Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Arum Tea
Tea Description:
A sweet and malty flavor that jolts the taste buds, with a caramel undertone and a floral finish.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
I don’t think I’ve come across a black tea quite like this before. For starters, it’s appearance reminds me more of an oolong. The leaves are black/brown in colour, but they’ve been rolled into oolong-like pellets, complete with leaf stem! The scent also puts me in mind of a dark roasted oolong – it’s rich and kind of earthy, with a metallic tang. I guess these characteristics could describe a black tea too, but I personally associate them a lot more with darker oolongs, as I do the leaf preparation. Still – we shall see! I used 1 tsp of leaf for my cup, and gave it 3.5 minutes in boiling water. The liquor is a medium golden-brown, so I made no additions.
It might look like an oolong, but it certainly doesn’t taste like one! It’s actually a mildly malty, delicately sweet tasting tea, with strong stone-fruit notes. I’m picking up apricot mostly, followed by a mild plum flavour towards the end of the sip. It’s incredibly juicy-tasting, almost as if it were infused with fruit juice rather than just being tea. It’s not, of course, and that’s what’s so incredible about it. I’ve not come across many like it previously, with the exception of Butiki’s Mi Xian Black. If you liked that one, this is definitely one to try. As it cools, I’m also picking up some bready, almost yeasty, notes. The fruitiness fades a little at this point, so it’s not as unusual as it sounds.
I really enjoyed this cup. It’s sufficiently different from other black teas to provide some much-needed variety, and the fruit notes are a particular highlight. It’s a fairly light tea, both in terms of liquor colour and body, but it’s certainly not short on the flavour front. The leaf barely unfurled on my first steep, so I imagine this one will also yield significant resteep value. Recommended!
Traditional Black Tea from Rington’s Premium English Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Rington’s Premium English Teas
Tea Description:
The perfect every day tea, rich and refreshing. From our ‘Original Blends’ family of teas. Two cup tea bags. Gas-flushed. 2 x 50 tea bags.
Our Traditional Blend contains some of the best teas produced from around the world, selected predominantly from our long standing relationships with family businesses in East Africa and India. Our expert tea blenders taste and choose each individual tea that goes into the blend, ensuring you always receive that unique, refreshing and lasting flavour that makes Ringtons Traditional our most popular blend.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Traditional Black is a bagged tea from Ringtons, a UK tea company. At first glance, it looks like a typical bagged black tea. It’s in a square paper bag, and is about half full with finely shredded leaf. The scent is typical “black tea”. I used one bag for my cup, and gave it 3.5 minutes in boiling water. It brewed up to a fairly dark golden-brown, so I added a splash of milk.
To taste, this one is a malt monster! It’s deliciously sweet in that thick, syrupy, almost molasses-like way that really malty teas can be. It’s certainly sweet enough that I’d never personally consider adding sugar, and I do have a sweet tooth. The mid sip has beautiful milk chocolate notes, not over-strong, but definitely there. It’s rare to find that in a bagged tea, I’ve found, so I think this definitely speaks to the quality of the teas used in this blend. The cup as a whole is deliciously creamy (probably the milk helps this a little, but even so) and very smooth. My only slight reservation is that it’s a little tannic – my teeth feel kind of furry after a couple of sips, and it’s certainly a strong, hearty blend – so it’s perhaps not one to drink on a completely empty stomach. On the whole, though, it’s a delight to drink, and a serious challenger to my normal “everyday” tea.
Breakfast Blend Black Tea from Rington’s Premium English Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Rington’s Premium English Teas
Tea Description:
Ringtons English Breakfast Tea is a superior black tea blend from Assam and Kenya, with a strong and refreshing taste. With a medium/high caffeine content, this bright and lively blend is strong enough to help wake you up in the morning.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
The first thing I have to say about this one is that it really surprised me. I don’t drink a lot of bagged tea at the moment, but it generally seems much of a muchness to me when I do. At least in the UK, the flavour profiles of “breakfast blend” style black teas seem very similar – sweet, malty, strong, and otherwise fairly nondescript. Until now. At first glance, Ringtons English Breakfast looks like your typical bagged black tea. It’s in a square paper bag, and is about half full with finely shredded leaf. The scent is typical “black tea”. I used one bag for my cup, and gave it 3.5 minutes in boiling water. It brewed up a pretty strong-looking red-brown, so I added a splash of milk.
