The art of dunking!

The Brits not only enjoy their tea; they love to dunk biscuits in it! Since I happen to be married to a huge fan of tea drinking and dunking biscuits, I thought I would write a few lines about this topic in this week's Elevenses!

The Brits are world leaders in biscuit dunking!

So what then does it mean to dunk?

For a Brit it means to dip a biscuit, or other baked goods into tea (or coffee, milk). It's done to soften the biscuit and to release its flavours. But dunking is not as easy and simple as it may look! If you dunk for too long, the whole biscuit will create a small disaster and you'll end up either with the biscuit in your tea cup or somewhere between the cup and your mouth!

Dunking or not is also a question that divides the population in the UK and probably in many other countries. Some people love it and some do not. In this interesting article you can read much more about the topic of dunking and about its history. It was the Romans who started the dunking tradition.

Due to the Daily Mail an average British person dunks (or eats) 3 biscuits a day. That's a lot of biccies when you consider that the population amounts to 68 million (it's actually 204 million biscuits a day!).

Digestives are the favourite!

The Daily Mail continues to provide an update on the world biscuit league, which looks like this: The UK is at the top of this league with a stunning 8.5 kg of biscuits per person per year! Then follows the US with 8 kg, Italy with 7.5 kg, Germany with 7 kg, Japan with 7 kg, and France with 5 kg!

The favourite biscuit to dunk?

The McVitie Company’s own research revealed that Digestives (39%) are the nation’s favorite biscuit to dunk, closely followed by the Chocolate Digestive (35%) and Rich Tea (35%). Source.

According to Robert Craggs, the Lead Product Development Chef at McVitie’s UK & Ireland, “Dunking a biscuit is an art form - it’s a delicate balance to preserve the integrity of the biscuit whilst also enhancing the taste with your drink of choice."

So, dear reader, would you consider dunking your biscuit or other baked goods in your tea? Please let me know in the comments :-)

Tea is the world's most consumed beverage - after water!

And if you are interested in tea and want to learn a lot about it and even get your Diploma in Tea, please join me and other tea aficionados for the next Tea Sommelier Diploma Course, Level I, which is planned to start at the end of September 2025. You are welcome to read about the course here and find out what earlier students say about it! I look forward to hearing from you!