What's all the fuss about    High Tea? "Under certain circumstances there are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea." --Henry James, The Portrait of a Lady     The Brown Palace in Denver does it.  So does the Palm Court at New York's Plaza Hotel.  And the Empress Hotel in Victoria, British Columbia.   Everyone's doing it.  From charming little tearooms to the swankiest of restaurants and venerated hotels, everyone is hawking an elegant afternoon repast they're calling "high" tea.   But that's not what they're serving.   If you're longing to imitate the tea-gowned Victorian ladies who sipped from almost-transparent china cups and savored exquisite morsels of food, what you want is afternoon tea.   "High tea" has always meant something completely different:  it was the workingman's supper, the evening meal which consisted of cold meat pies, joints of mutton, and other hearty foods.  (And by the way, our Victorian farmer or factory worker was very likely to have chugged ale with this meal rather than sip tea from a dainty cup.)   Even today, in northern England and Scotland, families still call their evening meal "tea", whether that beverage is actually served or not.   ("High tea" has been shortened to "tea", which still means supper.)   So it tickles me no end when a woman lifts her dainty chin and proudly announces, "And then we had High Tea at..."    No, sweetheart, you didn't.   If you were ushered to a plush seat in an elegant hotel lobby at 3:30, and if you sipped Earl Gray and ate cucumber sandwiches and scones and exquisite little cakes, what you enjoyed was not high tea but afternoon tea.   Although there is still some discussion, most people who have looked into the history of tea-drinking agree that "high" tea refers to the high table--in the kitchen or dining room--on which the meal was served.  Afternoon tea, which was often called "low" tea, was served on low tables (like our coffee tables) in the drawing room.  Makes a little more sense now, doesn't it?   Afternoon tea was a luxury reserved for the leisure class.  Can you imagine busy farm wives and exhausted factory workers taking the time to trim crusts and make finger sandwiches?  Not very likely.  Besides, the dainty bits customarily served at afternoon tea would not have gone over real well with an exhausted worker who needed food and lots of it, now.   I sure wish I knew whose fault it was, but somewhere along the way people began confusing high tea, a perfectly respectable but informal meal, with "high-class" tea.  The idea first caught on with us American bumpkins, but now the Canadians have jumped on the bandwagon, too.  Shame on us all.   Another thing that gets me is ladies who chatter endlessly about "taking" tea.  While that expression is not incorrect, it is a little affected.  In former times people "took" breakfast or supper or tea, but now we just plain old "eat," or "have" those meals.  (I'm speaking as an American.  Maybe it's different in Canada or the UK.)  Since we "have breakfast" and "eat lunch," isn't it a little silly to "take" tea?  I can't help rolling my eyes when I hear someone say,  "We had a late breakfast this morning, but we're planning to take tea at the hotel."   Oh, please.   Just have your tea and get on with it!   Sorry.  I guess I'm a little cranky today.  Nothing that a good cup of tea won't set right....   ...or click here to visit the home page of BrendaCoulter.com