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!
Gielle 1st Flush Darjeeling Black Tea from Harney & Sons
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Harney & Sons
Tea Description:
This beautiful estate is set off to the side, away from most other Darjeeling estates, and this discreet locale aptly suits the owners of Gielle. They do what they think is best – in particular, to use the old “Chinese” tea bushes and to make an older style First Flush Darjeeling. Our tea mentor, Bernd Wulf, helped to develop this older style back in the 1960s. It was less oxidized than the Darjeelings of that time, thus lighter and greener, yet still with enough body to handle milk and sugar. Bernd was the father of our tea supplier Marcus Wulf – a cornerstone of our Tradition of Tea that ensures you excellent tea, produced and sourced with great care over generations.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
I should probably say upfront that first flush Darjeeling is one of my favourite varieties of black tea, so this one is preaching to the converted with me. The dry leaf itself is a thing of beauty – light and medium green leaves, and some downy silver-white buds. They’re a little twisted, and of about 1-2cm in length. The scent is mildly grapey with hints of stone fruit. I used 1 tsp of leaf for my cup, and gave it 2.5 minutes in boiling water. The resulting liquor is a medium golden-orange.
To taste, it’s pretty much perfection. The main flavour I can discern is dried apricot – quite rich and fruity. It lingers beautifully right until the end of the sip. There’s a very light hint of muscatel grape, which develops primarily at the end of the sip and in the aftertaste, and something that’s reminding me just a little of frangipane – a sort of nutty, almondy sweetness. It pairs beautifully with the apricot. There’s the slightest touch of what I can only describe as briskness – not bitterness or astringency, but a slight sharpness that takes this tea to a whole new level. It seems to enhance the grape notes a little, cutting through the initial rich sweetness. Certainly no bad thing!
This is a fine example of a first flush Darjeeling – clean-tasting, and beautifully light and delicate. Each one I’ve tried seems to have a slightly different character, and drinking this cup has been another pleasant experience. I’d not hesitate to recommend it to Darjeeling fans.
Miss Figgy Black from The East Indies Tea Company
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: The East Indies Tea Company
Tea Description:
Fig taste with dried figs and pink pig sprinkles.
Learn more about this on Steepster.
Taster’s Review:
Despite being pretty much over my ‘sprinkles in tea’ phase, this tea drew me in with the combination of pig sprinkles in the blend and the fun, whimsical name and the promise of fig flavour. In my humble opinion, there aren’t nearly enough fig blends and any chance I have to try a new one is one I’m going to take!
However, when I cracked open my sealed 2 oz. package of this blend I was hit with something I hadn’t been prepared for; the strong, piercing aroma of lavender! The lack of comprehensive ingredients lists on East Indie’s website it definitely a valid criticism; while a super generic blurb has worked out in my favor in the past in this case I feel like I was failed – I cannot stand lavender, and had I known this blend had so much of it I’m sure I would’ve been persuaded against this tea despite wanting to try ‘all the fig’.
Regardless, I cold brewed myself up a mason jar worth of tea because you never really know how a tea is going to taste for sure until you try it, so despite major reservations there was still a chance this could be alright. Sadly, I just couldn’t get over that concentrated lavender flavour. It was floral in a soapy, artificial way that made me feel like I’d licked all of the counters and shelves in a Bath & Body Works store. Any fig that was in this blend, and I know there was because I could see the dried out pieces in the leaf along with the adorable pig sprinkles, was completely masked. I was not impressed.
My overall opinion is that personally I found this blend as irksome as the puppet it’s playfully named for – and if you’re looking for fig look elsewhere. However, if you’re a fan of lavender and want to try a strong lavender blend over a black base you’re in luck.
