The Tea Whore of Australia

My husband is a tea whore.

I don't want to start any inter-continental arguments about who loves their tea more, but I do believe that Australians take their tea and coffee more seriously that just about any group of people I've ever met. I think the phrases "obsessive", "fanatic", "weirdly-connected to" and "overly-preoccupied with" come to mind.

Just a personal observation, is all I'm saying.

David is downright snobby about his tea, which is why I was a little mortified when we went to brunch at a lovely and very reasonably-priced restaurant in our neighborhood called Cafe Largo and had a "tea incident".

David ordered hot tea. I ordered the unsweetened iced version, which according to my husband, is another way that Americans have bastardized proper tea drinking.

Like I said, tea whore.

So, a very nice waitress dutifully brought David his tea, which was a cup of hot water and a tea bag tucked neatly on the saucer. But alas, this apparently was a crime against proper tea drinking and some kind of important proper tea drinking line had been crossed and my once calm husband was all nerved up like a lion in a cage.

Apparently to get a proper brew, the water has to be boiling ferociously hot and you put the bag in the cup and then you put the boiling water, right off the fire, into the cup. Failing to do so means that the water will have cooled down in the transport from kitchen to table and will not be hot enough to brew the tea, which makes perfect sense except this concept is completely against the whole individualistic American mentality, if you ask me, because if the waitress had put my tea bag in the cup, poured the water over it and brought it to me, I would have been pissed because it's my tea and I control the bag and I want to make my own tea and get the darkness and strength to my satisfaction.

See the difference? Tea drinking is obviously a clash of cultures and experiences.

So the waitress, unaware of her transgressions, puts the cup of hot water down in front of him, totally unaware that she had committed the ultimate tea sin. This is the look on his face.


He's thinking, "This is soooo wrong."

Here he's trying to be a good sport, but it's, like, killing him.


The man is in agony. Drink the tea. Don't drink the tea. Drink the tea. Don't drink the tea. Dooh! What can an Aussie do to get a good cup of tea in this country?

And see now, he's in a pickle because he can't really drink the tea like this, but David has this whole reserved British/Australian thing going that prevents him from jumping up and making a scene. It's the pickle of all pickles!


So, one minute he's pondering his situation and then, he steadies himself and realizes he must say something or he won't have any tea for brunch and he waves the waitress over to the table.

This is what he says to her, which doesn't sound all that bad because his thick accent actually makes everything he says sound very smart, if you can actually understand what he's saying:

Um, Hi...um, I need you to do something for me and um, I know it's going to sound strange and it isn't anything you've done wrong, but I need you to take this back to the kitchen and pour out this water and um, put the tea bag in the cup and pour the boiling water over it..ha ha..I know that sounds ridiculous but it's actually the proper way to brew a bag and um, yeah, I just can't drink it this way.

Okay, so the waitress now thinks my husband is drunk. At noon on Sunday. And she rolls her eyes. And sort of sighs a little. Like this:



And she's thinking, "Who does this guy think he is?" And then, this picture pops into her mind:


Not that David cared, because he got his tea all properly brewed and I wanted to say "It's Lipton's for heaven's sakes, not liquid gold" but I kept my mouth shut and he regaled me with all the reasons that Starbucks never took off in Australia - coffee bastardization freaks - and then, he mentioned that the restaurant had heated his milk, which was another "tea whore no-no" and he contemplated jumping behind the bar and giving the wait staff a proper tea lesson but steadied himself and went back to drinking his ill-prepared tea, feeling all vastly superior and content in his tea whore snobbery.

See? All smiles now.



xxoo YM


PS: Disclaimer: I didn't take a picture of our waitress during the actual "tea whore" exchange between her and David. Actually, after it was over I called her back to the table, as if she had nothing to do but serve my every whim, and asked her if I could take her picture rolling her eyes at my husband and so, she did several very enthusiastic takes and ignored a bunch of other tables so I could get my shot and then she went back to the kitchen and spit in my eggs.

No, she didn't. I think.

She was a great waitress and a good sport. Her name is Sunny and if you go to Cafe Largo on Broadway and 138th Street, ask for her and tell her you are a food blogger and she'll pretty much do anything you want her to do on camera.

No, she won't. Just kidding.