Your Favorite Teas

[mrbigjas]

OK I found that thing I was talking about in the thread above. Check it out here. Very convenient for work.

[Rhea_S]

There's an Earl Grey that comes in a cylindrical silver tin that I thought was fab. I went through the tin very quickly. Unfortunately, I don't remember what kind and didn't save the tin. There's also a Taylor's of Harrogate Assam that I liked very much. I drink lots of the cheap jasmine tea that comes loose in a yellow/gold tin.

I've been enjoying Tazo teas lately. I was reluctant to try them because I associated them with Starbucks and figured they were just some hyped up, mass produced product. I bought a box last week because it was on sale at a local health food store and was pleasantly surprised. Every flavour I've tried (Wild Sweet Orange, Awake, Tazo Chai, Passion) have had strong clean flavours. I much prefer these to others I've tried from Republic of Tea, Harney & Sons and other tea purveyors.

[Amuse Bouche]

My most favorite is Fortnum and Mason Queen Anne. I'm very upset they've stopped distributing it in the U.S.

Also like Earl Grey, Darjeeling, P.G. Tips (A British tea bag), Celestial Seasonings Mandarin Orange Something.

[ghostrider]

A merchant from whom I used to buy Fortnum & Mason teas told me last month that F&M are no longer distributing their wares through other vendors, & will be selling them directly in the US henceforth.

The implication was that, sooner or later, there'd be a US website.

Now, teas, one of my favorite subjects........

I gave up coffee about 25 years ago but have remained a diehard black tea drinker. Rarely go for flavored/spiced/herbal teas.

These days, most of my teas come from Upton. Someone mentioned them above. They have a great website and a consistently superb quality. I generally have 5 or 6 of their Assams around for my morning tea, & a selection of Ceylons & Darjeelings & other teas from that general area for the afternoon.

I drank a lot of Chinese teas for nigh on 20 years but then for some reason lost my taste for them. Have yet to figure out why. Maybe my tastes have simply become less subtle with age, I don't know.

Now, we could have a lengthy discussion of which Assam gardens are the best, & whether a Ceylon Uva is superior to a Kandy, & so on. But I fear this would bore most folks to tears, so I'll stop. For now.

[jo-mel]

All Chinese:

Gunpowder

Tie Guan Yin (Ti Kuan Yin)

Chinese Restaurant Tea

[jpr54_]

A merchant from whom I used to buy Fortnum & Mason teas told me last month that F&M are no longer distributing their wares through other vendors, & will be selling them directly in the US henceforth.

The implication was that, sooner or later, there'd be a US website.

Now, teas, one of my favorite subjects........

These days, most of my teas come from Upton.  Someone mentioned them above.  They have a great website and a consistently superb quality.  I generally have 5 or 6 of their Assams around for my morning tea, & a selection of Ceylons & Darjeelings & other teas from that general area for the afternoon.

have you tried other online tea vendor's?

www.imperialtea.com

www.specialteas.com

www.rishi-tea.com

www.kyelateas.com

joanne

[pumpernickel]

Puttabong first flush darjeeling is currently my favorite tea. Unfortunately it's also ridiculously expensive--at, for instance, Tealuxe in Boston it was about $20 for 50g.

Puttabong is also one of my favourites, because it's so tender,green and tippy. The price got me startled though, I paid something like 10 Euro for 125g. Compared to Europe, I find that loose tea is a rather rare commodity here in the States and prices are more commensurate with packaging than with quality. I found a decent Kukicha and ordinary Sencha at our local asian store, though.

So who has made experiences with online tea stores?

Enjoy!

[ghostrider]

have you tried other online tea vendor's?

www.imperialtea.com

www.specialteas.com

www.rishi-tea.com

www.kyelateas.com

joanne

Thanks for those recommendations! Special Teas & Kyela look particularly interesting to me. I've bookmariked their sites for future use.

Here's a link to Upton just for the heck of it -

Upton Tea Imports

The challenge of buying tea on line is always that you can't see/feel/smell what you're getting until it arrives. Between the descriptions & photos & reviews at Upton, I can usually get a pretty good sense of whether I'm going to like a parrticular variety.

I've also gotten some good teas from this merchant -

Frair&Grimes

[jpr54_]

I order from upton as well-

I order lightly fermented oolongs and some darjeelings from them-

[tsquare]

I just started drinking tea and tesanes (sic) by Numi.

Numi's website

They are handsomely packaged, creatively combined, and organic. I had a slight problem with one of their items and when I emailed a short note about it (just some mispackaging, nothing drastic), they apologized immediately and went beyond the call to rectify the issue - and noted that the QC person would be informed. Looks like a fine company trying to do right. And a nice cuppa to boot.

