Black Teas

For us in the UK, Black Tea has been the most important of all teas. But the mass produced Black Teas we drink in such quantity are, in our view, nothing short of rubbish. The quality Black Teas we offer on this site will open up a whole new world for you.

The very finest teas are still hand produced

With fine Black Teas, the production methods are at least as important as the quality of the leaf itself.

The very finest teas – a tiny proportion of total production – are still hand produced using traditional low-volume methods. They are hard to find, but we list a number here, including Mao Feng Keemun and Zeng Xiao. Our personal view is that these teas are still unmatched, with a soft quality you simply don't find in even the best of the machine processed teas. But quality machine processed teas have their advocates too, so we carry a number of these as well.

Fine Black Teas start with the best leaves

Fine Black Teas start with the hand-plucking of the bud and top two leaves of the branch, as these and only these provide the best flavour. Mass produced teas use inferior leaves from the whole bush.

Then they are brought to perfection by the skill of the great Tea Masters

Ideally the leaf is spread out to wither in the sun, or it may be machine withered.

Withering starts the process of oxidisation which alters the essential oils in the leaf to produce the dark colour and rich flavour characteristic of Black Teas, and leaves the leaf pliable and ready for rolling.

A leaf left to dry without intervention will become over-oxidised and bitter. So the ancient Tea Masters developed a subtle process of alternating between hand-rolling the tea against the side of a warm copper pan to encourage an even fermentation process, and roasting the leaf in large pans to slow the speed of oxidisation. And at just the right moment the Tea Master will arrest the oxidisation process entirely by drying the leaf rapidly over a high heat.

The finest teas are still made this way, with the Tea Master using a lifetime of experience to perfectly balance the rolling and roasting of the leaf to achieve a refined flavour. Less traditional tea gardens attempt to replicate this process mechanically, and the best of them come close to achieving the same quality.