Compagnie & Co (formerly Compagnie Coloniale)

It was my morning tea in the train to reach Aix en Provence. The SNCF, the national French train company uses now Compagnie Coloniale as unique brand for the tea served in all their restaurant coaches.
I am quite happy to see Lipton disappearing from main lines trains. Unfortunately the employees are not aware the water should be boiling (or at least near). I would say they served me a water at 60 or 65°C…hard time for a Darjeeling.

It was so clear liquor I was really worried but the taste was light and very pleasant. I detected a fruity note .

I need to buy some to get a correct preparation (home made…) but I really think this tea should be one of the type of Darjeeling I really appreciate (even if it mainly comes from a first flush and is from green type)

I had a full pot of this flavoured Oolong yesterday night.

I already reviewed this tea but I wanted to add something : the mineral taste.
This taste is the most proeminent I ever had in a tea. Ever. Of course I already noticed mineral taste in some teas but here it is really as if I made my tea with some typical mineral water very heavy on iron (Volvic).
It makes this Balade en Bretagne a very special tea and a beautiful dedicace to Brittany, a very mineral area.

I bought this tea in a beautiful tin this afternoon at La Grande Épicerie in Paris.
Compagnie Coloniale is one of the oldest tea company in France. They are using a special method to flavour teas : a vapour method (or steam method, no idea which word is most adapted for tea flavouring in English !)

Of course I bought it because it is an Oolong…and because caramel beurre salé is really an appealing ingredient…isn’t it ?

The dry leaf smells incredibly good, caramelly and salted caramel…so noticeable.
Unfortunately the taste of the liquor is less noticeable. This is a light caramel, not an in your face one and this is really ok, a subtle caramel.

But I was expecting more Oolong notes and this Oolong base is a little too much discrete for my taste. This is a buttery Oolong, mellow but too much subtle for my pleasure to be complete.

I’ll play around temperature to see if it changes something for me.

My favourite (as Amynmercedes knows!) I add a wee touch of honey to add even more sweetness. C’est si bon!

What a beautiful tea. Blends of cherry, almond, and a lovely zip of ginger that lingers.

I love a strong brew so I left it in the pot for about 7 to 10 mins. It has a delicious light a floral smell which was not what I expected from a Christmas Blend. I’ll still be drinking this in the summer!

Finally I taste this tea …it’s in my cupboard for ages…well just 5 months :) No idea why I didn’t take some time to have it.

This is an holiday tea, the first one to use the Thé Noël name, Compagnie Coloniale is a very old French Tea company.

I appreciate very much the scent of the dry leaf : not habitual for an holiday tea : no cloves, no cinnamon. But cherry sure and almond.

This is delicious, really.
Next time I’ll leave it steep longer, because the tea base is a little weak to my opinion.

I can perfectly understand why in France this is one of the Christmas Teas best sellers.

I’ve been purchasing this two years in a row. This would be a delicate almond-cherry-flowery black blend willing to please everybody. I have never found something similar nonetheless, it really is a good quality french ’’pastry’’ tea and the tin it comes in is absolutely adorable.

Yummy peach-flavoured tea, tastes great with honey. Also, tea bags are little muslin pyramid shapes rather than paper; so cool.