Tea with Catherine the Great | 18th-century Russian Tea Culture | Historical Tea Session

Today, I’m sharing an historically-inspired tea session with Catherine II, Empress of Russia, also known as “The Great.” I’m loving The Great on Hulu and I’ve had this requested in the past as well, so it seemed time to tackle it.

One thing that occurred to me as I edited this is that I really ought to write scripts because I definitely forgot to discuss a couple things -- one is that Catherine was known to enjoy strong coffee for breakfast every day, and was not recorded to have drunk tea, but she was a known abstainer from alcohol in a country where alcoholism was a problem, and tea was known in 18th century Russia to be a temperate drink, so perhaps she enjoyed a cup later in the day, probably as strong as she liked her coffee!

On the history of Russian tea culture: http://www2.pitt.edu/~slavic/sisc/SIS...

To see my full tasting of this tea, see this video:    • Smoked Black Tea from Old Ways Tea | ...  

The tea I’m drinking: https://oldwaystea.com/products/smoke...

New to tea? Not sure where to start? Looking to branch out? Check out my Tea Primer: https://tealeavesandtweed.com/tea-pri...

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NB: The tea I am featuring was sent free of charge as a gift with purchase, with no expectation of feature or review.