Home Haven Homemaking Lesson and Tea

Monday Blessings  Beloved!

I sure hope to have pictures back on my blog this week.  Pictures really add a lot, don't they?
Want to show some from this 1926 book that I share on Mondays.  Think the pictures in this book are insightful in how upscaled households of the day functioned.

THE ART OF 

Cooking and Serving 

by 

Sarah Field Splint

For now, we shall see what Sarah says about Afternoon Teas!

AFTERNOON TEA

For the woman without a maid no form of entertaining is more practical than the gathering together of two or three choice friends over a cup of tea.  It involves no wear and tear of preparations, she can express her very innermost yearnings of daintiness and it comes at the most leisurely hour of the day.

Everywhere afternoon tea is wedging into popularity ~ with hot tea served in the winter and iced beverages in the summer.  It calls for the simplest accompanying dainties if you invite only two or three friends, and if you have no maid you won't attempt more than eight or ten guests even in your most expansive mood.  For such an occasion you will press a close friend into service to help with the passing and replenishing of the tea cups.

The more intimate and individual an afternoon tea, the more delightful it is.  Mrs. Armington, who is one-fourth American and three-fourths English, always brings her pot of tea from the kitchen with the tea all brewed ~ a special blend of her own, by the way ~ and serves with it nothing but the crispest, thinnest pieces of buttered toast and delicious home-made jam.  Everything is so perfect that one would never think of wanting anything else ~ which is as well, since it is all she ever serves.  Needless to say she rarely invites more than four guests at once for the very first mandate of tea is that a guest shall have a real chance to chat with her hostess.

Everything that one has for tea, unless it is toast, usually may be prepared ahead so that there is no need for flutter.  Ordinarily it seems simpler to bring the hot water in from the kitchen and coax it to a final boil in an alcohol or electric kettle.  If you have inherited or been presented with a silver service you are fortunate, but a samovar or a copper kettle serves splendidly.  You have out, of course, your most delicate cups and saucers, a pretty white tea-cloth covers the tea table, and cream pitcher, sugar bowl, plates, small napkins, a strainer, a tea caddy and teaspoons complete the list of inedible necessities.

A tea wagon is invaluable in saving steps but a prettily arranged tray on a small firm table looks really more interesting.  If you own a nest of small tables, distribute them among your guests, keeping the largest one for the tea tray.

In summer, tea on the porch is very much the same, except that iced tea or punch is served.  The preparation of the beverage necessarily takes place behind the scenes where the ice may be cracked and the tea or ginger ale or grape juice poured in.  Then everything is brought in on a tray, the beady pitcher sprigged with mint, the cakes and sandwiches.  It is a little more of a ready-made affair, but it gives the hostess that much more freedom once she settles herself with the tray.  The iced drink is a peculiarly American development, and consequently being without old-world traditions almost any variation and accompaniment that one likes is correct.

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I don't know what an alcohol kettle is.

Next week I will finish this first chapter with the segment about Sunday Night Supper.

I'm looking forward to moving onto chapter two

Table Service in the House with a Servant.

Have a delightful Monday!

Somewhere in here today, I will have to make some toast, 

fix some tea, 

and take a much deserved break.

God bless and wedging in,

~Deanna~