Sugar
spoon
... "Do you take
sugar in your tea?” we were taught to ask. It was the 1950s
and in Belsize Park coffee had not yet become a regular
morning drink. It was never seen in the afternoon. Tea was
made in a teapot, with leaves and water from a kettle that
blew steam to a height of 18 inches. It was the drink that
cheered but did not inebriate. Or, “My God, I need a cup of
tea,” as Mum would sigh on entering the house.
The
battered tin sugar spoon was always in the sugar bowl,
which never matched anything else, perhaps because it was
so often broken and replaced. A variable cook and an
atrocious housekeeper, Mum did love tea and teatime. So we
did, too. One of our favourite reading books was Grey
Rabbit Gives A Party by Alison Uttley. For Mum, just like
Grey Rabbit, whom she resembled more than a little, a party
was always a tea party. I can still hear her voice breaking
with excitement and pleasure “Shall we have a party?” The
next step might be to haul out Concerning Cake-Making or
the awe-inspiring red tome of Constance Spry, aprons,
mixing bowls, weights and the other archetypal spoon in our
house: the oversized tablespoon which we always without
fail used to measure a spoonful of flour or sugar. I have
it now, and it is too large for recipes, but it shows as
she would have said, a generous nature.
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