The food blog: how well do you know your tea?

Tea is fast becoming trendy in London but it is the coffee sellers and wine sommeliers who are leaning all about its provenance, flavour and how to infuse it perfectly.
Victoria Stewart22 March 2013

Earlier this week I wrote a piece about a new type of tea that has just launched as well as a guide to London’s top ten tea bars. This got me thinking a bit more about the way that tea is beginning to be served in London.

New tea bars have opened in Marylebone, Portobello and Notting Hill while in Soho the new Urban Tea Rooms stocks a list of ten teas alongside its coffee and sandwich selection. But in other parts of London, it seems to be the coffee house owners who keen to cater for this new teammunity: places including Kaffeine, Caravan, Prufrock, Nude Espresso, Shoreditch Grind, Timberyard and White Mulberries have increased their tea menus to reflect the renewed interest for the drink.

“I love the coffee geeks because they understand the concept of the perfect serve. They are serving our tea beautifully - in some cases even better than Michelin starred restaurants,” says founder of the Rare Tea Company Henrietta Lovell who believes that it may be the independent coffee houses which have the most impact on this tea revolution.

“They understand the need for really good leaf, they are fascinated by provenance, they want to support independent tea gardens and they are getting the leaf to ration, water temperature and serve exact… Either way, the tea houses are now emerging and it is a joy to see.”

Meanwhile Nadeem Lalani, one half of the brother duo behind the tea broker business Lalani and Co has begun introducing tea to a number of wine sommeliers in London's top restaurants. These include Damian Sanchez Perez at Gauthier Soho, Jonathan Benoliel at The Modern Pantry, Maria Wallen at Coya, Sandia Chang at Kitchen Table at Bubbledogs and Sue Sethi (pictured above) at Trishna.

“Our tea sommelier is able to create a tea drinking experience on a new level that a guest would rarely get; one that comes from an understanding of an artisan tea’s provenance, flavour and how to infuse it perfectly. With a seasonal tea list from artisan producers, our tea sommeliers can recommend and even match a specific tea to a specific dish – as they’ve just launched at Gauthier Soho.”

I think it's time to start swotting up.

rareteacompany.com; lalaniandco.com

READ THE FOOD BLOG - a day in the life of a street food trader by Shrimpy Balfour

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