Around the World – Tea-growing Asia

Each tea-growing region has its own unique style of tea cultivation and processing. This selection takes you to Thailand, Taiwan and Japan, where teas with completely different characters are produced. You’ll taste a full-bodied black tea, a traditional Taiwanese oolong and a delicate Japanese kukicha, and discover just how significantly the place of origin influences the final flavour. With this pack, you’ll save 5% off the original price of the teas. In the descriptions, we use comparisons to the aromas of fruit, flowers and the like, but these are all pure teas, without any additives.

Organic Thailand Chang Rai Hong Cha

This Thai black tea comes from the mountainous province of Chang Rai in the very north of Thailand, in the so-called Golden Triangle on the borders with Burma and Laos. The Jing Shuan cultivar bushes were grown at an altitude of 400–700 metres. The consistently warm weather throughout the year, combined with abundant rainfall, creates ideal conditions for growing tea plants. Hand-picking, followed by a longer and more intensive withering and rolling process, and up to five hours of leaf oxidation, give the tea its distinctive, unmistakable character.

Fully oxidised, unbroken dry leaves in several shades of brown with an intense honey and malt aroma. The infusion is a sparkling brown-copper colour and has a velvety-smooth, sweet honey flavour with notes of dried pears, vanilla and an autumnal deciduous forest.

Four Season Oolong Natural Farming

A lightly oxidised oolong of the Sijichun cultivar (Four Season oolong), grown at an altitude of 300–350 metres in Nantou County near the town of Ming Jian in the west of Taiwan. The tea was grown and processed by Mr Chen, who cultivates tea using Natural Farming methods in harmony with the surrounding natural environment, without the use of chemical fertilisers or pesticides. Light oxidation of 10–15 per cent, traditionally tightly rolled into medium-sized, light green balls, with a delicate, sweet and refreshing floral aroma featuring hints of vanilla, strawberries and raspberries. A clear, light green infusion with a distinctly floral aroma featuring richer notes of roses and lily of the valley, a smooth, creamy flavour dominated by exotic fruits and vanilla, and a slight malty sweetness in the aftertaste.

Organic Kagoshima Kukicha

It is made mainly from high-quality stems and leaves left over from the processing of the first, April harvest. In Japan, it is known as ‘Shiraore’; it has a delicately sweet flavour, a grass-green infusion and a fresh green aroma. Due to its lower caffeine content, Kukicha is ideal for drinking in the evening. The leaves are light green in colour, with the characteristic shape of small, straight twigs, and an intense sweet, slightly peppery and mildly citrusy aroma. A pale, slightly milky-clouded green infusion with a delicate, sweet, rounded flavour featuring fresh citrus notes, a hint of green pepper and white chocolate.