One of the ways I’ve been keeping myself busy during this period of forced proximity with the walls of my home is to listen to daily lectures on various tea-related topics given by the proprietor of Blue Monkey Tea in Pittsburgh. (Let me make clear right now that this isn’t me lecturing on what anyone else should be doing; if my brain isn’t occupied, it occupies itself, which eventually lands me on Horrific Anxiety Hill.)

Like so many other small business owners, Margaret Harris is doing everything she can to keep her Pittsburgh store afloat by maintaining an internet presence (the shop is still shipping and will hopefully be able to restart curbside pick-up again soon), and she says her online lectures is a “next best thing” to hosting in-person events and interacting with customers.

If you’re interested in checking out the talks, you can go to the Blue Monkey Tea Facebook page or Instagram Mon-Sat @ 4 pm EST to participate live. Past talks are archived on the Facebook page if you want to catch up or see if Margaret has discussed a particular topic you’re curious about.

I honestly had no idea that tea was such a deep and wide topic, and I’ve been having a blast acquiring bits and pieces and obscure factoids. I’m sure some of them will pop up in my writing and, if it doesn’t happen on its own, well, I’ll just have to pick a tea topic to build a story around.

All this is a very long was ’round to say it was a perfect time for Insight’s The Official Downton Abbey Afternoon Tea Cookbook to land in my inbox. Because yes, I do indeed bake when I’m stressed. Also, high tea is a project, and it’s a project in which I can involve the children and anything I can use as an educational framework that’s also fun and involves snacks is a parental jackpot right now. (I mean, come on, culinary arts, math, history, geography are all involved. Where does tea come from? How did Britain get it?)

The first thing you’ll notice about The Official Downton Abbey Afternoon Tea Cookbook is that the photography is absolutely gorgeous; kudos to John Kernick as the eye behind the camera. Every shot is absolutely pristine, capturing the luxury of the setting perfectly in the shine of silver, the texture of linens and backdrops, and the perfect browning of pastry.

I know it’s a food photographer’s job to make their subject look good, and I remember watching a show on The Food Network at one point about some of the tricks professionals use to keep the butter looking fresh and the flowers from wilting, but it takes a lot of skill to simultaneously capture the light on someone’s hair and the sprinkles of sugar on a Madeleine, the minute details on a china cup, and the translucent amber of the tea – even with the help of editing.

Another aspect of this book I particularly appreciate is, while the food looks stunning and some of the recipes are complex in terms of time investment and number of steps required, none of them are particularly difficult. I’m a pretty experienced baker, but even I had an “uh oh” moment when I saw the Battenburg cake my daughter wanted to make (of course she picked the pink cake).

However, each step of the operation is laid out clearly in simple language with none of the frou-frou, faux poetical metaphor some baking books like to mess with. If the Official Downton Abbey Afternoon Tea Cookbook wants you to sprinkle confectioner’s sugar on your surface so your marzipan doesn’t stick, it tells you to sprinkle confectioner’s sugar on your surface so your marzipan doesn’t stick. Which means you get at least a rough facsimile of end goal.

And even though some of these pastries may seem exotically posh and you may not have all the ingredients on hand, a grocery store run should do you fine (at least in “normal times”). You just need to plan ahead a few hours. Some recipes do call for more labor-intensive processes such as the Simnel Cake (p. 69), which wants you to make your own marzipan. If that feels too intimidating or you just don’t want to, go ahead of buy it. I won’t tell the Dowager Countess if you don’t.

In addition to moderately specialized ingredients, a few recipes require special equipment such as cookie stamps or Madeleine pans. There’s no need to rush out and buy that stuff; test run with a well-washed ink stamp or the back of a silicone ice tray for the former and a mini-muffin tin or tic-tac-toe board made of aluminum foil for the latter. If you really enjoy making one of those recipes and you think you’re going to do it on the regular, you can look into investing.

Best of all, with the advent of The Official Downton Abbey Afternoon Tea Cookbook, we Americans finally get to find out what a Cornish pasty is. Though I’m still not sure why anyone thinks watercress is a good idea.

Hit up Margaret Harris’s British Invasion talk and you’ll know exactly which tea to drink with each of these treats and exactly how to drink. it! The Official Downton Abbey Afternoon Tea Cookbook is now available from Weldon Owen and Insight.