I wasn’t expecting much, except perhaps a quality black bagged tea – an everyday sort of experience, I thought. Not at all. It’s delicious! The first thing I picked up on is the strong baked bread flavour, which I’ve never before experienced except in fairly premium loose leaf varieties. It’s sweet and malty through the mid-sip, perfectly smooth with no bitterness or astringency at all. Right at the end of the sip, there’s the tiniest hint of milk chocolate. I don’t know what varieties of tea went into this blend specifically, but I’m guessing there must be an Assam, probably a Chinese black, and something else that I can’t quite put my finger on. It’s not floral, exactly, although that was my first thought, so I don’t think it’s a Darjeeling. Maybe a Ceylon, or something Kenyan? It’s certainly intriguing!
I thoroughly enjoyed this cup. It has a real depth of flavour, and it’s almost completely unique amongst the bagged breakfast teas I’ve tried in my time. I’d happily drink this one again – I actually think it might be replacing my normal breakfast tea for a while. It’s just too delicious to pass up!
Anji Bai Cha Green Tea from Nannuoshan
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Nannuoshan
Tea Description:
Anji Bai Cha owns a delicate, soft and relaxing taste, with a light sweet aftertaste.
Characteristic of this green tee variety is the colour of the leaves, rather white than green; in Chinese, bai means white. The lack of pigment is due to the low chlorophyll content of the plant.
The leaves are long and thin, with the necessary self-tension to maintain, thanks also to the roasting technics, their straight shape while drying. Upon steeping, the leaf opens and doubles its width.
The origin of Anji Bai Cha is protected. Only the tea produced in the certified area of Zhejiang province can be labelled Anji Bai Cha.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
I’m more open minded about green teas these days, after discovering that there are some I actually like (and some I even love!) That they’re not all bitter, astringent and brown came as a bit of a revelation to me. This one is a stunner just to look at. The leaves are long and spiky in appearance (a minimum of 2cm long, and broader across the middle than at the tips), and a fairly uniform grass green. They appear to have been rolled horizontally, and unfurl a little when wet. The scent of the leaves, once brewed, is of asparagus and spring greens. I used 1 tsp of leaf for my cup, and gave it 2.5 minutes in water cooled to around 175 degrees. The resulting liquor is a very, very pale yellow – really almost colourless.
The taste is very mild also, although a lot sweeter than I anticipated based on the scent of the brewed leaves. I was expecting something vegetal, and while there are hints of that, the main flavour I’m picking up is actually reminiscent of sugar beet. It’s thick, sweet, and a little syrupy. Once the initial flavour fades there’s a touch of fresh pea, but it’s pretty faint. It’s not at all what I was expecting from a green tea. As my cup cooled, I did find that the vegetal flavour intensified a little, although it’s still mild in the grand scheme of things. It remained smooth throughout, though, with no bitterness or astringency to be found.
This one makes for a very pleasant, and unusual, cup. I like it when I come across teas that challenge my expectations – often they’re the ones I end up enjoying most because they’re so unlike anything else. This would be a good green tea to introduce those who are wary of the variety, simply because it avoids the characteristics most likely to put someone off. I’d also recommend it to those who love green tea, as an example of something honestly quite different and unusual. An intriguing tea!
Pure Peppermint Herbal Tea from Rington’s Premium English Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Herbal
Where to Buy: Rington’s Premium English Teas
Tea Description:
An exciting and invigorating herbal infusion of pure peppermint leaves to revitalise and refresh. Peppermint has been shown to aid digestion.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Peppermint is a classic herbal if ever there was one. It’s hard to go wrong with something so simple, and it’s a good stomach settler to boot. Rington’s pure peppermint is provided in a standard square paper tea bag, each one containing a generous amount of finely shredded peppermint leaves. I gave 1 bag approximately 3 minutes in boiling water for my cup. The liquor is a mediun golden brown, the scent mildly minty.
To taste, this is pretty much a standard peppermint tea. It’s exactly as you would expect – fresh tasting mint, with the wonderful hot water/cooling mint contrast that makes peppermint tea such a refreshing choice (and particularly suited to summer, if hot tea is your drink of choice when it’s 30 degrees out, as it is for me!) It’s a reasonably gentle mint, not too strong or reminiscent of toothpaste, but still identifiably mint. A well balanced choice.
There are so many similar peppermint teas available that it’s hard to make one stand out. Peppermint is an evergreen staple of the herbal tea world, after all. This one has no bells and whistles, but it’s clearly of quality – that much is evident in the drinking.