Tag: Black Tea

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DavidsTea’s Supreme Pekoe

Supreme Pekoe by DavidsTea
Black Tea / Straight
$7.98 for 50g

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First Impressions

I grew up on orange pekoe as a staple in my life, so I have fairly high expectations since Supreme Pekoe is a lot more expensive than the Red Rose that I grew up on. DavidsTea describes the tea as having ‘graham cracker notes’, which was intriguing enough to me to get some to try. The dry tea of Supreme Pekoe smells a bit like plums, but it doesn’t smell overly fruity to me. The dry leaf of the tea smells like Red Rose to me, which is a very familiar tea, but Red Rose doesn’t make me think of plums. The tea leaves smell smallish to what I’ve come to expect from DavidsTea’s teas.

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Supreme Pekoe is described as being an ethically sourced tea with black tea from the Sabaragamuwa Province in Sri Lanka.

Preparation

DavidsTea recommends steeping Supreme Pekoe in near-boiling water for 4-7 minutes. The product page on their website for Supreme Pekoe has the temperatures as 90-95°C (194-203°F). My first steep was for 4 minutes.

First Taste

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Supreme Pekoe steeps to a golden orange colour. I would recommend steeping this tea with a fine mesh infuser or a filter bag because there was a bit of dust that wound up in the bottom of my Tea For One pot, thankfully this didn’t end up in the tea itself.

The taste of Supreme Pekoe is a lot bolder than the orange pekoe of my childhood. It has a strong flavour, there’s a malty quality to it, and there’s more depth to the flavour with the addition of a wheat or grain quality to it. I would hazard a guess that this is what DavidsTea was talking about when they mentioned the graham crackers. It is interesting, for sure, and I quite like it. Supreme Pekoe does taste good on its own. The addition of sweetener (I used sugar) helps to brighten up the flavours, and does bring out more of that grain taste.

My childhood tea was Hong Kong-style milk tea (orange pekoe with evaporated milk and some kind of sweetener), I couldn’t resist doing the same with Supreme Pekoe. The tea itself holds up well with the addition of evaporated milk and sugar – the bolder tea base stands up and makes the milk tea more flavourful overall.

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A Second Cup?

I did resteep Supreme Pekoe – it holds up well for a second steep! The leaves unfurl quite a bit, and were larger than I had expected from the appearance of the dry leaf. The flavour is still as bold as the first steep, which is definitely something that I was never successful with when it came to resteeping Red Rose’s orange pekoe.

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My Overall Impression

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I loved DavidsTea’s Supreme Pekoe. Orange pekoe has always held a special place in my heart, so I did unfairly have expectations for this tea to be good as well. I found it to be very enjoyable and it does very well on its own or with sweetener and milk. It works well as an any time tea, and if you’ve never tried Hong Kong-style milk tea before I would highly recommend it!

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Teatulia’s Earl of Bengal Tea

Earl of Bengal Tea by Teatulia
Black Tea / Flavoured
$11.62 USD for 32g (16 tea bags)

I received this carton Earl of Bengal Tea by Teatulia as part of a reward for backing the Kickstarter for Tea Journey, an online tea magazine. I was unable to find Earl of Bengal Tea on the Teatulia website, I based the pricing on their other 16 count teas. The last review of this tea on Steepster was from over 2 years ago, so I suspect that this tea was old stock being given away as part of the Kickstarter.

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First Impressions

I really like the overall presentation of Teatulia’s Earl of Bengal Tea. It comes in what they call an “eco-canister”, which their packaging describes as being hand crafted and printed on recycled paper. Earl of Bengal Tea is captioned as being a “refreshing new take on the classic Earl Grey”. The carton has some preparation instructions, says that each bag can be brewed twice, and that all of the teas from Teatulia are sourced directly from Kazi & Kazi Estate Ltd. in Bangladesh. It further goes to describe that it’s a single tea garden, and that Teatulia creates a sustainable partnership with the people there. Pretty neat!

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The carton is not air-tight, the 16 tea bags are in a clear plastic bag that is not sealed or resealable. This is a bit of a let down since air is one of the things that can cause tea to go stale. I put the entire bag into a plastic zipper bag just to seal them in. Each individual tea bag is made out of corn silk (as per the packaging) and they are compostable. The whole tea leaves are visible through the corn silk sachet, but they do look small. The bergamot flavouring isn’t as heavy as I’m used to with Earl Grey teas, but I am looking forward to trying it! Earl of Bengal Tea is made up of organic black ta and oil of bergamot.

Preparation

Teatulia recommends steeping Earl of Bengal in boiling water for 2-3 minutes, and then recommends repeating for a second cup.

First Taste

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Earl of Bengal steeps to a lovely orange colour, it is quite clear and the corn silk sachet does a fantastic job of keeping most of the tea leaf debris out of the tea itself. It smells like a very mild Earl Grey as it still lacks a strong bergamot scent. I had steeped it for the full recommended three minutes. Tasting it, it tastes quite like a rather plain black tea. It isn’t bitter when steeped for the full 3 minutes, which is nice. Nothing in particular stands out about this tea though.

