A well researched and thoughtful book, and like its title suggests, its entirely about the tea based economy in Regency (and some Victorian) England. It had dabbles of Jane Austen, but if you want to know everything tea during the late 18th and early 19th century, this is your jam. I am not sure I will use it fully in my books, as I read this with the sole purpose of researching Regency for my forthcoming historical romance novels, but I do know now that people did drink green tea during that time period. Huh.

Much more interesting than you might expect, facts about tea and how tea played out within the strict hierarchy of Recency era England were informative. Excerpts from Austen's works and correspondence rounded it out, and the recipes within were so much fun to read.

My daughter gave this book to me for Christmas. I confess it took me awhile to get around to reading it because the opening passages didn't "grab" me. Having said that, I picked it up just a week ago, desperately in need of some simple comfort reading and "Tea with Jane Austen" hit the spot. It's full of lovely photographs, period illustrations, lots of fun facts about Jane Austen, and nearly everything you'd want to know about taking tea in her time. It's also chock full o' quotes from Jane's letters and other writings. Add to that several period recipes updated to today's measurement system and you have a nice little book that's a pleasure to read.

Favorite quote and new bit of information regarding the "tea gardens" constructed by the wealthy on their land: "Guests wandering through the gardens and groves could stop to enjoy each vista or monument, or to chat with the hermit hired specially to live in the hermitage." Imagine being hired to be a hermit in a beautiful garden! I'd take that job! :)

A somewhat cheaply-printed little book that makes up for it in value. Each chapter explores the history and customs of tea drinking in the Austen era, and closes each chapter with at least one period recipe followed by the updated version. A useful resource for any Austen Addict!

A pleasant, weightless book about tea. It's a knockoff of the more substantial Jane Austen Cookbook, which is more detailed and erudite. However, this was an agreeable pastime, and fun for any Austen fan.

I find history fascinating, so I loved the various glimpses into the Regency era.

A charming book, written in an engaging conversational style, Tea With Jane Austen tells us of the importance of tea in the Regency Era.

(Note: This review is of the 2011 edition published by Frances Lincoln Limited, which includes forty color and forty-five black and white illustrations.)

Tea is not just a soothing, aromatic beverage – in Jane Austen's time it was a daily ritual, a social activity, an indication of status, and a literary device. Throughout Jane Austen's novels and the novels of her contemporaries there is great significance placed on the purchasing, serving, and drinking of tea - some of which might be missed by modern readers. In her charming and elegant book, Tea with Jane Austen, Kim Wilson meticulously examines the inclusion and influence of tea in Jane Austen's novels.

Tea with Jane Austen is divided into five chapters that discuss the different times, occasions, and locations to drink tea. For those of us who are not from England or are not very familiar with the customs of drinking tea there are many interesting bits of history and traditions to learn. I was amazed to learn that before tea was introduced to England, people drank ale with their breakfast. In addition, I found the practice of smuggling or selling used tea leaves to be both fascinating and disgusting. There are many other intriguing and amusing facts and opinions to be discovered in the quotes, passages, and letters cited in this book.

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Admittedly, the scope of this book was small. However, what it set out to do, it did very well. It covered all the "tea times," a short history of tea in Britain, all the references to tea in Austen's works, and quite a bit about how Jane would have taken tea, how she prepared it, where she bought her tea, etc. etc. It was interesting and engaging to read, and it had recipes for teas, other drinks, and other cakes and foodstuffs to eat with tea (from cookbooks of the Regency period). I read this for research purposes, but it was just plain fun!

And actually, it inspired me to make a tea cake and serve it to my family on my new cake stand. We felt very fancy. I guess a book that inspires you to go out and actually DO something must be a pretty good book.

Not quite what I expected, but plenty of information and history.

This is a cute but sort of gimmicky book, though more substantive than one might expect from looking at it. Tea with Jane Austen is an overview of the tea rituals in England around the turn of the nineteenth century, from the breakfast cup to the meal called tea served at the end of the day. It's broken down into chapters describing one piece of the tea ritual, including things like tea shopping and tea's connection with health and medicine.

The gimmicky bit is how closely it's tied into Jane Austen's books. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but from what I could tell it was marketed more as a social history of tea, which it isn't exactly. It's more an exploration of what tea and taking tea was like specifically in Jane Austen's life, and I wish there had been more emphasis on that in the marketing. I think it may have suffered for me since I was reading it in conjunction with Liquid Jade, a far more in-depth and broad-ranging history of tea. Still, it was a fun, quick read, and it did include some recepies that might be fun to try. Worth a look, especially if you're interested in tea, Jane Austen, or both.

I found this book to be a charming read about tea in Jane Austen’s time and learned so much about the history, transportation and enjoyment of it all!