Tea slips its earthly leaves from water to vodka, gin, and rum, igniting a wave of tea‑infused spirits in bars, boutiques, and home kitchens. From Chicago cocktail nights to avant‑garde lounges, this “next big thing” in America proves tea’s rise—steeped into hot toddies, desserts, beers, and botanically brightened gin.

America mistrusts tea, branding it feminine: fragile, gossipy, unmanly. Yet coffee and wine escape such gendered scorn. History, from Shen Nong to Lipton, and culture, from Sherlock to Picard to British teashops, proves tea is universal. Masculine, feminine, nerdy, ordinary—tea simply is. America must drop macho posturing and just drink.