If you are anything like me, then you thrive on a good glass of juice (no concentrate, either juiced straight from the fruit or bought in the store after having been minimally messed with). In fact, juice is a huge part of our lives – it forms our breakfast or a part of it, gives us a boost when we finished exercising, fills us up on vitamins when we just can’t do eating but we really should and is enjoyed as a part of social occasions where we wish to avoid alcohol, be it in mocktails or straight on a chance day meeting with friends, during an evening outing and during all manner of other to dos.
But it’s really another couple of drinks, tea and coffee, that hold the prime position in our social behaviour, as well as our maladaptive; and I have heard it said that it defines the socio-national background to a t.
That may not be wholly correct, because most sweeping generalisations have a tendency to become the sweeping generalisation fallacy. There are many Brits who love coffee and many French, Germans and so on who probably prefer tea.
There are even those who like both.
Maybe not together, but that said, you ain’t tried nothin’ yet until you have had a chai latte. And that is, in a way, a combination of the context.
Whatever our personal preferences, tea and coffee are definitely perceived as being a strong part of different cultures. Just like Austria and Germany are, in socio-cultural minds, associated with beer and lederhosen, there is strong association of other nations with other drinks.
In Englishman in New York, the lines go:
“Don’t drink coffee, I take tea, my dear” (by Sting)
A slightly more lively, naughty rap on the thematic, by Professor Elemental, makes an entire song just out of British behaviour about tea (including the pinkie out), reaching its peak with these lines :
“Coffee clots, nodding off–lost the plot, sodding off”
suggesting a truly alarming preference for tea (if you find the notion of Earl Grey bath even worse, don’t knock it till you try it – I’m serious, throwing a bag in your bath when you are experiencing muscle pains, winter blues or a cold will do you no end of good, and I’m a living proof of that experiment).
In our household, juice and water are the predominant drinks, as are the smoothies (at least the ones liquid enough to be called a drink).
That said, OH and I are both rather British in our approach to tea (read this as firm believers in this infographic), hot and iced, but we also feel very strong loving feelings towards coffee.
And it’s really coffee that becomes the most interesting beverage to study.
Coffee originates in the East; it is believed that the first use dates back to the cca 11th century Arab world, (cf. here, here, & here) and there exist several holy past myths that sanctify the use and the discovery of coffee, giving it a reverential meaning, not atypical in cultural indoctrination (cf. here & here). From then on, coffee is supposed to have spread slowly through the Muslim world, becoming a staple by 15th century, and was supposedly picked up by Venetians, and then by Europeans in general, a century later still. However, none of this accounts for two important things.
One, that the 11th century East was in large part held by the Franco-Norman empire, which would make it highly impossible for the Muslims to be the sole party familiar with the coffee itself, nor would there be a lack of Franco-Norman (and other European) nobles with pockets deep enough to afford what was potentially an expensive drink; given that the Crusaders introduced sugar (cf. here, here, here & here) to Europe, the mysterious absence of coffee is just that – mysterious, as the two worlds were far more connected than we tend to think (cf. here).
Two, that the Europeans would as eagerly pick up a Muslim drink, from Muslim world, in the time when Turkish depredations were far more vicious, and the trade far more complicated, but would have somehow missed it when it first started, in a time when the conflict was not nearly as bad and a lot of the land in the East belonged to the Europeans, is somewhat difficult to believe. But that is the story of the inception of coffee, barring several legends, which you can find here (cf. here).
Tea, meanwhile, was a Chinese invention (with the rest of the world presumably drinking herbal teas instead, some of which are pretty potent, like mate tea (cf. here for a brief history of tea, here for more on mate).
Whether there was ever any contact with tea proper before is hard to say; much of what we used to believe of history has changed (cf. egs. here & here), and, given that a vibrant trade existed with the East until Jerusalem was lost and the European countries got embroiled in internal conflict rather than be constructive (cf. footnote 1), and the sea routes became perilous due to the Berber pirates while the land was in turmoil due to the numerous political issues in the Middle and Near East that followed (cf. here & footnote 1), as well as the travel presumably becoming far more perilous due to the latter, it is not impossible that Europe would have come across tea before the official date. But, speculation aside, tea only became a British staple it is now in mid 60s of 1600s, when the average Brit became utterly fascinated with this new drink and the financial state of the country became, due to the new trading ties (that would later become colonial) with India especially, rich enough to afford it. From then on, the ritualisation of tea drinking became more and more evolved. From elaborate baking to equally elaborate teaware, even more elaborate indoor and garden spots devoted to the pleasure of a good chat with a pot, and possibly the ultimate invention of dinky (or not so dinky) tea rooms became the hallmark of Britishness, as well as of drinking tea. This goes so far that many non-Brits actually don’t know that tea is not drunk solely with milk in Britain; Earl Grey, my personal favourite, and possibly my greatest sugar indulgence, is drunk with lemon instead (though lime, if you want a suggestion, is a lovely alternative).
Similarly, cocoa was once drunk as a social drink (cf. here), and makes it into Carmilla as just about the only thing she does normally (cf. footnote 2). Casanova describes inviting friends (especially female) over for cocoa in the morning (cf. footnote 3).
