Tea made with a teabag doesn’t really taste as good as tea made correctly. It tastes like tea made in a paper bag, which it is – but since they do exist and since we all use them because life happens let’s have a look at them. Tea was first consciously served under the Chinese Emperor Shen-Nung in about 2,700 BC. It is believed by some that a tea shredder had been invented by that time and that a clay or wooden pot with a sharp wheel placed inside cut the tea leaves to produce the first cup of tea!!

The forerunner of the tea bag we know today was invented by John Thomas Sullivan in 1903 when he patented it (image below). It was available commercially around 1904 when a Brit called Richard Blechynden served tea in it at the St Louis Fair but was slow to be accepted  by the public. In 1908 Sullivan handed out free samples of glorious fine quality large leaf tea, packed into pre-sewn silk muslin bags with instructions that they be popped into teapots and it all started …..

Some Americans, looking to make a fast buck, manufactured single cup tea bags and restaurant owners soon began serving their customers with tea made from them – only to discover that by the time the tea reached the customer, the water had cooled down below the required boiling point needed to infuse the tea sufficiently and the tea tasted vile!!  Not to be diverted from achieving their goals, research continued and as the tea drinking population grew with the simultaneous growth in demand,  cheaper teabags had to found!  The “fannings” also known as the “dust” were used to fill the bags and to this day, the tea in most teabags are of an inferior quality – with the exception of one or two companies. A company, like Dilmah in Sri Lanka, produce excellent tea bags and even better leaf tea and a decent cup of tea can be had. Whilst the tea is good, the ethics aren’t but since the quest is for good tea, do  visit their site.  Over the years the increasing demand for tea has produced even poorer quality teabags and really horrific tea. 

Lipton Tea patented a four sided flo-thru tea bag in 1952.