An age-old question – what comes first, the tea or the milk? Readers of The Times London have been treated to some exciting drama after contributors got into a heated debate about this important ritual in the paper’s Letters to the Editor section.
It began when one reader asked whether a famous female British soccer player poured the milk in first when she mimed drinking tea to celebrate a goal – which inspired this response from another:
“I was always led to believe that the milk first or second question was originally a signal of social standing. Cheap porcelain cracked when hot tea was poured into it, so the milk was poured in first to lower the temperature and avoid such a disaster.”
The debate continued for three days, and The Times printed several more responses from passionate readers/tea-drinkers.
One argued that “tea stains porcelain, so putting the milk in first mitigates this”, while another maintained that tea “must be poured first so as to determine how much milk is necessary.”
The whole ordeal might be the most British thing we’ve ever heard.
