Tea Time

I have never understood the puritanical zeal some people bring to drinking tea without sugar. They talk as if they have achieved spiritual enlightenment. “Oh no, I don’t take sugar,” they declare, with the expression of someone who has personally defeated decadence and type 2 diabetes.

Good for them. I take sugar in my tea and coffee because pleasure matters. Bitterness is nature’s way of saying “this might be poisonous.” Sugar is the reassurance that it isn’t. My taste buds are doing their evolutionary job. They are not submitting themselves for canonisation.

My mother used to take sugar in tea. Then she contracted malaria. During her recovery the combination of fever, medications and general misery rewired her brain. Tea became associated with feeling dreadful. The mind has a basic rule: anything you consume while violently unwell must be avoided forever. A crude but effective survival system. She still took sugar in her coffee though. Clearly malaria only objects to English Breakfast. Even parasites have preferences.

Then we have the really enlightened ones. The ones who make a grand declaration about their sugarless tea, then chomp through a biscuit loaded with enough sucrose to floor a horse. Digestives. Custard creams. A chocolate hobnob as a weekend treat. If you listen carefully, you can hear their molars weeping.

This is dietary theatre. Virtue signalling via hot beverages. “I’m being healthy,” they say, while shovelling more sugar into their bloodstream than I put in a fortnight of brews. It is the nutritional equivalent of installing solar panels and then heating your swimming pool with diesel. You applaud the intent while wondering if they have ever encountered arithmetic.

I know rationally that dropping sugar would be the healthier choice. I could taper down the teaspoons like a grown-up and eventually taste the subtle floral notes of the leaf. The problem is that subtle floral notes taste like disappointment. I refuse to pretend otherwise.

Life already supplies enough bitterness. Politicians. Comment sections. Feeling a year older every time you stand up too fast. Why add more bitterness to the only drink that gets you through the day. I am not here to impress a panel of beverage ascetics who think a teaspoon of sweetness is a sign of moral weakness.

Human beings are absurd. We defend our habits with the same ferocity we defend our politics. Even when we know we are wrong. Even when a tiny change would help. At least I can admit that. Which probably makes me more rational than half the sugar-free evangelists out there.

So raise your cup. Sweet or bitter. It is your choice. My tea comes with sugar. My self-respect does too.