Kenyan Earl Grey

So I totally made this one by mistake! I meant to make Justea’s Chai and didn’t clue in that something was off, even after wondering why it was just black tea and no spices… :P

This is still good though.

I totally did not look at my previous tasting notes for this one and I was convinced that I was going to have a bitter cup… I remembered to underleaf it (relative to what I normally would add) but I definitely brewed it hotter and I initially set my timer for longer. I pulled it a bit early, and it turned out great! Lots of crisp, citrusy bergamot and a substantial (but not too robust) tea base. A good cup to start my (late) morning off. :)

I love Earl Grey and I have some very definite ideas of how it should taste. I have a rule about it when reviewing – if it is anything but tea and bergamot you better call it something else or I will complain. If you change the name I will cut you some slack and judge it on its own merits. This tea passes on both ends of my rule. It is Earl Grey but the name change suggests to me there is something different about it. Thank you Justea for this subtle but important attention to detail.

My normal everyday earl is Ceylon based, which I believe to be the standard. I like my bergamot front and center. I don’t want to have to search for it but don’t overwhelm me. I do demand balance. I want to taste the tea as well. Some tea companies call their tea earl grey and overemphasize the base or the bergamot. Justea once again pays attention to the details and balances this blend nicely.

This particular blend using the Kenyan base is malty and smooth, yet slightly drying. It does not have the throat grabbing bite of the Ceylon standard. This is why I appreciate the name Kathryne, it suggests a softer, more gentle approach to my beloved tea.

The bergamot is very well suited to the base. By my standard it is not overpowering. The flavor is balanced between floral and fruit but I would say leaning towards floral. It is not perfumey or fake tasting. Nicely done.

After sipping this hot, I iced it down and found it to be very refreshing. This takes sweetener well. I greatly enjoyed this one. Thank you Justea.

For those who may have missed it – Justea is a non-profit organization attempting to break the cycle of poverty that too many tea farmers face by teaching them to process their own leaves and selling direct.

Sipdown!! (117)

Thank you Cavocorax for the sample of this tea. It is nice as far as EGs go but I am not sad to see one more bergamot-centric tea leaving my cupboard.

Oh WOW. I don’t know if it’s because it is winter with the lack of sunshine or because I haven’t had an Earl in a while but WOW. This stuff is amazingly delicious. Upon opening my sample, the bergamot fragrance is divine! Bright, fresh, lemony… almost like there is some lemon myrtle here. There is some yellow powder, but I think that’s just the tea itself. I definitely thought “sunshine”. I brewed a heaping teaspoon for exactly three minutes after waiting for the water to cool for about ten minutes. I don’t think it could get more perfect than this. I’m not sure if JustTea uses the Kenyan black base for this one, since I didn’t seem to find any of the notes there that I did here. This one doesn’t seem malty, chocolate or Yunnan. Maybe the bergamot is so strong it is overpowering those flavors but if I’m drinking Earl Grey, I want my bergamot to be tough stuff. Maybe I was just wishing for the last cup to taste that way. But this is amazing. This would be in strong competition with Teajo’s Earl Grey in the Battle of the Earl Greys. (I don’t recall if it was in the Battle, but if not, I demand a rematch! :D) I really hope JusTea will create more blends because the three they have are EXCELLENT. I’m very tempted to buy these for their Christmas sale!!
www.JusTea.com

So I had this tea last night in the JusTea headquarters made by the JusTea media guy. I put milk and a bit of sugar in them because that’s how I can get around my hatred of the bitterness of black tea and it was quite good. They’re a little low-tech in their office, kettles and thermometers and pouring through a steeping filter into various mugs. Was cool.

This is actually my first time having their earl grey and it’s pretty nice. The flavour of the bergamot is pretty strong and I finally finally tasted the actual citrusiness of the bergamot in the aftertaste. It was quite nice. This is one of their machine processed teas since last year they were still teaching the tea farmers how to process their own and in order to have money to do this they contracted with one of the companies to do this and their other 2 current teas (Kenyan Black and African Chai). This year, later than now obviously, they will start offering their hand-crafted teas by the tea farmers and I had some of those at the tea cupping event last night and there were a couple of oolongs and they were REALLY good. And I don’t even love oolongs all that much normally. Search starfevre on Instagram for some pictures of the whole thing.

Sipdown no. 97, & yes, I’m going for it, tonight!
Sil sent this one to me, mainly for my man, Tony, who loves earl Grey. I am not a huge EG fan, although occasionally I manage to enjoy a cup. I figured before I gave this to Tony I should drink one cup, so I did. As far as EGs go, this is actually very drinkable, with a real bergamot flavor, nothing phony about it. As it cooled, it did take on a vegetal taste, but I still managed to polish it off. The rest is in Tony’s tea cupboard now. I’ll let you know if he makes any comments about it when he drinks it.

This tea has the type of bergamot I like in it, bright and complex, fruity citrus with notes from lemon to tangerine with spicy notes that remind me of lavender and ginger. The flavouring is bold and strong which blends well with a strong heavy bodied tea.

Using 1.5 tsp this tea brewed up to a nice red after around 3 minutes. The first flavour note was of sweet potato, followed quickly by citrus spice with lavender and light ginger notes, underlain by deep malt and cocoa. This is quite nice, bright and light tasting on top, with depth underneath and a lovely citrus spice aftertaste.

sipdown. nope nope nope nope nope nope nope. I could tell this wouldn’t be a tea for me as soon as i cut into the package. but i tried. and no. the rest is going in a box for terri. and tony. ’cause this is a tea for him….not me. but if you love earl greys…IGNORE MY REVIEW! since i suspect that many a fan of the EG would like this.

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When JusTea sent me this several weeks ago I was really excited by the prospect of trying an Earl Grey with a twist and it killed me not being able to review it yet. Earl Grey has been a favorite of mine absolutely forever, but because it is a favorite of mine I have very high standards.

Honestly, I didn’t like this tea at all in the beginning, it took quite a few cups for me to appreciate the differences the Kenya Black base brought to the table. There was a sweetness that I’m not accustomed to finding in an EG and the flavor was much more malty that I’m accustomed to. The familiar citrus flavors from the bergamot were there as was the slightly drying effect I generally associate with EG. What I loved was that this is no shy EG, it really packs a wallop, which may not appeal to everyone; however, I love a good strong cup of EG on a cold day like today.

My biggest disappointment with this tea, and one I had with the Kenyan Black as well, is that it just does not resteep well. I was only able to resteep it once and would love to see some improvement in that area.

One thing that I think is important to note is that the steeping instructions for this tea are slightly different than I am accustomed to using with a black tea and Earl Grey in general. It calls for a much lower temperature (195°F) and 2 teaspoons of leaf per 12oz. I double checked and all of the Earl Greys in my cabinet call for either boiling or near boiling water. For anyone who is having trouble with astringency, try dropping your steeping temperature and see if that makes a difference.

I would like to thank Tyrone at JusTea for sending me this sample. I hope you will all check out their crowdfunding campaign which launched on 16 September to raise the necessary capital to allow them to work with Kenyan farmers and provide quality “Direct Trade” tea to the masses and improve the quality of life of the farmers providing you your tea. You can find more information on their website http://www.justea.com/ you can also check out my full review of Kenya Black, which was used as a base for this tea on my blog
http://www.notstarvingyet.com/index/2013/9/16/tuesday-tea-kenyan-black-justea.html