Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Restaurant Tea

Years ago, ordering a cup of coffee out could be a dangerous thing. You could even end up with a cup of instant coffee with whitener. Fortunately, thanks to consumer demand, you're pretty much assured a decent cup of brewed coffee wherever you go these days.
So why can't the same thing happen with tea?
This evening, I attended a banquet at what's supposed to be this area's premiere restaurant. The food was OK (too much salt but that's a personal preference) but the tea was dishwater. I mean, they had to work to get it tasting that bad. So what's the problem? The demand for better tea has been growing - you can't turn anywhere without hearing something about how tea is good for you or that it's the world's most popular drink.
Yet restaurants in this part of Canada continue to serve swill to their customers. Part of the problem is that they don't reserve cups for tea drinking only. The other part is that they continue to use cheap bags. They go to all the trouble to ground coffee beans and run them through filters yet they can't be bothered to do the exact same thing with tea.
Kinda makes you wonder, doesn't it?