Reviews
Scored on flavour, aroma, value and brew forgiveness — that last one because a tea you can ruin in thirty seconds of inattention is not as good as one you cannot, whatever it tastes like at its best.
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19 reviews
A wide fine-mesh basket that lets leaf expand properly and lifts straight out when time is up. It fixes the two most common brewing failures at once.
Read the reviewAir, light, heat and smell are what degrade tea. A set of sealed opaque tins removes three of them for about twelve dollars.
Read the reviewEvery brewing instruction written in teaspoons is wrong, because leaf density varies enormously. A cheap scale fixes all of them permanently.
Read the reviewFive presets, a hold function and a gooseneck spout at roughly half what the boutique kettles cost. The single best upgrade for most tea drinkers.
Read the reviewA lightly oxidised rolled oolong that unfurls over eight or more infusions. Per cup of drinkable tea, nothing else here comes close.
Read the reviewIndividually wrapped 5 g nests of ripe pu-erh. One nest is one session, which means you can discover the category without committing to a 357 g cake.
Read the reviewThe Jin Xuan cultivar tastes naturally of cream and butter. A great deal of what is sold as milk oolong is flavoured to fake it — this one holds up, but check the label on any you buy.
Read the reviewHeatproof borosilicate with a deep mesh strainer. Practical for a table of people and quietly educational, because you can see exactly what your leaf is doing.
Read the reviewA blend engineered for consistency, milk tolerance and a very wide brewing window. If you want one tin in the cupboard that never disappoints, this is the unglamorous right answer.
Read the reviewBulk dried hibiscus at a fraction of boxed-blend prices — and the subject of the most solid clinical finding in the whole herbal category.
Read the reviewApple, hay and honey, and a bedtime ritual worth keeping. Just be clear that the anxiety trial everyone cites used a concentrated extract, not a cup of tea.
Read the reviewA third of the price of bud-only white tea and, for most palates in a blind cup, more enjoyable. The best-value entry point into the category.
Read the reviewNaturally caffeine-free, low in tannins, and it will not go astringent however long you forget about it. The most useful tisane to keep in the house.
Read the reviewSuperb pour control, one-degree precision and a build that feels like an appliance rather than a gadget. Also roughly double the price of something that works nearly as well.
Read the reviewPan-fired rather than steamed, which makes it nuttier, rounder and considerably more forgiving than a Japanese green. A good first green tea.
Read the reviewA single-origin Assam with real backbone. Strong enough to be a genuine coffee substitute and astringent enough that you will want to watch the clock.
Read the reviewA lidded bowl that is the entire equipment list for gongfu brewing. Awkward twice, then trivial forever.
Read the reviewSteamed, grassy, faintly oceanic and genuinely sweet when you get the temperature right. Also the tea most likely to punish you for using boiling water.
Read the reviewDowny silver buds and a cup like light honey. Worth having once — but it is bud-only, and buds are where caffeine concentrates.
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