I learned this term from Michael Mosley’s BBC Radio 4 podcast Just One Thing. From the Oxford English Dictionary:
British colloquial. In builder’s tea and similar compounds: designating robust, full-bodied black tea, brewed until very strong, and usually drunk with milk and often sugar.Wikipedia: “It takes its name from the inexpensive tea commonly drunk by labourers taking a break.”
Ah, so that’s what I’ve been drinking. (Almost always black, no sugar.)
Related reading
All OCA tea posts (Pinboard)
comments: 12
Usually has a connotation of an inexpensive tea, making up in sheer brewing tie what it lacks in real quality... Pretty much always blended rather than a single variety. Think "cheap and cheerful" rather than "luxury"
Yes, bags, not loose tea.
I generally drink decent but relatively inexpensive tea — Barry’s, Red Rose, Republic of Tea, Twinings, always steeping for five minutes.
I've recently swapped allegiance from Whittard's of London to Dorothy's Teas up here in Cumbria - partly because Whittard's had become unhelpfully erratic about which teas they had in stock at any one time. Dorothy's are excellent :)
I tried a box of builders, and it didn't seem all that strong. I do loose tea though, so Twinnings in the red box, or if I'm splurging, Scottish Breakfast from Harney & Sons in a 1 lb bag. That's strong breakfast tea!
@Richard: I looked at the website. Dorothy’s looks like an excellent way to drink tea.
@ChasM: I didn’t realize that tea is sold under the “Builder’s” name.
What I miss for breakfast: Twining’s loose Irish Breakfast. Still available, I know, but not as good as it once was (imo).
"@ChasM: I didn’t realize that tea is sold under the “Builder’s” name."
There's a generic non-branded use as well as any firm wanting to cash in on the well-known expression :)
I'll keep my eyes open. Oddly enough, a good source for tea has been the nearby Big Lots, which has had brands i've never seen elsewhere.
in one of those weird coincidences, today I came across a box of Builders' Tea - so their packaging, as opposed to Builder's Tea. this was in Booths - who don't use an apostrophe at all in their labelling, but the name is short for E H Booth & Co Ltd. That was just this morning in Keswick, prior to walking up Skiddaw.
Booths is a supermarket primarily in the north-west, though a few branches have made it across the Pennines into the north-east... nothing south of Lancashire or Yorkshire though.
https://everyday.booths.co.uk/booths-builders-tea-100-tea-bags.html
https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/tea-break-joinery-works-shardlow-derbyshire-60887
I saw that Booths packaging online. I like that design. And the painting — so evocative. Thanks to you both.
I've never heard of builders tree drunk black. It's made up of the cheap parts of the tea plant, ground to a near powder, so it gets incredibly strong very quickly. As it reaches the brink of being "stwed" the bag is removed and milk is added until it's a medium brown colour. Builders tea almost always includes two heaping teaspoons of sugar per mug.
The tea bags are only partly paper, so this is a mug full of microplastic.
I've been informed (by a sign in a little cafe) that the traditional tea for this is lipton yellow label. Twinings will also do the job. I preferred clipper.
Milk and sugar — it’s a good thing I taught college. : )
I appreciate all the tea culture in these comments, and the brand names I’ve never seen before.
Random question: would Typhoo be considered a likely brand for builder’s tea?
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