Black Dragon Pearls Organic

These are not a flowering tea, though they put on just as good a show. Each pearl is made of large black tea leaves, hand-rolled into a tight little sphere, and as they steep they slowly unfurl back into whole leaves. It is genuinely lovely to watch, so if you have a glass teapot, this is the tea to use it for. But this is no case of style over substance; the flavour more than earns its place.

It is a rich, full-bodied black tea from Guangxi Province in southern China, and the pearls are speckled with golden buds, the young tips of the plant, downy with the fine hairs tea people call pekoe (it is that pekoe that turns golden as a black tea is made). In the cup, the word I always reach for is fruit cake: deep, malty and comforting, with sweet, dark notes of raisin, plum and sticky dates. It shares something with my Peregrine Mountain first flush, if you know that tea, though it has a character all its own. It is a wonderful after-meal cup, and more than one customer drinks it in place of coffee; one even swears by it with a bit of cheese.

A couple of practical notes. Because the leaves are rolled so tightly, they take a little longer to open up and rehydrate than ordinary loose leaf, so give them a good four minutes to unfurl fully. The pearls also make it beautifully easy to measure: I would start with three or four per cup, then simply add another if you like it stronger. It is a proper black tea, so there is caffeine in it, and it is organic. Lovely as it is, or with a splash of milk if you prefer.

Brew at 100°C for 4 minutes, using 3 to 4 pearls per cup.

Ingredients || Organic Black Tea

Warning, packed in an environment that contains nuts

Caffeine || Yes

Tasting Notes || Rich and malty, like fruit cake: raisin, plum and sticky dates

Brewing Notes || 4 pearls per cup, 100ºC, brew for 4 minutes.