Quilp, the epitome of evil in Charles Dickens' The Old Curiosity Shop, seen here with Little Nell, is a dwarf with the head of a giant and a "few discolored fangs" for teeth. But his most grotesque trait is his trick of drinking "boiling tea without winking" and eating "hard eggs, shell and all." Culture Club/Getty Images hide caption
A satire of women's social discourse in the Queen Anne period depicts six women taking tea in a parlor, with figures on the left signifying hidden emotions and power struggles behind a genteel facade. Circa 1710. Hulton Archive/Getty Images hide caption
Classic Burmese laphet yay tea is a mix of evaporated milk, sweetened condensed milk and black tea. Victoria Milko/for NPR hide caption
Pu'er tea is packed in bings at a market in China's Yunnan province. A cake of Pu'er continues to change as it ages, and bits of tea are chipped off in order to brew. Ellen Mack/Flickr Vision via Getty Images hide caption
Tamil and Sinhalese workers pick tea on Amba Estate in the early morning. Victoria Milko for NPR hide caption
Adele performs onstage during the Grammy Awards on February 12, 2017. Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images hide caption
Sir Thomas Lipton in 1909. Lipton was already a self-made millionaire before he ever entered the tea trade. But by figuring out how to lower the retail cost of tea and standardize his product "direct from the tea gardens," he became much, much richer. Library of Congress hide caption
Workers harvest autumn flush teas on a tea estate in Darjeeling, India. Autumn is the personal favorite flush of many of India's most discerning tea tasters, though these teas remain largely unknown and nearly impossible to find. Jeff Koehler hide caption
The "Green Giant" mechanical tea harvester, one of only a few in the world, does the manual work of 500 people. Wayne's View Photography/Courtesy of Charleston Tea Plantation hide caption
Marybong Estate, second flush. Jeff Koehler hide caption
Laxman Rao, New Delhi Courtesy of Zach Marks and Resham Gellatly hide caption
Boba 7, the speakeasy at the back of downtown Los Angeles restaurant Soi 7, serves boba cocktails made with beer or the Korean alcohol soju, in addition to an inventive nonalcoholic menu. Courtesy of Boba 7 hide caption
A tea lady brings round refreshments for British office workers in the 1970s. All over the U.K., the arrival of the tea ladies with trolleys loaded with a steaming tea urn and a tray of cakes or buns was the high point of the workday. M. Fresco/Evening Standard/Hulton Archive/Getty Images hide caption
Object (or Luncheon in Fur), by Meret Oppenheim. In 1936, Oppenheim wrapped a teacup, saucer and spoon in fur. In the age of Freud, a gastro-sexual interpretation was inescapable. Even today, the work triggers intense reactions. Flavia Brandi/Flickr hide caption
In 1747, members of the notorious Hawkhurst Gang carried out a brazen midnight raid on the King's Custom House in Poole, England: They broke in and stole back their impounded tea. What followed over the next weeks would shock even hardened criminals. E. Keble Chatterton - King's Cutters and Smugglers 1700-1855/Wikimedia Commons hide caption
Loose-leaf green tea of the modern variety. Archaeologists have discovered ancient tea in the tomb of a Chinese emperor who died in 141 B.C. It's the oldest known physical evidence of tea. But scientists aren't sure if the emperor was drinking tea as we know it or using it as medicine. iStockphoto hide caption
The Windsor Court Hotel in New Orleans began holding afternoon tea in 1984. A representative says the hotel held daily afternoon tea times until Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005. It still serves afternoon tea a few days a week. Sara Essex Bradley/Windsor Court Le Salon hide caption
Cascara is made by brewing dried coffee cherries, which typically would have otherwise ended up as compost. "We have been throwing away this perfectly good coffee fruit for a long time, and there's no real reason for it, because it tastes delicious," says Peter Giuliano, of the Specialty Coffee Association of America. Murray Carpenter for NPR hide caption
Some believe increased metabolism may be among the benefits of drinking green tea. But there's scant evidence to support that idea. iStockphoto hide caption
For centuries, tea drinking has been synonymous with female tittle-tattle — even though men drank just as much tea. Old dictionaries of English slang provide colorful proof of this association. Hulton Archive/Getty Images hide caption
A view of Canton (Guangzhou), on the Pearl River in China, circa 1840. Canton was already a great trading port when the American ship Empress of China arrived in 1784 to fill up its hold with tea. Hulton Archive/Getty Images hide caption
Sugar offsets the bitterness of tea, but have we gone too far in how much we add and how often we drink it? Yat Fai Ooi/Flickr hide caption
"For most of the 19th century, there was less concern about the perils of taking cocaine than there was about the negative side effects of drinking green tea," says author Matthew Sweet. The backlash against green tea was caused by a mix of baseless fears (that it triggered hysteria and insomnia) and genuine concerns about it being toxic as a result of widespread adulteration. McKay Savage/Flickr hide caption