I was always a card carrying tea drinker. Hated coffee. HATED it. (Expect when I was quite small, I think. I do have memories of getting up to drink coffee, Maxwell House coffee, with my father. Out of matching blue ceramic mugs with handles shaped like small circles to put your fingers through.) Through the years, I've been a tea only drinker. (My brother is as well. Our maternal grandmother and our paternal grandfather were both HUGE tea drinkers. I believe they both drank Red Rose tea. I know that was the case with our grandmother. I remember the small animals that she used to collect that came inside the boxes of tea bags.) Somewhere along the line, that changed. Not sure when or where. I do know that I love the coffee in Australia. They have AMAZING cappuccinos no matter where you go it seems. And I haven't been to Australia since pre-Claire. I also like the espresso in Macau. It's STRONG but awesome. And we were married ten years ago. I remember drinking espresso at the bakery where we ordered our wedding cake. (Scary cake, by the way. Tom made the mistake of telling the baker that he was "an artist". And he gave him free reign. This whole long drawn out conversation was translated into Portuguese by our friends Mario and Regina. Our cake was brown-ish, had different shaped layers on different levels attached to each other by stairs. There was a lake, birds that chirped when you walked by and maybe a boat??? Might be exaggerating about the boat, but not about the rest of it. We were given the top layer to take back to HK. I know we left it in our suite at the Westin.) So, anyway, somewhere along the line I became fond of lattes and cappuccinos. Still don't care for American drip coffee, though. Yuck. Maybe a French press coffee after a dinner party. Maybe.
Two years ago I decided to buy an espresso machine and grinder. I did a lot of research and Tom was skeptical of this purchase. I bought a Rancilio Silvia and Rocky (although my Rocky is doserless). A FANTASTIC purchase, one that we enjoy every morning. I also tend to buy my beans from Ancora Coffee. This trip I purchased Ancora Espresso, Espresso Nero and Sumatra Mandheling. Loved the Ancora, thought the Nero was a bit harsh and the Sumatra a bit wimpy. Mixed the Nero with the Sumatra and it's pretty good. This summer I will definitely buy more Ancora Espresso, Ancora D'Oro and Ancora Black and Tan Blend. Hmmmm. Getting a coffee buzz just thinking about it.
In Hong Kong, I start the day off with a cup of PG Tips. In my Athens Olympics mug, with a packet of Splenda and skimmed milk. Also very nice. (I would LOVE to have cappuccino every morning on the boat. Not sure that I would actually have time to make it, though, as I'm always in a mad race to leave on time. The main problem, though, is that Claire's turtle (terrapin, really) lives on our bar upstairs in the salon. It's where my espresso machine would need to live. So until the terrapin DIES (and it shows no signs of that---it's as if it ate one of Hera's golden apples of immortality. Can you tell that I've been reading D'Aulaires Book of Greek Myths to Claire and James in preparation for our trip to Athens after Cathy's graduation???) Thus no lattes for me in the morning until I drop off the kids and go to Pacific Coffee.
Yesterday I felt like a cup of tea. More specifically, I felt like drinking a cup of tea. (In my mind I can hear James yelling "YOU'RE A CUP OF TEA, YOU'RE A CUP OF TEA" much like he yelled "YOU'RE A TAXI, YOU'RE A TAXI" at Doug, "the library guy" after a party. (And I worried about James never speaking. AND I thought he was thinking profound thoughts about world peace. Now I know he was just thinking about specific car brands.) Because most of the tea here is old, from previous trips, I chucked most of it in the bin the other day. My PG Tips that I had bought from the Publix on Longboat Key last summer was most definitely state. I had made some tea in my very cool tea pot with a built in press earlier on this trip with some loose Twinings Irish Breakfast tea. It was decent. I tried to buy more at Bi-Lo but they had NO loose tea. None. I then noticed Lipton had pyramid tea bags. I've never seen them other than with PG Tips. (Not sure if Lipton owns PG Tips...wouldn't be surprised, though.) I bought a box of Lipton Black Orient. Sounded promising. YUCK! Warm dishwater tea, AGAIN. I hate American tea bags. Made a second cup using two bags, let them steep for a good 5 minutes, added Splenda and (major treat, one that is difficult but not impossible to find in HK) half-and-half (flah in my mom's world) and took a sip. Blech. Still pretty tasteless. Sigh. Must source PG Tips for the summer.
Note: Googled "PG Tips". Amazon now sells it and you can get it using Amazon Prime. Very excited!
