Sweet-ass Tea

[plumtreeblossom]

I was just standing next to someone who ordered a "small tea, 7 sugars." I looked down my nose at her disapprovingly.

Then as I was walking away I remembered that I usually order a small Coke/Pepsi with my restaurant meals, which is like "small drink, 16 sugars."

*facepalm*

_{(But she still shouldn't have used the word "sugars" as a unit of measurement.)}

Comments

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Isn't it shameful? And I can't wait to have one with lunch....

[trowa-barton.livejournal.com]

I'm not happy until the spoon stands straight up, though these days I go for Splenda rather than sugar.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I put Splenda in my oatmeal. I wish they made Brown-Sugar Flavored Splenda though.

[trowa-barton.livejournal.com]

Actually, they do.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Really? Yum, I'm going to look for it. Oatmeal just isn't the same without that brown sugar flavor.

[androidqueen.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's got some calories, but fewer, and it's still quite yummy!

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

Look for it in the baking aisle. It's packaged as a baking blend (there's a similar blend for white sugar, too).

[marmota.livejournal.com]

1 sugar = 1 Lump Avoirdupois ?

[spatch]

1 sugar, 2 sugars, 3 sugars, my tooths hurt.

A Suthuhn thang?

[marius23.livejournal.com]

Is it possible she was originally from the South? Seven teaspoons of sugar for a twelve ounce glass of "sweet tea" sounds about right.

While "sugars" is potentially ambiguous--"packets", "spoonfuls", "glucose, sucrose and fructose"--in context it seems like a reasonable shorthand for "of whatever your usual measure of sugar is.

Re: A Suthuhn thang?

[beowabbit]

While "sugars" is potentially ambiguous--"packets", "spoonfuls", "glucose, sucrose and fructose"--in context it seems like a reasonable shorthand for "of whatever your usual measure of sugar is.

I think of “sugar” as a count noun as being basically jargon (specific to the food-service industry and people who interact with them, i.e., almost everybody, but situation-specific). I’d think somebody was incorrect (not that I’d care) if they asked me for three sugars for their cereal in the morning, as opposed to three teaspoons of sugar, but I don’t think somebody’s incorrect if they ask for three sugars in their coffee at Dunkin Donuts. (I just think they’re incorrect for ordering coffee from a Dunkin Donuts. :-)

I love it when I have a perfect userpic!

Re: A Suthuhn thang?

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I love when you word-geek. :-)

The only time I have cause to mention sugar in the coffee shop is to say "no sugar." But I have heard people say "no sugars," so there's that unit of measurement again. I have to admit though, I do say "two creamers," but that's because I don't know of a name for the little plastic cuplets with the pull-off seal that the creamer comes in.

I has coffee userpic, too. :-)

Re: A Suthuhn thang?

[beowabbit]

I love when you word-geek. :-)

Well, then...

Now “creamer” is an interesting case, becase “creamer” means both the substance (and I’m guessing the word arose because they weren’t legally allowed to call the stuff “cream”), but also a container for cream. (Actually, Wiktionary only has the second definition, although they also have a third definition I didn’t know about.) It doesn’t seem like too much of a stretch to go from “a glass or ceramic container for cream” to “a little plastic container for something not quite like cream”. So when I hear “creamer” in that context, I sort of think of the little plastic cuplet itself, used as a unit of measure for its contents.

On a complete tangent, when I was a little kid, I used to love to go to my father’s office when he was chair of the English department, because they had a little coffeemaker station and I loved to eat the powdered non-dairy creamer. Can you still love me, knowing that?

Re: A Suthuhn thang?

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I think you're trying to seduce me. ;-)

I love you, my powder-eating sweetie! When I was little, I liked to drink the brine out of the jar of pickles.

