Alice Loxton

And I've actually been to the cafe and drunk tea in the cafe.

So, you know, repeating Catherine of Brickhands' experiences.

Of course, of course.

I do my best.

Yes.

Well, a big moment in the history of tea in Britain comes in 1706 because we get our first tea shop.

An exciting moment.

And it opened on the Strand, which is where many of the London elites were living after the Great Fire of London.

And it was opened by a man called Thomas Twining.

Absolutely.

Actually, the shop still exists today, which is rather wonderful.

But the key thing about the 18th century is that tea at this point was insanely expensive.

Right.

So this is because it had to be transported from China.

That's the only place producing it at the time.

And there were these massive taxes on importing it.

Okay, so by 1707, three and a half ounces of Twining's gunpowder tea, it was called gunpowder tea because they had these tightly rolled leaves that looked like grains of gunpowder.

This was sold at a price which would work out today as £160.

OK, so three and a half ounces is the same as 100 grams.

It's about the same weight as four AA batteries or two medium eggs, if that's helpful.