English Estate Earl Grey

If any if you dear readers would ask how it feels to be in a meadow while feel the midday’s heat in the highlands? Its calm and serene and raw and brisk much like this tea! Tregothnan Tea grown in the northern hemisphere seems to capture the calm of a winters season and serene floweriness after a winters thaw. Naturally a tropical plant, it still imparts raw and brisk flavors untamed to be made lively for a drinker who seeks the liveliness of a jungle with much of starchy richness and malty flavors. The added orange essence compliments a floral meadow much beloved in this tea. A must for any one trying a truly unique tea made in England!

One sachet will brew a 1liter pot. Individually wrapped tea bags with strings, 10 in a small box. Packaging not very attractive—which is not necessarily a bad thing, as some american tea companies are all about the packaging, and less about the quality of the leaf. Be careful when opening the packet, it’s a tight fit, my first attempt resulted in ripped tea bag. Of course, I brewed it up anyway using a mesh filter. That incident did allow me to view the contents, and it is a very fine texture, as most english brands are. Second attempt, paid strict attention to the top selvage and was successful. (Yay) Once you get past the packaging, the opened packet has a lovely aroma. I drink my black tea without milk, I like to taste the stuff unadulterated. I don’t add milk or sugar to Earl Grey anyway… and this has a smooth mouth feel, does not dry out my tongue. Less of a lemony note than Ahmad Earl Grey, which is my daily tea, my standard of comparison. I also brewed it a rather long time, as I got distracted during dinner time, and walked away. No problem, I have discovered that most British tea blends are rather gracious about overbrewing — they will still turn out fine. And if you think brewing it was almost too tricky for me, you should have seen me ordering it! Apparently, my bank feels that my visa is safest if I don’t use it at all. They wanted the last 4 of my SSN “for security reasons”… luckily, I have two Visas, or I would not have any tasting notes for Tregothnan. I am still trying to find the magic combination that allows me to try Fortnum’s tea. I refuse to pay $150 for 12 oz of tea…. but that is another subject entirely. Give me time, I shall surely find a way, this Yank may be slow, but she gets there eventually.

No other way to put it. This is THE definitive Earl Grey. British-grown tea (blended with Assam) scented with British-grown bergamot oil. And it sure does taste like it. The black tea base was malty, floral…and balanced absolutely perfectly with the citrus-sour bergamot. A second steep yielded a more diluted bergamoty cup but with no astringency or bitterness. In a word, “Wow.”

Full Review: http://www.lazyliteratus.com/1152

At the moment, this is my favorite Earl Grey tea. I’ve not tried many others because I’ve had poor experiences with them in the past. Mainly during that time where I thought you just microwaved some water and dipped a tea bag in. I probably should give Earl Grey another try.
Anyhow, I picked this up as a package at the local Christmas Tree Shoppe on markdown, thinking “sure, why not? I can spare $3 on a box of tea bags”. So I honestly am surprised by how much I do enjoy the scent and taste of this. To be fair, the scent is really what I love. The Bergamot is a joy to smell and very relaxing to me.

Earl Grey is one of those teas that I get a sudden craving for, and when I do nothing else can substitute that lovely Bergamot taste. This Tregothnan tea has the balance just right, between their own home grown tea, the finest assam, and British grown bergamot oil, and has become my go-to tea when such cravings strike.

Whilst in the sample stage of PostTea I was lucky enough to recieve samples of four different Tregothnan teas, and this was my favourite. I received a box of ten individual wrapped bags, which is perfect for keeping them fresh. In fact, the lack of decent individually wrapped teas is a bug bear for me, so this was a definite added bonus. As one reviewer has mentioned, the tea bags are a little tight in their foil wrap, but I managed to open it without ripping. The outer box for the tea is beautiful, just British enough without being tacky, but distinctive enough to identify as British.

As I had the bagged tea to try, I only attempted one steep. If you follow Tregothnan’s instructions they simply suggest boiling water, and a brew of 2-3 minutes. I knew this was going to be too light for, I’m much more a ‘leave the bag in’ kinda tea drinker, so I brewed mine for five minutes and absolutely loved the rich Bergamot flavour, balancing the rich malty Tregothnan tea, which I know well from their Classic Blend. There are some delightful citrus-y undertones too. All in all this is an exceptionally balanced Earl Grey when drunk black. I balanced mine with just the tiniest dash of milk – I find that the Tregothnan teas ‘hold’ the milk very well and you certainly don’t need more than the smallest dribble. As always I had this tea unsweetened, but I’m sure a little honey would be lovely in there too, if that’s how you take it! I’m going to try the next cup black with a slice of lemon. In fact, I might just do that now!

This is Most English cup of Earl Grey tea you will ever have – and it definitely won’t disappoint!