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I did try adding some sweetener to the tea to see if it would help bring out the flavour. I used sugar and found that the black tea base does stand out a little bit more with the addition of a sweetener. It tastes almost astringent with the added sweetness to the tea. The bergamot remains lost.

The corn silk sachet itself does a good job, as you can see in the above photo that there is still some room for the leaves to expand. It is nice that it isn’t overly filled with leaves. I do think that the tea could have done better if they had been loose, so I may try this tea again with the leaves emptied into an infuser.

A Second Cup?

Because it was recommended, I attempted to steep Earl of Bengal for a second time and it was a very lackluster tea. It was very weak and watery, I would not recommend steeping it for a second time.

My Overall Impression

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I didn’t like Teatulia’s Earl of Bengal Tea. As much as I wanted to, it just wasn’t my cup of tea. I would have expected something with a heavier hand of the bergamot oil, as it was meant to be a refreshing new take on the Earl Grey. I think this tea works well if you’re looking for a black tea that could stand to be doctored up with some sweetener or cream, but overall I would say that there are other better (and less expensive) black tea options out there to try.

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Teapigs’ Darjeeling Earl Grey

Darjeeling Earl Grey by Teapigs
Black Tea / Flavoured
£3.99 for 37.5g

This is a review of a tea that I received for my birthday in 2015.

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First Impressions

Teapigs is an amusing name, this is my first experience with them! I got this package of their Darjeeling Earl Grey for my birthday last year, and I’m quite curious about it because I just love Earl Grey. The packaging states that the “tea temples” (I’ll be calling them pyramids throughout my review, or sachets) are biodegradable. The total package is 37.5g, which makes for 2.5g per sachet, a fairly generous amount!

Inside the cardboard carton, there’s a cellophane bag which contains all the sachets. Sadly, this is not resealable once opened. I put all of my leftover pyramids into a ziploc bag with the necessary information from the packaging itself. I try to put my tea into containers if I have them handy, but I didn’t have any empty tea tins and I did have resealable bags available.

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The pyramids are adorable, and you can very easily see through that the leaves are a decent size for a bagged tea. I could even see the cornflower petals in there, which is a nice touch. The ingredients for Darjeeling Earl Grey are: Darjeeling tea (98%), natural flavours, and corn flowers (1%). The tea is described as being high quality Darjeeling with bergamot and lime flavours. I’ve never had an Earl Grey with lime before, but then I’ve also never had an Earl Grey with a Darjeeling base! It smells like bergamot, and the lime aroma is definitely present. I can’t make out the Darjeeling when the tea is dry though. (I have checked out Teapigs’ UK website, their Darjeeling Earl Grey on the website does not list lime as a part of the tea, so I believe they must have changed the formulation of the tea since this was purchased.)

Preparation

Teapigs recommends steeping in 100C water for 3-5 minutes.

First Taste

I steeped my pyramid of Darjeeling Earl Grey for about 4 minutes (possibly closer to 5) and I think that was a bit too long. Darjeeling steeps to a lovely reddish brown that’s deep and clear. There’s just a touch of a bitter aftertaste, so I definitely think that steeping it for a shorter period of time would be a good idea. There’s a bright citrus aroma to the tea, thanks to the bergamot and lime. I would almost say that the lime overpowers the bergamot just a little bit too much, but it’s not unpleasant.

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I added a small spoonful of honey, because I’m usually a fan of a touch of sweetness with my Earl Grey. It does not disappoint, the sweetener brightens up the bergamot flavouring but doesn’t amplify the lime so it’s a bit more familiar and closer to what I’m used to, but still retains that lime flavour.

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I found that the pyramids are way too small! The leaves unfurl and they fill the pyramid to capacity. I would really recommend, if you can, to snip the sachets and empty the leaves into a basket infuser (like the kind that comes with teapots) to allow the leaves more room to expand.

A Second Cup?

I did resteep Darjeeling Earl Grey and it’s delightful. The lime and bergamot flavouring is less pronounced in the second steeping, but the Darjeeling base holds strong and still has a bit of a kick to it in terms of caffeine. The flavouring was mostly gone by the third steeping, and did not resemble an Earl Grey at all. I would say that Darjeeling Earl Grey is good for one more steep only.

My Overall Impression

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I liked Teapigs’ Darjeeling Earl Grey. I think it’s a great mix of the convenience of bagged tea with the quality of loose tea. It’s a very interesting experience because I’m not used to lime in my Earl Grey, but that doesn’t mean that it was bad. I definitely would recommend steeping the leaves outside of the pyramid because they’re just so stuffed in there, they need room to steep! My guess is that Teapigs may have changed the formula of their Darjeeling Earl Grey because lime isn’t really what people expect in an Earl Grey, although it is a bit confusing that they kept the same name and changed the added flavourings. Nevertheless, lime is a welcome change to an old time favourite, but I’m kind of disappointed that I won’t be able to get more of it once I run out since it’s not longer being produced. Also, pro-tip – watch your steeping times! It can (and will) get a touch bitter if you don’t baby your tea a bit more carefully than I did.

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