Sainsbury's Taste the Difference Citrus Grey Fairtrade Fine Tea

£1.40 for 50 tea bags. This is a variation of Earl Grey, rather like the softer Lady Grey, in which some bergamot is replaced by citric notes from orange or other zests. While the name Earl Grey has not been trademarked (so tea companies are free to call their blends by the name Earl Grey), the softer Lady Grey variety, which was devised by Twinnings in 1994 for the Nordic market, is trade marked, so softer, citric variations of Earl Grey need to be called by names other than Lady Grey. Such as here, with the name Citrus Grey.

This has pleasant citric notes - a little buzz of lemon and orange. The bergamot is almost not there. The tea is a robust, tannic black tea, which comes through fairly boldly, giving a solid base to the fruity zest. I'm not convinced the robust tea and the lively fruit zest quite marry - there is something of a hollow space between them, which a bit more bergamot would fill quite nicely.

Score: 7/10

Sainsbury's own label tea and coffee

Coffee roasts

There are four main categories of roast: Light, Medium, Medium-Dark, and Dark.

There are a variety of names used to describe these roasts. While there will be some distinction between a company's Italian and French, one company's Italian may be the same as another company's French, as there isn't a firmly agreed universal definition of these roast names.

Unroasted:

Green

Light: 

Light, Light City, Half City, Cinnamon, New England, 1

Medium: 

City, American, Breakfast, Regular, 2, 3

Medium-Dark: 

FullCity, After Dinner, Vienna/Viennese*, Italian, 4

Dark: 

Vienna/Viennese*, High, Continental, New Orleans, European, Espresso,  Italian, French, Spanish, Dark French, Double Dark, Heavy, 5, 6

The UK has a number system

Strength Guide

Rating	Description
1	Light to Medium Roast
2	Medium Roast
3	Medium to Dark Roast
4	Dark Roast
5	Very Dark Roast

Reviews

Taylors Hot Lava Java 
Score:  7   Price:  £3.49 for 227g

Sainsbury's French style 
Score: 5   Price: £2.30/227g

Starbucks Caffe Verona 
Score: 5   Price £- /227g

Lyons Gourmet Italian Score:  5   Price £1.00/150g

Tesco Original Fresh Coffee Beans 3 
Score:  5  Price £1.99/227g

Alcafe Italian Blend 
Score:  4   Price: £.1.69/250g

CafeDirect Rich Roast 
Score:  4  Price: £3.66/227g

Sainsbury's Continental  
Score: 4   Price: £2.30/227g,

Aldi Alcafe Original Rich Roast  
Score: 3  Price:  £1.49/250g

Lidl Bellarom French Blend 
Score: 3    Price: £1.70/227g

Sainsbury's Italian style 
Score:  3   Price: £2.30/227g

Percol Italiano 
Score:  3  Price: £3.39/227g

Taylors Rich Italian Coffee Beans 
Score: 3  Price: £3.39/227g

Waitrose Cafe House Blend 
Score: 3   Price:  £2.99/227g

Ikea Bryggkaffe Mellanrost  
Score: 2  Price: £1.90/250g

Sainsbury's Double Dark 
Score: 2   Price: £2.30/227g

Percol Plantation Wharf Dark Rich
 Score:  2  Price £0.79/150g

Cafe Express Italian Style Blend 
Score:  2  Price  £1.00/150g

Asda French Style Coffee  
Score: 2

Links

* Wikipedia
* National Coffee Association
* About.com
* Another Coffee
* CafeBritt
* Coffee Crossroads
* All About Coffee
* The Joy of Coffee

Tea and Coffee Emporium Tanzania Kibo Chagga

Medium roast beans from tea-and-coffee-emporium.co.uk. Quite a bold bean with a refreshing acidity. Not much roast flavours. Lots of citric fruit (which is not my thing when it comes to drinking coffee) resulting in a lively, clean, invigorating, and slightly sweet coffee. There's a hint of parma violets in the finish.

Tanzania is in East Africa, which is noted for its acidic coffees. The coffee is grown by the Chaga tribe on the slopes of Killimanjaro. Bought from tea-and-coffee-emporium.co.uk, who don't seem to exist at that website any more.

Score: 7

Other reviews:

*Imperial Teas say: "This incredibly popular coffee grown by the Wa Chagga people who live on the slopes of Mount Kilimanjaro is washed in the glacier streams and dried in the pure mountain air. Japanese and German buyers will pay a heavy premium for this flowery, full flavoured yet delicate coffee with its pointed acidity and clean taste. As a result this fulfilling drink is very difficult to obtain in the U.K. When you get it, covet it!"


*Peck says: "Vast deforesting was carried out in the tropical forests to make room for the coffee plantations. The natural and washed Arabica coffees from Tanzania have a vinous, sweet flavour with an acidic tone. The Tanzania Kibo Chagga coffee is produced by the inhabitants in Wa-Chagga who live at the foot of Kilimanjaro.It has a well-balanced taste and a most delicate acidity. The competition to purchase this coffee is very high: Peck recommends this blend for high quality coffee lovers."

Taylors Colombian High Andes Ground Coffee

This is a full bodied and somewhat bitter coffee - it doesn't like to sit in the water for long! There are buttery toast notes, and some acidic peaks, suggestive of greengage and gooseberry. It's drinkable, but feels somewhat ordinary. I don't like the acidic bits, and I don't like the tendency toward bitterness. Colombian coffee doesn't appear too different to Costa Rican coffee.

