cambric tea
- noun
- Archaic
:
té débil
- As a child, my grandmother always made me cambric tea with milk and sugar on chilly mornings.
Examples
-
The hostess offered cambric tea to the children instead of regular tea.
-
She prepared a cup of cambric tea for her son.
-
As a child, my grandmother always made me cambric tea on chilly mornings.
-
He remembered the taste of cambric tea from his early school days.
-
Would you like some cambric tea?
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He remembered how his mother would prepare cambric tea for him after school.
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The hostess served cambric tea to the children, making sure it was sweet and warm.
Synonyms
937
1.0
A hot or cold drink made by putting dried leaves in water
1
3.7
A drink with little flavor or something that fails to convince
How Strong
937
1.0
- Archaic
Surface Forms
Morphology
cambric + tea
The modifier 'cambric' is archaic/obscure (typically a type of fine linen) and does not transparently connote 'weak' or 'diluted', so combining it with 'tea' does not yield the meaning 'weakly brewed tea' by straightforward composition. The specific historical/idiomatic sense 'tea diluted for children' cannot be predicted from the parts, making the expression non-compositional for typical B1 learners.
Etymology
Cambric tea may come from cambric, a very thin, fine cloth, to picture a tea that is light and delicate. That's why cambric tea means a 'weak' tea mixed with hot water, milk, and sugar and often given to children.