A nice cuppa...

We Brits like our tea.  Even today, when coffee us so prevalent, but even more so back in the 1930s and 40s.  Indeed, so important to the country's well-being was tea seen to be, that in the immediate run-up to the Second World War the government spent a large amount of money in purchasing all the tea stocks in the world so we wouldn't run out.  Of course, having bought them, they then had the problem of getting them to this country, and once the German U-boats starting wreaking havoc on our convoys tea had to be put on ration - 2oz per person per week.  And in fact it remained on ration until 1952.  I have vague memories of my Gran coming up with ingenious ways of making the tea ration stretch out as much as possible - we had a sort of precursor of the tea-bag - an small oval metal thing with holes in into which you put your tea and then dunked it in the teapot several times until you got the right strength.  And by adding more leaves you could keep it going for several days, until it just became too stewed and you were forced to throw it away and start again.  I'm more of a coffee drinker now, but I still enjoy a nice cup of tea,