Who am I kidding? I STILL do that! :-)

[ron_newman]

This surprised me when I first looked at the nutrition labels:

8 ounces of Coke: 27 grams of sugar
8 ounces of 'Simply Orange' high-pulp orange juice, Not From Concentrate: 22 grams of sugar, plus 4 grams of other carbohydrate

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

This is why you shouldn't drink a lot of fruit juice if you're diabetic (unless you're crashing) or on a diet -- fruit juice is very high in sugar and you're not getting the fiber in the fruit to mitigate the spike in blood glucose. There's a reason that fruit juice glasses are (or were) typically so small.

[oakenguy.livejournal.com]

Where were you, that she had to order her sugar separately instead of having packets or dispensers on the counter?

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Dunkin. They dump the sugar for you in heaping spoonfuls into the bottom of the empty cup, then pour the piping hot coffee onto the dune of sugar, creating a treacle that lays at the bottom of the cup until the pre-diabetic customer stirs it up.

I used to take 2 spoonfuls of sugar in my coffee, but now I just take cream and no sweetener. (so that later I can feel virtuous enough to have a Pepsi)

[rdcf.livejournal.com]

I used to think my mother was crazy for using a full cup of sugar when she made her gallon of tea (yes, we're Southern :-). I recently started making tea at home, because I am becoming my mother, and realized that she consumes far less sugar than I do when I drink soda. If my math is right (and I'm an accountant, so there's a good chance it's not ;-), a gallon of Coke would contain 106 teaspoons of sugar (if 12 oz can of Coke = 10 teaspoons of sugar), whereas her gallon of tea had 48 teaspoons of sugar.

I've been slowly cutting soda out of my diet and trying to drink water more regularly and tea when I wanted something other than water. I still don't put a cup of sugar in my tea though. We make it in half-gallons and only use 1/4 cup of sugar.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I think I'm the only person in the world who likes unsweetened ice tea, and can't stand it sweetened. As far as I know it is impossible to buy bottled unsweetened ice tea -- I've stopped bothering to look!

[bedfull-o-books.livejournal.com]

Lipton used to. Not sure if they still do. Still, it is Lipton, which I hate....

[roina-arwen.livejournal.com]

Lipton makes 16-oz bottles of Unsweetened Ice Tea, but you have to look carefully amongst the Lemon, Sweetened, Extra-Sweetened, and (occasionally, but harder to find) Diet Sweetened bottles to find it. :)

My main problem right now is that what I want is a premade (can/bottle) of Diet Sweetened black tea (I'm not too fussy as long it is sweetened with Splenda or NutraSweet), but the majority of the premade teas that I find are either a) Sugar Sweetened, or b) Green Tea, or c) White Tea. Ugh.

Lipton's Green Tea with Citrus is okay, and I'll drink it now and then, but mostly I want Black Tea - with caffeine - not green tea or white tea. Meh.

[treacle-well.livejournal.com]

I think I'm the only person in the world who likes unsweetened ice tea, and can't stand it sweetened.

*raises hand*

You're not the only one.

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

There's a brand called Honest Tea, which has little or no sugar, depending on the flavor (lemon, mint, peach--flavors added to the tea itself.) I've seen it at Harvest, and I think maybe at Cambridge Naturals in Porter Square.

sugar, sugar

[heatherp8.livejournal.com]

Sugar. Identified as my addiction.
CBS Sunday morning did a segment which said that the average American consumes 2.5 POUNDS of sugar PER WEEK. Yes, you read that right.
Sugar is hidden in many things you wouldn't even realize.
My husband probably has even more than the 7 teaspoons mentioned in your post.
I keep our sugar in a small lidded candy jar on the counter. He doesn't even use a spoon. he just takes the lid off and pours it....yowza!
I've tried to give it up but most of the substitutes give me a headache.

Re: sugar, sugar

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I'm really more a salt person, other than the soda. I crave salt with a side of salt. My blood pressure tells the whole story of my salt addiction!

[crs.livejournal.com]

Ob-xkcd

[jimmystagger.livejournal.com]

I kind something similar this weekend when I referred to someone's choice of drinking Natty Ice as "shameful" (not that I haven't imbibed my fair share of it over the years) and totally forgot I was drinking a PBR.

Er, and the like.