Naturally, the ritualisation brought forth the inescapable – OCD. While milk was reportedly poured in first to prevent the less good pots from dying when tea was poured in (cf. here & here), making it a show of class and finances to pour tea first and then add milk, that is no longer the case now, and, while there exists a number of beliefs and compulsions on how you are supposed to put what in first, there is really no significant difference in taste in doing things in a reverse order – the only significant difference, obviously, is the amount of each ingredient added. There are, however, always unruly spirits who insist that the ritualisation affects the taste – as this comedian’s rap suggests (cf. here).
Meanwhile, in the land of coffee, where the whistling kettle makes no sense but the cafetiere does, the preparation of coffee has become, if anything, even more elaborate.
There are no less than a dozen or more usual ways of preparing coffee, from the black straight Americana to orders only a skilled Starbucks employee can handle. Coffee has gained a strong foothold in many countries, especially Italy, States and ex-Austro-Hungarian Empire, where it was – and often still is – drunk with the same social premise as the tea was in Britain. One must only visit the numerous cafes that sprawl into the street in the late spring and summer and see the testimony to this habit. Interestingly, the food eaten with the beverage tends to compliment the preparation – the stronger the coffee, the less the sugar, the likelier it is that the cake, gateau or similar will be sumptuous and sweet, while the milder coffees and tea lend themselves more to the small, light sandwiches and lighter cakes. The high sugar content of the coffee related foods is highly likely in part a Turkish and Arab influence, as well as a good foil to the bitterness of coffee, especially if it is a bitter blend and brewed in the Turkish style, as is often the case with the Germanic lands and anyone who picked up their habit.
While France entertains something of that liking for sweet, and while coffee is either drunk straight black or as a milky mixture (café au lait), the variety of coffees as well as the mode of preparation varies greatly. Here, coffee is not as often so bitter; sweeter and fruitier blends, such as Ethiopian or Kenyan coffee beans, can be easily found in most stores, and the cafetiere (or the coffee press) is the predominant way of preparing coffee.
Commercially, both coffee and tea profit from automatisation – the only difference is in what precisely goes where. Instead of pouring the hot water through the filter of your coffee mixture, the tea you order is still generally made by using the same machine, the only difference being that the said water goes directly into your cup where the tea bag awaits it.
With coffee having developed foam due to latte, mocha and other preparations, it lends itself very well to the types f art that tea can never aspire to. It has become a thing, in the recent years especially, for a skilled barista not only to shake little elaborate cocoa patterns on top of your cup, but to literally create art with the foam. While the art is short lived, it is definitely a testimony of how much of ourselves we put into our social beverage times.
Both tea and coffee lend themselves to superstitions. Much like tea leaves, remnant coffee grinds would hold the future for the eager clients of previous centuries predominantly; some believers still exist today but are rarer.
That said, much of negative and maladaptive social behaviours still revolve around the drinks, both rightly so and otherwise.
While tea and coffee are definitely stimulants, they are not dangerous to the health of a moderate to mild drinker (unlike alcohol, which has no health benefits that you could not derive from a safer alternative source, no matter what some Mediterranean diet revivalists claim) and can even be used as a part of one’s exercising routine (cf. here & here). A mild boost from a light brew an hour or half an hour before you hit your workout is a lovely alternative to the commercially prepared pre-workout drinks, which often contain caffeine and other concentrated stimulants and may be too strong for your personal taste or even your body.
After a really strenuous workout, or after marathons, many suggest the use of coffee or tea to aid the body’s recovery and lift you up from that feeling of exhaustion that will hit you once the adrenaline wears off like Thor’s famous hammer. Earl Grey is reportedly as a natural boost for depression; indeed it can be said that the consumption of either drink in sympathetic company probably has the potential for that effect, even without the unique, mood boosting blend of Earl Grey (bergamot).
On the other side of this coin, both coffee and tea can make our mood worse. If we drink them maladaptively, in a chain of fruitless efforts to stimulate our body and mind, it will likely leave us feeling worse than we felt before once the boost (if we even feel one) wears off. Maladaptive behaviour in coffee and tea consumption is really what often defines them in the eyes of purists who believe that to consume them is to pollute oneself. That is hardly the case; but maladaptive behaviour is, in its nature, a self (and often others) harming, destructive behaviour, which is not and cannot be seen as defining to beverages, but underlines a personal and/or group problem that should have probably been addressed a long time ago but hasn’t been.
Under maladaptive behaviour, we understand people who live from one cup to the next (and while majority may be coffee drinkers, don’t ever think that you cannot do the same with tea, and that only coffee gets you jitters), existing barely through the haze of the stimulant before it wears away and they need another.
While our society certainly struggles with many substance abuses, it is not what defines us, and far less than we end up defined by which beverage we choose and which one we associate with our personhood. And yet, this view of not coffee or tea drinking but technically substance abuse of the maladaptive, is the third way of beverage self-definition by the purist groups, who draw their personhood (just as maladaptively as the obsessive drinkers) by hierarchical exclusion of others.
In the end, it matters little what we drink or what we do not. What matters is how we behave in light of things we bump into in our journey through life. Much like many other social behaviours, coffee and tea are national, class and even gender definers, while having a darker side that is either deliberately ignored or blown out of proportion. But, while our beverages define us, they do not define us – the socio-cultural definitions are not solely what we are, and our personhood should be built far more on a personal relationship with the world than on what others think about us or even the things we interact with most.
1. Phillips, J. (2009) Holy Warriors: A Modern History Of The Crusades. Vintage Books: London
2. LeFanu, J. Sheridan (1871-1872) Carmilla
3. Casanova, G. ((1960)1822-1829) Histoire De Ma Vie