We Put Salt in Our Tea So You Don’t Have To
27th January 2024
It’s well established that the British are an eccentric people. Among their national obsessions is drinking tea – they consider themselves experts – and one way to trigger the entire United Kingdom is to fuck with the formula.
But that is exactly what American chemistry professor Michelle Francl has done with her new book, Steeped: The Chemistry of Tea, which was published this week through the Royal Society of Chemistry.
Therein, Francl proposes that a tiny bit of salt – not enough to taste – improves tea because “the sodium ions in salt block the bitter receptors in our mouths.”