Bond Street English Breakfast Blend

[liralen]

Bought: Upton Tea, nearly a year ago, the third 125gm packet I've bought and put into the same tin I've had for quite some time.

Brewed: Full, roaring boil (203). 16 oz water on 2 level teaspoons of leaves for 2 minutes in my little Brown Betty of a Chatsford teapot.

Leaf Appearance and Fragrance: This is Crush Tear Curl tea (CTC in tea-chnospeak) so small leaf bits, nice brown color, smooth tannin scent.

I was reading Carpe Jugulum, and for those that know the book, there was this point where I HAD to make myself a cuppa tea that could, perhaps, conceivably take three sugars. It didn't have to. :-) I only did one sugar and some milk and had the best cup of tea I've had in a while. It helped that it is now raining outside and I'm a bit chilly and it's wonderfully gray out. Comforting. My childhood had mostly Lipton in it, with lots of milk and sugar, and it brought back all those memories.

It's actually a malty cup from the Assam with some citrus high notes from the Ceylons in it. Brewed this short, that hot, it didn't get bitter at all, and just laid down a deep, dark basis to make the sugar and milk taste right in the cup. No perfumes, no grass, no characteristics, no high price, no special fruity or floral extensions. It's kind of the material opposite of Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee, in that it's as cheap to get and make as anything, but it boils down to the essence of what tea is about, in my mind. Comforting, hot, and tasty enough to make me come back to it again and again.

And, yes, it was perfect in my present mood and situation, especially with the craving prompted by the book, after I'd gotten Jet home from pre-school.

Rating: 10 of 10