Tea at Home: A Cheapskate's Delight

illustration by the fantastic J. Homersham

Having started this blog to discover – and hopefully, publicise- the tea delights of London et environs, I'm starting to feel like I've acquired an expensive hobby. It's not quite in the league of Formula 1, say, or buying a football club, but our last few jaunts have left my delicate eyes watering with the cost of a piece of cake and a pot of tea in the Capitol. Something that's made with cheap ingredients has, through the vicissitudes of metropolitan rent hikes and the completely laudable need to pay people a living wage (plus, I have to think, a smidge of a desire to turn a profit)...has become dear. Fine, I'm a bit slow to catch on. But I'm not definitely getting the message that tea...is a treat. I won't! And I think with a little DIY magic, anything – even an affordable tea – is possible.

Last week my tea pal Mr. Things came down South, where living is a bit easier, and we had tea chez moi.

I share with you our menu:

First course:

Mariage Frères Tea: Thé Alexandra David-Néel (black tea with spices)

Caramel Toast

Second course:

Mariage Frères Tea: Thé Sur Le Nil (green tea with citrus fruit and spices)

Harry Eastwood's Passionfruit Cream Swiss Roll

Third course:

De Lieto Sandwich: Mini-baguette with coppa, sheep's cheese and pickled artichokes

De Lieto Apple Pie.

We then exeunted the premises for one of my favourite cheap nights out, Stitch London at the Stamford Arms.

Overall cost, about £10. Not dirt cheap, but we did eat a staggering amount (I like to carboload before Stitch London.)

Fancy doing a home tea of your own? In addition to the recommendations above, may I introduce you to a recipe by Ms. Julia Homersham? Julia, in addition to being an amazing illustrator and cartoonist, is also a dab hand with a tea treat. To whit – her marshmallow truffles, pictured above on the happiest day of their very brief lives.

Marshmallow truffles

1 packet of rich tea biscuits (about 250g), crushed

½ tin condensed milk

2 tsp vanilla essence

100g butter

½ cup brown sugar

2 tsp cocoa powder

desiccated coconut

1 large packet of marshmallows

Melt the butter and sugar in a pot. Add condensed milk, cocoa and vanilla

essence. Mix well. Take off the heat and add crushed biscuits.

Wet your hands and roll the mixture around marshmallows. Coat each ball

in coconut.

Put in the fridge to set.

Variation: try using other types of biscuits, e.g. digestives

You can get Julia's new comic Chuckle Sandwich here

And don't forget - in tea circles, as in everything else, when in doubt, DIY!


An update on a former Tea Report destination, the Tea Room at Liberty's of London.  The Tea Room is now shut for refurbishment, pending reopening with 'an exciting new concept'.  A bit terrifying, but fingers crossed.  

Drink Shop and Do

Snuggled next to a sex shop in grimy Caledonian Road, just down the street from King's Cross tube and rail station, Drink Shop and Do offers precisely the amenities its moniker suggests.  It sells stuff, you can drink stuff and you can do stuff, all under one roof.  But what are these things? And are they any good?  And what's the cake like?  Intrigued by anything palatable within the orbit of the British Library (and, slightly further afield, Gosh! Comics) Mr. Things and I decided to explore.

We entered the carvernous, nearly deserted space around 5 on a weeknight.  With high, looming ceilings and a ladylike dove-grey on the walls, DS+D had a ghostly quality to it, only slightly dispelled by the overly loud music (courtesy of Frankie Valli and others).  Perhaps it's haunted by the specter of a furniture warehouse owner – for neon orange price stickers appear on most of the items of furniture.

It's all for sale, as far as we could tell - even the table we were drinking at.  This situation made Mr. Things extremely nervous.  "I keep wondering why people hover around the table, looking over us...but it's just that they like the look of the mirror, or the bookshelf we're in front of.  This is crazy!"

Thinking that a bit of food and a caffeinated beverage might quell our mounting panic, we approached the counter to check out the victuals. A very sparkly-eyed Frenchman who wouldn't have been out of place in Andy Warhol's Factory helped us with our selections (comfortingly, he seconded my expression of worry at the size of the Scotch eggs. Scotch eggs are something we Auslander just do not get.)  Mr. Things and I thought we bought two pieces of tart - a very nice-looking slice of something involving sweet potato and some greens - and a pot of tea.  It turned out that we got one piece of tart - 5 pound 50 with a bean salad - and a pot of tea - 5 quid.

The tart was fine, and luckily we came up with the idea of sharing it.  We just couldn't face the nice Frenchman again, and confess a) our mistake and b) our horror at a 5 pound two person pot of tea.  Perhaps we're just behind the times, but  I just couldn't get my head round it - tea's not very expensive, and though the pot was very large...can't we keep tea cheap and cheerful?  On principle?  After all, it takes less time, energy and manpower to create than the meal, with fewer, cheaper ingredients - but it's almost the same price.  This seems unfortunate.

On to the second course – CAKE. Both our lemon slice and carrot cake proved to be excellent specimens of their respective species, though the lemon slice could have been a bit more tart.

As we enjoyed our food, the place began to fill up - first with ladies relaxing after work (Drink, Shop and Do also serves cocktails) and, as the night wore on, with a crowd of mystery folk, all quite keen to make...dinosaur origami.  When I asked the proprietress about, the, erm, dinosaur origami, she did not, unfortunately, regale me with listings of upcoming events, or even bother with much explanation of this one.  


"It's Drink, Shop and DO" she replied, when I asked if the event was organized by the store, or strictly spontaneous (King's Cross does attract an odd sort).  I felt a bit snubbed - for Christ's sake, I was just asking! - and it caused me to cast a jaundiced eye on everything I'd seen (and eaten).  Those neon price tags burned brighter in my mind's eye, and the numerical values emblazoned thereon seemed all the more ridiculous (160 quid for a two tone 50's mirror?  Please no.)  The undercooked artichokes in the bean salad rumbled in my stomach, and I felt terrorized anew by the enormous scotch eggs.  Was this place the making of King's Cross, or just the encroachment of –gasp!- Islington?!

But then, let's get some perspective.  We're talking about a part of town where tea is already either completely absent as a sit-down affair, or wildly overpriced (the Peyton and Byrne concession at the British Library being a worthy new-ish contender, soon to be examined by yours truly).  Most importantly, the fact that DS+D serves cake and tea until 11:30 is unprecedented, to my knowledge, in the Capitol.  I now dream of stepping off the Eurostar and NOT having to visit McDonalds.  Ooh, or I could get a dosa in Drummond Street and then pop over for some tea and cake.  My mind reels with the possibilities.

So, do Drink Shop and Do.  Do it soon.  Their website has plenty of information on upcoming events. Just bring some cash, and, please read the sign next to the door to the loos. If you don't, you might end up in the sex shop next store, and I cannot -repeat, CANNOT- vouch for the quality of their cake.  

That is all.

3 teapots.