"What Is Worse? Tea Before Milk or Vice Versa?" Topic

In the spirit of the recent "what is worse?" debates, what is worse? Putting milk in the teacup before the tea? Or pouring the tea and then adding milk? What would Hitler or Stalin have done? Would a slave have any preference?

Relevance to pushing toy soldiers around – I quite like a cup of tea during a game, as do my wargaming friends and we'd like to make sure we are doing it right so as not to offend anyone (except Nige, he'd probably like to offend as many people as possible)

Don't put milk in tea anymore, but when I did, it was always milk first.

And people who put milk in last should be rounded up and…..

….made to drink Amercan coffee!

Cheers,
JohnG

Tea before milk is worse. Socks or trousers on first?

I prefer tea to be miffed, but usually have tiffed.

Interesting-

Milk in first or last?

This thorny question has divided tea drinkers for quite some time. Putting the milk in last was considered to be the ‘correct' thing to do in refined social circles, but the reason for this is often forgotten. In the early days of tea-drinking, poor-quality cups were inclined to crack when hot tea was poured into them, and putting the milk in first helped to prevent this. When finer and stronger materials came into use, this was no longer necessary – so putting the milk in last became a way of showing that one had the finest china on one's table. Evelyn Waugh once recorded a friend using the phrase ‘rather milk in first' to refer to a lower-class person, and the habit became a social divider that had little to do with the taste of the tea.

Having said that, there is a good reason for adding the milk last – if you are drinking an unfamiliar tea, it is easier to judge the correct amount of milk to add once you have seen the strength and colour of the tea. On the other hand, putting the milk in first means that the fat in the milk emulsifies in a different way when the tea is poured, which does change the flavour of the tea, giving it a more even, creamier flavour. It also cools the tea slightly to a more acceptable drinking temperature. So, now that the days when one's social position was judged by this sort of thing are long gone, you may pour your tea however you choose.

milk before tea in fine china, milk after in a builders mug.

Spot on Fred – milk in first when doing it properly, but if it's brewing in the mug, milk has to go after.

Fred and Dom have it right.

Nonsense. Milk in first is simply showing that you have inferior porcelain. ;)

I never knew the context of the sledge milk in first! Learn something new here every day.

NATO standard – Moo and Two – mixed by the drum. None of that sissy china stuff, lip searing metal or bendy plastic.

Tenthly, one should pour tea into the cup first. This is one of the most controversial points of all; indeed in every family in Britain there are probably two schools of thought on the subject. The milk-first school can bring forward some fairly strong arguments, but I maintain that my own argument is unanswerable. This is that, by putting the tea in first and stirring as one pours, one can exactly regulate the amount of milk whereas one is liable to put in too much milk if one does it the other way round.

--George Orwell, "A Nice Cup of Tea", 1946

Milk should be added before the tea, because denaturation (degradation) of milk proteins is liable to occur if milk encounters temperatures above 75°C. If milk is poured into hot tea, individual drops separate from the bulk of the milk and come into contact with the high temperatures of the tea for enough time for significant denaturation to occur. This is much less likely to happen if hot water is added to the milk.

--Royal Society of Chemistry, "How to Make a Perfect Cup of Tea", 2003

So it seems that even great minds cannot agree on this matter.

Ron

If you put the milk in first, your guests could be seriously MIFFED. Harold Steptoe, circa 1968, top expert.

Milk first (I like mine milky rather than watery)

Your on holiday right now Dave? :)
Can see yer not used to all this free time eh?
Cheer up lads its a teabag into the milk let sit for a minute or two to get the milk at room temp then in with the hot water (tip, fresh water in the jug each time so that its oxygenated to give a good draw) that's for us uns who don't have time or patience with that 'pinky' china rubbish :) oh and a decent tea is better over the cheaper 'dust' you get in the stores so rather spend a £ or so more for goodness.
Even HM would not complain as to a cuppa from yours truly. :+D
Cheers I'm off to do me up one now ;) my preferences are a nice strong morning teas and good old Earl Grey.
And yes I've been seen drinking a coffee or two, so not totally a triker.

People put milk in tea? Why?

Depends on the variety of course. anyone putting milk in Earl Grey for example deserves to be blackballed from the club

I drink sweat tea in the summer. But I put milk in my coffee first. Unless I'm using non-dairy creamer.

How is this even a question? Milk goes in first. It goes in while you are waiting for the water to boil and the tea to mash. Then you put the tea in.

This not only does all of that squirrelly nonsense that the Royal Society mentions above it also allows the milk to warm up a bit so it doesn't cool the tea off as much.

If you don't get blisters when you drink it you are doing something wrong.

Milk in first….bringing the empire back one cup at a time!!!!

Douglas Adams explains:
h2g2.com/edited_entry/A61345

Tea, milk, then sugar.
I like my tea light and sweet.
I don't care how others drink theirs, it is not my job to be the "Tea police".
Now coffee is a totally different story……

This is why we threw it into Boston Harbor.

Milk afterwards, obviously. We won't even talk about loose sugar vs, cubes. This sounds like a cause for war between a couple of Imaginations armies. My future Imaginations armies were going to fight over cheese; perhaps I will change that to the process of making a cup of tea.

Rrobbyrobot, don't open the sweet tea can o worms in the southern USA, I seen granny's curse like sailors over the right way to make it. On the mlk cup thing I always thought it was a regional thing. American coffee is the great social caste definer.

No contaminants in my tea please.

My wife puts the milk in first, and I put the milk in last. She is from Yorkshire, I'm not:)

We both put milk in Earl Grey.

I prefer mine black and strong. Irish Breakfast or something similar is just the thing.

My favourite is a nice cup of smokey Lapsong Souchong, though I rarely get it.

Milk in first if using tea bags, milk in last if loose tea brewed in the pot. And yes I put milk in Earl Grey.
Coffee filtered only none of that instant rubbish.

The drink is tea, the milk, like sugar, is an optional extra. So, obviously, milk comes after tea. QED.

Mollinary

Well I'm the exact reverse of Greg G1 – MIF if from a teapot and TIF with the teabag in the mug. Which is why I'm mostly Tiffed, and very rarely at all Miffed.

Don't like tea. EEK!!!!

Drink it black so no issue!…..

Did Mrs. O'Leary's cow start that fire so she would not have to answer this? Milk first of course.

It's boiling water
That brings out tea's flavor
With a dash of milk
You've a real brew to savor

YouTube link

I want to taste the tea so I take it black… or green as the case may be…
Does anyone put milk into green tea?

I drink sweat tea in summer

That sounds perfectly dreadful!

I add brown sugar from simple syrup. Never added milk, either first or last!

skippy0001 for the win! ;-)

Of course, the next question is:
Do you prefer your tea shaken, or stirred?

coffee only,the stronger the better.If the spoon can stand upright in it,then its worth drinking.

Ok this is educational!

My olde Eastern European grannie taught me about tea, which pretty much means adding anything is unnatural; ideally sugar is added by holding a sugar cube between your teeth, but I have given in and add the sugar to the cup

Tea + milk =

Seriously, though, I usually use a tea bag, so I add milk afterwards. If I'm not using a tea bag, then I pour the milk before the tea.

I will very occasionally drink tea if I have a sore throat, other than that I prefer coffee.

However I saw an episode of Downton Abbey (I know entertainment not fact), a group from the village was having tea when one lady asked for her milk to go in first. The look down Carson the butlers nose said all that had to be said for those of us who have far less care about the formalities on this side of the pond.

Based on that I would have to say that it should be tea first. (besides that way you get a tiny nuclear cloud explosion of milk in the cup- how fun).