“[W]hat could be less British than a cup of tea, given that tea is made from plants grown in India or China and often sweetened by sugar from the Caribbean.”
“[T]he drink which has become the worldwide caricature of Britishness has nothing indigenous about it, but is the result of centuries of global trade and a complex imperial history.”
“[R]ruling classes had a real interest in promoting tea drinking among the growing urban population, who were poor, vulnerable to disease and perceived as prone to disorderly drunkenness.”
“[S]laves in the Americas worked on sugar plantations, the start of the long and terrible triangular trade that carried European goods to Africa.”