5/10

Colombian coffee

Taylors of Harrogate

Twinings Assam tea

A robust and assertive tea. Quite bitter with some tannic notes at the back of the tongue. A dark, serious tea that smells and tastes of proper black tea.  This is my memory of what loose tea smells like in the packet. Probably a little too bitter and  dark for my taste - on a side by side with Twinings Ceylon tea  I prefer the Ceylon.


Score: 3

***

Twinings

Twinings Ceylon tea

Lively and refreshing? Hmmm. £3.29 for 50.

A bold, bright, refreshing tea. No astringency, but no sweetness either. Cleaner, dryer, more assertive, more serious, than Crai Tea Classico Ceylon.  On the whole I think I prefer the more easy going and sweeter Crai Tea.

Score: 4

***

Twinings

Ceylon tea

Ceylon tea

Ceylon is the old name for Sri Lanka, and is still used when referring to tea from that country. It has has been for many years the world's leading supplier of tea, but has in recent years been overtaken by Kenya. It is regarded as a good standard tea, suitable for blending or - from the best estates - to be drunk on its own. Richer than Darjeeling, lighter than Assam.  A good base for Earl Grey and Breakfast Tea.

Sri Lanka is a large island just to the south of India which came under control of the British at the end of the 18th century. The British started coffee plantains, but after a leaf blight in 1869, production eventually shifted to tea. The tea plant had been brought to the island in 1867 by a coffee estate manager, James Taylor, who experimented with it as an alternative crop. Thomas Lipton, the founder of Lipton Tea, bought four tea plantations on Ceylon, and marketed them as a cheap, everyday drink in Britain.

The most prized teas are those from the high estates, such as Somerset and Kenilworth; the higher the altitude the brighter, cleaner and more delicate the flavour.

I keep trying Ceylon tea because it has a certain resonance for us British tea drinkers. But I can't recall ever being struck by it. It strikes me as a fairly basic and uninteresting tea. Neither delicate nor rich. Not highly flavoured or distinctive. It's just a tea. It's OK - drinkable, with just enough strength, but not overpowering, and with a clean finish. But there's nothing to hold the attention or to delight.

Crai Tea Classico Ceylon

Twinings Ceylon tea

Asda Chosen by you Ceylon tea

Waitrose Smooth & delicate Ceylon tea

Twinings Lapsang Souchong

Lapsang Souchong has been a favourite tea of mine for more years than I care to remember. For the past ten years or so, it has been my tea of choice, and I have only moved away from it recently as I have been exploring other teas.

I was surprised a couple of weeks ago when I read the Twinnings box and saw that Lapsang is a smoked tea. I mean, of course it's got that smoky taste, along with tar, but I assumed that was part of the character of the tea leaf. I was a little disappointed to discover that it's a flavoured tea. It goes through a complex drying process,  to achieve its distinctive character.

Score: 8

***

Twinings

Crai Tea Classico Ceylon

Crai is a chain of small convenience stores on Malta, run by Magro. The company talks about "supermarkets", but they tend to be no bigger than your local corner shop - on Malta any grocery shop is called a supermarket. This is a reasonably pleasant and refreshing tea with a good balanced flavour, not too tannic (astringent) and not too sweet. It lacks character and refinement, but then it isn't intended to have that - it does what it intends to do, it makes a decent cup of everyday tea.

Ceylon tea

Huifang Chinese Tea

Gift brought back by a work colleague from a trip to China. Very attractive box. Very little information in English or Chinese. Inside the box are 15 green packets of what appears to be and what tastes like  gunpowder tea. It lacks impact for me. It is watery, vaguely grassy, earthy; hints of mint and pepper. It's not a tea I'm going to reach for often as it reminds me of dirty dishwater.

Mariage Freres Sakura Impérial tea

According to the Mariage Freres website this is "High quality Sencha tea grandly flavoured with cherry blossoms". The cherry blossoms are the more noticeable aspect, both in aroma and taste, making this more of a cherry tea, than anything else. Sencha is the most popular tea in Japan, and it is picked and processed in several different ways to give some variety to the delicate taste. It is intended to be prepared by simmering the leaves in hot but not boiling water.


Other reviews
*Steepster

Mariage Freres tea company

Peppermint tea taste test

Peppermint tea is simply infused peppermint leaves. Mint tea is mint leaves with other ingredients, usually a green tea, traditionally gunpowder tea in North Africa where mint tea has a strong culture, and often various spices and in North Africa particularly, lots of sugar.

I tried a taste test of three brands of peppermint tea. All three contain nothing but cut peppermint leaves.

The Tesco brand was the cheapest - 80p for a box of 20 bags = 30g. The bags are large, and are kept in foil, but are not individually wrapped.

Twinings Invigorating Peppermint had the smallest bag. They are individually wrapped in glossy paper bags - as you open you tear off a square of the paper which is attached to the bag with a string. It doesn't look good. These were the middle priced at £1.49 for 20 bags = 40g.

Taylors Peppermint Leaf had the most attractive box. Each medium sized bag individually wrapped with a pleasant little cardboard tag. The bags were the most expensive at £2.99 for 20 bags = 33g.

Taylors have a pleasant taste, quite bright, giving an immediate pleasant sensation, yet are also interestingly earthy, giving a natural feel. Twinings are the least pleasant, having a stodgy quality. They taste the l;east minty, and aroma and flavour both have a cardboard quality. The strongest is the Tesco, with a very assertive peppermint flavour.

While Taylors is attractively packaged, and produces a pleasant and interesting flavour, they cost three times as much as the very enjoyable Tesco Infusion, and for everyday use I would go for Tesco. But for something a little different now and again, or when there are guests, the Taylors Peppermint Leaf is worth having. The Twinings is a comparative failure.


Other reviews
*Independent.ie


See also:

Mint tea