This is what you’re going to have to do. Even in grocery stores with a semi-decent selection, you’re only going to get teabags. I’ve only seen loose tea in specialty tea stores (like Fezziwig’s and Teavana), and those “international” grocery stores run by Middle Easterners.
Strong, unsweetened or not-too-sweet iced tea is a refreshing beverage in the summer heat. You’re coming to the US anyway, be a tourist and try some. It’s not the same at all as the hot stuff you make at home, but if you pretend it’s something else entirely – tea flavored kool-aid for example – and evaluate it on its own terms, it’s pretty good. There’s a reason millions of Americans drink it every day.
I think that may be regional, Here in California if I order ‘tea’ I would expect to receive a hot drink; if I want iced tea I would need to order ‘iced tea’. And if there were any doubt, the server would confirm, “did you want that hot or iced?”
It depends on how picky you are about your tea and where you are staying/eating. I’m an American and a fairly picky tea drinker, of several types of tea. My tea is almost always loose leaf, never in a tea ball. I like Harney and Sons as a tea retailer, but will enjoy TeaForte’s white ginger pear. I also have a number of Chinese and Taiwanese award winning full leave teas (they are incredible) and some brought from India assams. (My husband has teams in Taiwan, China and India, and they send him/me tea). I avoid anything made of fannings and try for whole leave and not broken. I never touch Lipton. I dislike Tazo. So I don’t tend to drink hotel tea, and will drink restaurant tea only if I know the brand.
If what you drink is Tetley in bags, you can’t complain about American tea. My experience in Britain is that the majority of tea served in Britain is swill - as is the majority of coffee served in the U.S. If you are talking about coming from China, you definitely want to bring your own tea.
I’ve never had a problem finding basic “Brit” teas - English Breakfast, Irish Breakfast, Earl Grey in most decent restaurants. Cheap hotels will have a package of Lipton. Starbucks owns Tazo so that’s what you get in anyplace that does Starbucks coffee.
Water will be an issue in a hotel room - you are expected to use the coffee maker, which can leave a coffee taste. Tea kettles are uncommon in the U.S. Almost all city water in the U.S. is floridated, which can change the taste - and depending on the source of the water and the time of year, the water can have significant flavor. (in the Spring, St. Paul city water can taste vaguely fishy, and a lot of city water supplies in the U.S. have a sulfur flavor).
In south Texas, all the servers in the places I go ask “sweetened or unsweetened.” If you do plan to put sugar in your iced tea, ask for half sweetened and half un. They’ll pour from two pitchers. This is NOT a big deal.
folks, that style of “sweet tea” is a Southern US thing; it’s not so common nationwide. sweetened iced tea outside of the south isn’t loaded with sugar like that.
Heck, in Minnesota its hard to find the “made with sugar syrup” sweet tea - except at McDonalds. If you want your ice tea sweetened, they bring you sugar packets, which really don’t dissolve well.
I would consider the “standard” teas Earl Grey, English Breakfast, Irish Breakfast, and maybe Darjeeling. The ubiquitous Twinings has in their variety pack (which you should be able to pick up at any Walmart): Earl Gray, Lady Gray, English Breakfast, Irish Breakfast. (I have no idea what the difference between the “breakfast” teas are.) At my local grocery, you can also find also your standard assortment of generic black teas (like Lipton stuff) and weirder things like Lapsang Souchong. And herbal teas up the wazoo.
Anyhow, if you’re particular about tea and a creature of habit, yeah, just bring your own. I lived a few months in England and had plenty of English tea, but my palate isn’t really refined enough to tell the difference between a Twinings English breakfast here in the US and whatever I had in the UK. It all tasted fine to me, like tea.
I’ve seen Tetley tea here in the US as well. I have no idea whether that’s a terrible British tea, or suits you just fine, but it’s not uncommon to find here. If Tetley is your cup of tea, visit their website, they have a store locator. Here in Chicago, it seems pretty much all the major groceries carry it.
ETA: Oh, and I’ve seen PG tips around as well, but I don’t think they’re anywhere near as common as Tetley’s.
That’s because for most Brits, tea is what you might drink for breakfast or on the go at work, whereas coffee is the default after dinner drink - not that we don’t also drink coffee at other times. Of course we do. Most Brits drink both and have different preferences on how and where they might do so.
The point for the OP is, if he’s used to a standard British cuppa with milk to get him off to a good start in the morning, then he’ll wish he bought some teabags from home if he wants to replicate the experience.
Normal British tea isn’t better - mostly we drink it with a cheap teabag dunked in boiling water with a slosh of cold milk, nothing remotely fancy, but I haven’t found the same blend replicated anywhere in the US.
As mentioned before, there is a difference between “sweet tea” and “sweetened iced tea.”
At any rate, around here, at a sit down restaurant, ordering an iced tea will typically get me unsweetened iced tea, usually with a lemon, and possibly with sugar packets on the side (although the table will generally have sugar packets if it’s of the diner type.)
When it comes to iced tea that’s on the self-serve soda dispenser, it’s also usually unsweetened around here in my experience (if it’s on the dispenser at all. Usually Nestea brand.) I like to mix it 50-50 with the lemonade for an Arnold Palmer.
The stuff you get in the coolers that is in cans or bottles–most of that will be sweetened. Like your Arizona Iced Tea varieties and that sort of thing. You have to specifically look for the unsweetened varieties in that case.
You might start to hear me stamping my foot across the interwebs now. The vast majority of Brits never drink posh loose leaf tea. It’s just standard cheap teabag stuff. But the English breakfast tea sold by the likes of twinings to foreign markets is a different, lighter equivalent to what we’d drink at home, tailored for different preferences. It isn’t as strong so doesn’t go well with milk. That’s all.
Supermarkets carry plenty of English teas; I’ve seen Twinings, PG Tips, Barry’s, and Taylor’s of Harrowgate on the shelves.
I would say to never get tea in a hotel. The water is never hot enough in the thermoses. And it’s even worse if you order it from your server; you’ll get a pot of lukewarm water and a tea bag (usually Lipton).
:smack: I totally forgot that Twinings is British. To me, that’s the second name in tea that I think of after Lipton, it’s that ubiquitous in at least my part of the US.
That’s true. And here I was thinking that Brits despised the whole concept of tea bags. But you’re right, this is the 21st century, and our grocery stores have a large selection of teabags, with real teas and all sorts of herbal kinds, too.
I suspect as opposed to tea (the meal between lunch and supper). Commonly used in Britain (or as an alternative word for an evening meal), I guess much less so across the pond.