Excellent Chai - tea bag style. Refreshing herbals. High quality all around.

[m(a)ce]

I have had great experiences with Rishi tea (both for business & home use).

Owner & staff are knowledgeable yet laid back.

Best things we've been drinking from them:

jade oolong: (2nd & 3rd extraction are amazing)

organic silver needle white tea: delicate, clean taste.

[malarkey]

Dammann Freres Paris Romance *swoon*

[chengb02]

favorite teas, a difficult topic...There are a number of different ones:

currently enjoying an english rose tea I bought in Chelsea and the F&M Royal blend, but typically drink Chinese teas a la longjing, pu er, or jasmine teas.

[jpr54_]

favorite teas, a difficult topic...There are a number of different ones:

currently enjoying an english rose tea I bought in Chelsea and the F&M Royal blend, but typically drink Chinese teas a la longjing, pu er, or jasmine teas.

chelsea in london?nyc?

what types of pu-erh do you enjoy drinking?

i have not tried many of the pu-ehrs as yet-

what type of jasmine tea do you like?

i enjoy jasmine teas from tentea and imperial tea court

joanne

[duckduck]

The Republic of Tea's Vanilla Almond is my fave. I have it every morning cream and sugared and since it gets more flavorful as it cools I decided to toss it in the ice cream maker and freeze it. It's wonderful!

[Lisa J]

hoji cha. sencha green tea that has been roasted. nice toasty flavour and delish hot or cold.

[chengb02]

chelsea in london?nyc?

what type of jasmine tea do you like?

[maher]

Fortnum and Mason sell teas online in the US, the site is

www.fortnumandmason-usa.com

[mjr_inthegardens]

I don’t know whether it makes me a boor or a sophisticate but I drink and have always drank strong English tea, Sainsbury's Red Label, a supermarket brand from the UK with milk.

-mjr

[jpr54_]

I don’t know whether it makes me a boor or a sophisticate but I drink and have always drank strong English tea, Sainsbury's Red Label, a supermarket brand from the UK with milk.

-mjr

what other teas do you enjoy?

do you know what type of tea is in sainsbury red label?

[lambretta76]

I really like Jasmine Dragon Pearl tea ... in NYC, from the Tea Lounge (two locations) in Park Slope. Or, Tealuxe in Boston. (used to be on the UWS, but has since closed...)

(Bin #162 at Tealuxe.com - $4 for 10 grams or $20 for 50 grams.)

TeaLuxe

[Naomi]

Like almost everyone else in the UK and Ireland, tea is my comfort drink. It's simply part of the culture. My favourites have all kinds of memories and emotions related to them.

1) Golden Namosa. Blended in Belfast since 1860. It's like "irish breakfast", probably a blend of assam and darjeeling.

I love this brewed strong, with milk and sugar, like my Granny gave me every day after school.

2) Lapsang Souchong. I used to cry for a week at the end of every summer when I had to leave my beloved summer camp in County Sligo. As well as not washing my sweater for weeks, to smell the campfire on it, I would drink this smokey tea and imagine I was back with my friends singing round the campfire, on a damp misty mountaintop. It really does smell like a campfire.

3) Earl Grey. First tasted when visiting my mum's posh college friends in England. Felt ever so grand drinking this from a silver teapot and fine china. This was the first tea I bought loose. Still think it's worth bringing out the china for.

[klc14]

Ceylon and Assam blend, half and half. The signature blend for Brown's Hotel (Mark Twain stayed there, Rudyard Kipling died writing at a desk there).

Another tea from that trip was Twining's Lemon Balm and Fennel. No caffeine, and soothing to an upset stomach. In bags. Haven't seen it since, it's not on their website.

Republic of Tea: either Cardamon and Cinnamon or Cinnamon and Cardamon (I think they changed the blend, seen it both ways). A touch spicy, a bit rich. Just an American tea, this one...

[Gary Soup]

Nuttin' but longjing tea (O.K., I'll sneak in a biluochun once in a while). My favorite on-line source is Gray & Seddon, who should be offering their 2004 pre-Qing Ming longjing any day now.

I'd like nothing better than to be sitting on the front porch of the Old Film Cafe on Duolun Lu in Shanghai right now, sipping on some just-released tea straight-up in a glass tumbler, but circumstances dictate otherwise.

[Vervain]

Unless my stomach is in a twist, I'm addicted to strong black tea (with a drop or two of milk) too. Years ago a professor turned me on to McGrath's Irish Blend. After a few years, I stopped and went back to coffee. Then on a lark because we always saw the ads in London, my husband bought me a box of Typhoo in bags. I make a mug with two bags steeped for 7-10 minutes. It really gets the brain cells popping in the mid-afternoon (which is why I am having some at this moment )