Is there trouble brewing...

Many restaurants neglect the part of the meal that lingers in the diner’s mind. Henrietta Lovell examines why not taking tea seriously is a mistake...

“We don’t sell tea.” When I started Rare Tea Co. in 2004 restaurant managers in some of the best UK restaurants would laugh at me, or at best look confused. Way back then you might find a dusty box of teabags desiccated on top of the coffee machine. No one ordered tea because the tea was terrible. I often felt like I was banging my head against a brick wall. I tried to explain, if they served instant coffee granules they probably wouldn’t serve much coffee either. Some nods, more shrugs.

Since then a revolution has happened. Good tea can be found across the country and the world. But not universally.

“Ooh, la, la, Enriette, at the end of the service my waiters will be tired. I can’t ask them to take care of tea. Pfff.”

This from the restaurant manager of a three-Michelin-star place in Paris, where the amuse-bouche was a masterpiece of tweezers and finesse. But when it comes to the last thing people taste before the bill- who gives a shit? Just bung some tea in a pot and fill it up with water. It’s okay. It’s what they’re used to. Most people will drink fresh mint anyway.

There is a reason for that. Fresh mint is safer. Less fuck-up-able. It’s no rare excitement – but it is OK. And bad tea isn’t ever OK. Let’s not pretend.

I was sitting at restaurant with a pretention to perfection in Heathrow the other day, waiting for a flight, drinking coffee. I order coffee when I can’t be sure of the tea. It’s just less painful. The lady beside me was braver. She got a huge pot with one English Breakfast teabag dangling inside. There was enough water for three or four cups. Her tea was thin and weak. I watched her pour milk in it and the cup turned a sickening grey. She winced as she drank it. She waited and waited for colour. It came at last, but by then the tea was bitter and cold.

I asked her if it was as horrible as it looked. She said it was worse. The waiter came to give her the bill,

- Was everything alright?

- Yes, thank you.

When he was gone she turned to me,

- It’s how it is. I thought it might be better here, but it wasn’t.

The whole point of going to a restaurant is to have delicious things cooked and prepared for us by people with a skill that exceeds our own. We want to try new things, new realms of deliciousness. And we want to be looked after by people who care.

When it comes to a coffee we expect freshly ground beans and an expertly made cup. When it comes to tea we need beautiful crafted leaves prepared with that same level of expertise. It doesn’t need expensive equipment, just control of three elements: leaf to water ratio/ temperature/infusion time. With good leaf and a little precision those realms of deliciousness are easily achievable. As in baking, we can’t just add some eggs, bake for some time at some temperature and expect to get a decent cake or any degree of consistency. Ingredients matter too, of course – butter over margarine.

There are simple and ergonomic tricks I can, and do, teach large, busy restaurants, little cafés and Michelinstarred places to get it right for their set-ups. I’ve never found a restaurant where it wasn’t possible to make tea beautifully. No more effort has to be put in than is already shown to the coffee, but crucially, as much. It can be done. It is done by many, many places now, with fierce pride. Places from the excellent Kaffeine coffee shops in London to Noma in Copenhagen.

Before I first started working with Noma they were only serving about three cups a week. We put in some truly beautiful tea, including a bespoke blend of herbs, and things changed dramatically. They committed to infusing it perfectly, with just the same dedication they take over everything. People get the whole Noma experience from the moment they are greeted at the door to the last sip of tea that sets them up for their departure into the cold darkness outside. They leave as delighted as they arrive. Tea now stands shoulder to shoulder with the coffee, sometimes nudging ahead.

It’s truly wonderful to see the change that has taken place in restaurants. It makes so much sense. Not only are guests getting a better experience with good tea, there are good margins to be made. There are still those that complain about the price. Tea is no different to wine, or cheese: it can be bought for less or more depending on the quality; how it is crafted; how expensive it is to produce. Restaurants rarely choose their cheese or wine supplier purely on the basis that they have the cheapest product, regardless of the taste.

What I can guarantee you is that there is truly delicious, directly traded, loose-leaf tea out there that will afford any café, restaurant or hotel an 80 per cent gross profit margin. Probably a 90 per cent margin. If they want to up the stakes and chose the rarer, more expensive teas, guests are more than happy to pay a few pence more for something exceptional. Tea is an affordable luxury. What a restaurant won’t get with good tea is the 98 per cent margin achievable from a cheap, industrial brew. If it’s cheap there is a reason - low skill, high mechanisation and low flavour. No different from a flabby piece of processed cheese wrapped in plastic.

Then there is the impact on the producer. For tea to be dirt cheap, someone is getting it in the neck. Life expectancy is in the 40s in parts of Assam and East Africa where most of our “normal” tea is made. It’s a cruelly exploitative business run by giant agri-business and middle-men brokers. If we bought and served tea like wine - with care, for flavour and quality over price, then those same farms might thrive like vineyards. Massive hubris, I know, but we might change the world together, comrades, in small way, but for the better.

If they don’t care about the tea- what does it say about a restaurant? When your tea is left in a large pot to get cold and bitter, or a “silken” plastic pyramid on a bleached string, dangling menstrually, do you think – How kind. What a treat. How delicious?

Henrietta Lovell is the founder of The Rare Tea Company

Tea is no different to wine, or cheese. But restaurants rarely choose their cheese or wine supplier purely on the basis that they have the cheapest product, regardless of taste