Tea’s up with the Rare Tea Company

“I have been personally sourcing all our teas since 2004 .  I travel to small mountain tea gardens, mainly in the famous tea region of Fujian, China where they have been growing teas for over five thousand years. Our teas are not mass-produced in large industrial gardens. These whole leaves and tips are skilfully produced by artisans and tea masters.

“Tea may come from the same regions and have the same name but not all tea is equal. It’s rather like fine wine or champagne: in a terroir there may be many producers growing many grapes but they don’t, of course, all produce the same wine.”

These precious teas are personally sourced by founder of the Rare Tea Company, Henrietta Lovell, from small mountain tea gardens with centuries of tradition and fierce pride in their teas. Hand-produced by skilled artisans they retain the freshest flavours and the highest levels of antioxidants.

I’ve met Henrietta a few times and she is passionate and eloquent about her subject. Her teas are about tradition, sustainability and the livelihoods of small growers. And small is definitely beautiful. I am a non tea drinker, associating the drink with the sweet milky monstrosities of my youth. This is a drink that has infinite subtlety, that can engage mind and spirit. There are different teas for different moods; it can work as thirst-quencher, food-accompanier and digestif.

I was invited to Mark Hix’s new restaurant in Soho to try a range of teas from white to green to black. The tasting was covered by Imbibe magazine. Here are the teas shown with Henrietta’s notes and my uncultured comments in italics.

Malawi Antlers

Rather than being made from the leaves of the tea bush- antlers are the velvety stem of finely plucked shoots.
A soft lychee and apricot aroma and a sweet, gentle cup. 
These antlers wonderfully express the ‘terroir’ -the unique combination of factors that give Satemwa estate tea its great potential: aspect, soil and, of course, variety.  Not only that but the farm’s wonderful obsession with quality and innovation. 

Really unusual, very pretty, delicate, notes of blossom and peachskin. Very refreshing.

White Silver Tip Tea:

Made only from the spring bud this tea is extremely delicate yet rounded.  A high mountain tea it is dried in the sunshine and undergoes no other processing.  This allows the tips to retain a gentle sweetness combined with fresh grassy flavours.

Notes of sweet hay, the tannins are light and elegant

Jasmine Silver Tip Tea:

The finest spring buds are scented over six nights with fresh jasmine flowers.  A heady aroma with a very soft flavour this is simply the finest jasmine tea available anywhere. 
Wonderfully delicate and low in caffeine it makes the prefect after dinner tea or palate cleanser between courses.  It’s also the best tea for seduction. 

Delicious and natural - a beautifully scented tea and very fresh

Green Leaf Tea:

This whole leaf tea is one of the highest quality green teas available and subsequently one of the most delicious. Whole leaves unfurl as they infuse.  Carefully hand-crafted in a wok this tea has the subtle aroma of wood smoke from the charcoal used to fire the wok.  The flavour is clean and refreshing when infused for 2 minutes.  Steep for 3-4 minutes for the deeper notes.  Also delicious cold with fresh mint.

Definitely smoky, a touch more astringency - intriguing. More of a food tea for me. H. recommends with smoked salmon and scrambled eggs.

Meghalaya

This is a Second Flush Indian tea from a small, forgotten region called the Abode of Clouds.  It comes from a small farm where they only produce a few hundred kilos a year of the very best.  Rich floral aromas of apricot and peach.  Soft green notes of wet earth.  A perfectly balanced, mineral dry finish. 

Liked this. Spongy, mossy aromas but also well balanced and clean on the finish.

Tregothnan Earl Grey:

The first ever English tea, grown at Tregothnan, the ancient Estate in Cornwall established in 1335.  The delicate Cornish tea is blended with a top quality Assam and scented with bergamot.  It has no heavy chemical flavourings that can be used in lesser teas to disguise inferior leaf.  This tea is grown and crafted for love rather than profit. It’s delicious with or without milk and lovely with lemon. 

Not my cup of tea, but I did like the tangerine/orange notes of the bergamot.

Lost Malawi

This strong afternoon tea comes from Satemwa Estate on Thyolo mountain in the Shire Highlands of Malawi.  Picked from rare cultivars and carefully crafted it is both deeply satisfying and richly complex.  It’s the sort of tea our grandparents would have enjoyed.  If you need the strength of a “builders” but want something more than flat tannin this is your tea.  It’s like drinking tea in 3-D.  Richly malty you won’t be disappointed. 

Robust black tea. I could appreciate the quality (almost caramel notes), but wouldn’t drink this myself.

Wild Rooibos

Grown wild in the Cedarburg Mountains and harvested on horseback this is real redbush. Wild leopards roam where this tea grows.  Rich and earthy.  Full bodied, rich and deep.

More of a tisane than a tea. Really interesting artisan product!.