My Cup of Tea
Spring is upon us!!
Welcome to the home of the best hand made scones in Northern California!
Made Fresh Daily!
A Little Tea History 
In the 18th century tea was an expensive (and heavily taxed) luxury for the rich, also available in Coffee houses. After doubts and arguments about possible health risks and the suitability of the beverage for "persons of an inferior rank", the increasing reaction to working class drunkenness in the temperance movement led to tea being promoted as an alternative, and from the 1830s many new cafes and coffee houses opened up as a temperance alternative to pubs and inns.
 The tea room itself was developed towards the end of the century. In 1878 Catherine Cranston opened the first of what became a chain of Miss Cranston's Tea Rooms in Glasgow, Scotland, providing elegant well designed social venues which for the first time provided for well-to-do women socializing without male company and which proved widely popular. She engaged up and coming designers, becoming a patron of Charles Rennie Mackintosh who designed several interiors, and the complete building of The Willow Tearooms which provided a strikingly modern exterior as well as a series of interesting interior designs. Similar establishments became popular throughout Scotland, but as late as 1901 Glasgow men were remarking on the lack of "tea shops" in London.
However, from the 1880s fine hotels in both the United States and England began to offer tea service in tea rooms and tea courts, and by 1910 they had begun to host afternoon tea dances as dance crazes swept both the U.S. and the UK. Tea rooms were established catering for all classes of British society, most notably the chain set up by J. Lyons and Co. who opened their first teashop in 1894 at 213 Piccadilly, London, and set up a series of tea rooms known as Lyons Corner Houses. Tea rooms of all kinds were widespread in Britain by the 1950s, but in the following decades cafés became more fashionable, and tea rooms became less common. Country tea rooms offering cream teas are still a tourist attraction in many areas, particularly in Devon and Cornwall, and tea rooms can be found in most towns and villages. In Glasgow, The Willow Tearooms have been restored after years of having been absorbed into a department store, and now run a recreation of other Mackintosh interiors in another establishment in Buchanan Street near the site of one of her original tea rooms.
 How to make a perfect cup of tea...
- Use a good quality loose leaf or bagged tea
- This must be stored in an air-tight container at room temperature
- Always use freshly drawn boiling water
- In order to draw the best flavor out of the tea the water must contain oxygen, this is reduced if the water is boiled more than once.
- Measure the tea carefully
- Use 1 tea bag or 1 rounded teaspoon of loose tea for each cup to be served
- Allow the tea to brew for the recommended time before pouring
Thank you for visiting My Cup of Tea's website...I hope you enjoy your stay. Please come and visit it is well worth the trip!
Gift Certificates are available for our Gift Shop or Afternoon Teas. |
