always have my sweet potatoes with a slightly crispy oven roasted finish in some oil. Haven't tried them steamed before tbh.

i like to steam things like broccoli or cauliflower or green beans in the microwave. it is also good for potatoes. i didn't own one for a pretty long time! now i don't own a toaster.

Ahh the old metafilter chestnut "Is this something I would need to have a tv/microwave to understand?"

I don’t own a stove so microwave p essential

that sounds like a bad set-up wins, don't mean it in a shitty judgemental way. But not being able to fry some mushrooms and an egg on a morning would kill me.

Oh I have a little countertop oven & electric hob so I get by but the microwave comes into play for anything even slightly complicated but yeah it’s not a great setup

I didn't realize there was so much microwave hate. It's a really useful tool when you want to heat up a single serving of something: cup of liquid, bowl of soup, plate of leftovers. How do you heat up a single serving of, say, mashed potatoes? Similarly, Trader Joe's sells these little microwavable rice pouches, which are perfect, because they take three minutes, vs. 25, and only make enough for just one or two people. And what do you do when a recipe calls for softened butter? Put it off for a few hours? Or is there some overlap between microwave haters and people that exclusively store their butter at room temperature?

Yeah harbl otm regarding the kinds of vegetables you can steam best. We don’t do that anymore but it’s a handy thing to be able to do.

I find it satisfying and cathartic to pound the daylights out of a cold stick of butter with a rolling pin but ymmv.

Our microwave is mostly used for heating back up cold cups of tea and coffee because we get distracted and neglect to drink them quickly. But I also limit my caffeine intake so don't want to warm up a cup by adding more.

i have an electric kettle and a rice cooker, those are my only kitchen appliances

Yeah harbl otm regarding the kinds of vegetables you can steam best. We don’t do that anymore but it’s a handy thing to be able to do.

― mardheamac (gyac), Saturday, December 11, 2021 12:19 PM (forty-two minutes ago)

I did mean to also allow that you perhaps eat (or ate) more healthily than me! Also thinking about it now, very few things I cook take less than an hour, which does suck so

I'm know I'm the first person to have this idea, but have yall considered putting your coffee/tea in a thermos?

Where do you all stand on stand mixers? I'm for them!

Funnily enough I switched to a major brand of insulated cup that actually does an amazing job of allowing me to drink my coffee hot, but it's not going to be as effective over several hours.

Also it's made of metal so I can't microwave it, which I think will reassure some readers whose nerves are frayed by all the mentions of reheating drinks.

I am microwaving peas for my tea right now idgaf microwave gang 4eva

Drink yere bloody tea ye maniacs

or just dont have tea at all (it's horrible)

You say that have you tried it bloody

No way (xp)

it depends on what all they put into beef tea nowadays

I drink something like 12 cups of Barry’s Irish Breakfast between the hours of 8am and 11pm. Have been using a gooseneck electric kettle for a year+ and don’t think I could go back to heating water on the stovetop. This kettle has the ability to set a peak temperature lower than 212 which I know is best practice for many specific teas but idk I like to know that every bit of enlivening bitterness is being excoriated out of that teabag. A fun thing about the gooseneck is that I can pour into my cup from like 18” above without splashing, thus making sure the fucker is really pummeled for flavor.

I also leave the bag in the cup the whole time I’m drinking till it’s empty. And no second pourings per bag, GTFO into the garbage and au suivant as Jacques Brel would say

My dad used to have seven sugars in his Barry's tea, but cut down to 6.5 for health reasons a few years back. Also not sure if he has any real teeth left anyway

No sugar ever for me, nor milk. It was the same with coffee back when I was able to drink it (RIP)

I'm a pretty solid 4 cups of (Yorkshire) tea a day man. Use whatever kettle is available - virtually always electric, though not averse to stove top if I have access/the time. The idea of using a microwave to heat the water is, frankly, barbaric.

I've worked with my old man and father-in-law a few times - building a deck on the back of our maisonette, putting in a kitchen - and they drank heroic amounts of tea when they worked. I tried to keep up with with them but would start to feel weird by late afternoon - all shakey and metallic, like I'd been emptied out.

Ftr, we do have a microwave - mainly for baked beans, porridge for the kids and heating those hot sacks you can use for back pain.

2cups tea and 2cups coffee most days

ooh that means you can say "gimme a cup twice" twice a day

I've probably had about six cups today.

But, yes, I know people who drink far more tea than that.

Gimme a cuppa gimme a cup

I microwave my teabag and suck on it like a lollipop. Real Americans don't need water

(hurriedly thumbs through his Real American indoctrination materials)

I was told that the only tea that Real Americans consume is iced tea.

I microwave my teabag and suck on it like a lollipop. Real Americans don't need water

I'm a pretty solid 4 cups of (Yorkshire) tea a day man.

That’s my other brand besides Barry’s Irish breakfast - Yorkshire Red is sold at Whole Foods and I’ll do that for a week or two sometimes

i used to microwave for years, but I've made the move to boiling water in a pot on the stove. Microwave was really inferior, in retrospect. My wife had one of those countertop electric kettles for a while, but was cheap and it broke. I'd like to graduate to a stove-top kettle, but the one I truly want has been out of production for 20 years and costs about $1000 on ebay.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YBC7KMgDbI

Way back, in the 80s I think, I read an article about how hard it is to crack water to make hydrogen and oxygen for H-fueled vehicles because water molecules are so stable, and there was a parenthetical note saying this also makes it take longer to heat plain water in the microwave. So I used stovetop kettle for a long time before getting an electric kettle.

i'm sorry what

looks like i stupidly believed that microwaves heat water faster but the difference is not significant afaict

(especially given i would only heat a smaller amount of water in the microwave)

These things horrify me

https://www.quooker.co.uk/

yes I like to wash my hands with a jet of instantly boiled water as well

God, yes, can you imagine coming home pished and trying to cop a quick glug out of the tap to stop yourself getting dehydrated?

The advert where the kid takes a drink out of the tap just makes me think there will be a lot of kids with scalded mouths. No way can it be foolproof.

i would simply not use the boiling water tap except when i needed boiling water

It’s something North London cognoscenti seemed to have installed a couple of years ago - imagine the tedium of Caitlin Moran and her mates shitting up Twitter with Quooker enthusiasm.

i mean are we comparing it to how they normally shit up Twitter because

can you use the quooker to make quorn

and quoinoa

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FGb3HrGXMAMels8?format=jpg&name=medium

in this thread tell air fryers to fuck off

Bubble Tape is not for people with air fryers

fuck yr barbrous "immersion" heaters, i shall wash the soil of labour from my body in a tin bath before the fire