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I just don't know what an English Biscuit is. That's not something we run across in Kansas.We don't have fine china tea cups (Corelle works fine). I don't know what you do in a Tea Room. But I do know I like hot tea. In an effort to drop a few pounds I've tried to cut out late night snacks like cookies or ice cream, but I need something. Recently I've gone to hot tea, but that causes late night bathroom runs. Then I figured out that, in true American fashion, portion size was excessive. I was drinking too much tea with my 12-16 oz cup. Maybe the British have something with their 6 oz. serving.
Also their biscuit idea may have merit. Low sugar and nice and bland. That would be good before bed. So, a quick Internet search yields a recipe that claims to be a traditional English biscuit. The results were fine by me but I still don't know if they are the "real deal". They'll work just fine.
So, one small cup of hot tea with a little milk, and a couple small biscuits. That beats down the craving for REAL calories. I will continue my quest to understand the Brits cuisine, and to question the American super-size and super-sweet approach.
If anyone has exposure to the British tea and biscuit cuisine, I'd value your observations. Also, what IS a retail tea room and its rituals, as Liz and others talk about? And with that I end my not-so-masculine post.
Process notes: I used my Noodler's Ahab flex nib on this post again, followed by watercolor pencils, waterbrush on Arches Velin text woven. The ink flow tends to be finicky at the start, after not using the pen for a few days, but it does wake up. I still like the responsiveness of the nib. The ink is Noodler's Lexington Gray.
3 comments:
love the post John... I don't have time right now but I will do so sometime soon... I might even use it as an excuse to do some more tea sketching!!!!
And yes 16oz is WAY too big for a cup of tea...I almost collapsed with shock at reading that (well after doing the conversion into mls!)
Do let us know what biscuit recipe you used and we can tell you if it was anything like a 'real' English biscuit! (yes, English biscuits are often much less sweet than a cookie, but I might take issue with the bland accusation!)
Hoping to persuade you of the true beauty of an English biscuit...
Jane
ps love the sketch of the cup and the biscuits
I enjoyed this post, John. But if you were to go into a shop in England and look for biscuits, you'd find Rich Tea, Nice, Digestives, american-style cookies, Jaffa Cakes, Jammy Dodgers- not forgetting Scottish Shortbread either... I don't think there is A traditional british biscuit. A lot of them are indeed quite plain (I might also disagree with bland!)but fairly thin and crisp- good for dunking in your tea. And the pleasure of dunking the biscuit in the tea- there's a whole ritual in itself. Some biscuits stay in one piece, some crumble and leave soggy bits at the bottom of the cup! Opinions are divided on which is better...
I'm looking forward to seeing what you find.
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