Barefoot Tea

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi there. My name is Eileen, Eileen Bach, and I am calling from the side of a highway.

I hope that’s okay. I hope you can hear me okay.

You sound great.

Great. So, Martha and Grant, I’m very excited that you may have some information for me about the expression that I first heard 50 years ago, and I really haven’t heard since, so I’m quite curious about it.

When I worked in a nursing home, summers when I was in college, and then again, my first year out of college when I couldn’t find a job, I worked evenings in the same nursing home, where when I would deliver the supper trays, one lovely woman, very cheery, would tell me that she liked her tea barefoot.

And what she meant by that was she did not want either milk or sugar in her tea.

It got such a kick out of that expression.

I could imagine her as a young woman walking through the grass barefoot, and it gave me a lot of pleasure.

And seeing how cheerful she was and happy she was to have her cup of tea just the way she wanted it.

Nice. And she’s not the only person who has used this term by any stretch of the imagination.

It’s often used to describe tea or coffee that doesn’t have cream or sugar.

In fact, some people like to order coffee with socks on.

And again, they’re not talking about footwear.

They’re talking about, you know, coffee that has the white stuff in it, sort of like white socks, coffee with socks on.

But, yeah, people have used barefoot tea or barefoot coffee since at least the mid-19th century.

Or you might talk about, say, an alcoholic beverage that you’re drinking straight.

You would say, you know, I like my whiskey barefoot.

Is it regional?

I would describe it as slang, wouldn’t you, Grant?

Yeah, I would. I wouldn’t say it’s regional.

I would say there’s some heritage involved.

It comes from England, Ireland, and Scotland into the U.S., so maybe you’re more likely to find it in places settled by people from those countries.

There is a little bit of a region to it.

The Dictionary of American Regional English does say their data shows it is a little more common in the mid-Atlantic U.S., Pennsylvania, south through Georgia, and kind of west through Indiana.

But it’s never been all that much common, and the data is sparse.

And that would fit because this particular nursing home, the Orange County Home and Infirmary in Goshen, New York, is sort of tri-state area near Pennsylvania and New Jersey.

So that would fit that mid-Atlantic region close to Pennsylvania.

Well, that makes sense then, yeah.

Yeah, so Martha, you said mid-19th century, so that puts it around 1840s.

I found one mention of this in Pennsylvania German as well, so it’s not just in English.

Also, bread and dumplings.

Barefoot bread is bread or cornbread made without shortening larder eggs.

So that’s kind of a poor man’s dish, you know, when you’re just kind of flour and water, maybe a little bit of salt.

And barefoot dumplings are made from water, grease, and salt.

These are like the basics, basic dumplings.

And then in the Scottish National Dictionary, we have barefoot broth or soup.

So instead of boiling it with meat so you get the fat and grease from the meat, you put a little bit of butter in there to give it the oil, which is much cheaper than meat.

You might have a barefoot dinner, which is also without meat.

This barefoot dinner is just bread and vegetables, I guess.

Oh, my goodness. I’ve never heard of any of this. And I’m fascinated to hear this.

The only thing I would add that supports what you’re saying is at the time, and I’m going back 50 years now, but the Orange County Home and Infirmary was meant for indigent folks who had nowhere else to go in their old age.

So that kind of fits that whole idea that someone who has been raised with the basics and without any frills, such as cream and sugar.

Yeah, it generally does come from people who’ve had a poor upbringing or a thrifty background.

Yeah, well, I am so happy to hear all of this information.

I’ve never heard the expression used by anyone else, and it just delighted me.

So now I’ve got lots more to go on.

We’ll think of you next time we’re sipping tea with nothing else in it.

Delightful. Thank you. Thank you.

Take care. Be well.

Okay, bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

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