An American scientist has sparked a trans-Atlantic tempest in a teapot by offering Britain advice on its favorite hot beverage.
Bryn Mawr College chemistry professor Michelle Francl says one of the keys to a perfect cup of tea is a pinch of salt. The tip is included in Francl’s book “Steeped: The Chemistry of Tea,” published Wednesday by the Royal Society of Chemistry.
Not since the Boston Tea Party has mixing tea with salt water roiled the Anglo-American relationship so much.
The salt suggestion drew howls of outrage from tea-lovers in Britain, where popular stereotype sees Americans as coffee-swilling boors who make tea, if at all, in the microwave.
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The U.S. Embassy in London intervened in the brewing storm with a social media post reassuring “the good people of the U.K. that the unthinkable notion of adding salt to Britain’s national drink is not official United States policy.”
Hold on, about to have my morning cup o Yorkshire, will report back
Edit - it kinda just makes it… rounder. Tea is supposed to be a little bit bitter, the salt makes the softer flavours more pronounced so it kinda stops tasting like tea
Edit 2, second cuppa. Just realised the prof probably doesn’t realise that a pinch of salt is actually quite a bit, so I tried an actual tiny pinch. You know what, it actually does improve it a tiny bit, but no enough that I need more salt in my life.
Does that daft cow not realise how much tea we drink? This is diabolical
Thanks for your research, I was too lazy to get off the chair and try myself
Now don’t leave us hanging, won’t you?
You need to drink more (average modern human drinks too less). Then you need more salt.