Shibui Chocolate and Ginger tea

Shibui Tea 

A bit about who Shibui Tea are:

Shibui Tea was set up over a few pots of tea with the simple philosophy of sourcing and sharing great quality tea. We have created a menu which covers a wide range of loose leaf tea with flavours to suit all palates. With a choice of premium classics through to fun and modern concepts, Shibui’s tea drinkers can be assured of a consistent quality product they can trust.

We are a family run business - together with over 35 years of experience in the industry - with our head office split between the UK and Canada. Two brothers run the operation - John in the UK and Paul in Canada.

Our teas are sourced from all over the world, primarily from China, Japan, India, Sri Lanka, Africa, and Taiwan. Our locations in both the UK and Canada give us the ability to effectively service both the European and North American market places.

By visiting Shibui Tea online, you can browse and choose from over 200 teas and be assured of our excellent customer service. (Taken from their website)

So far I have reviewed one of the teas I was sent - Blueberry Rooibos, today I am reviewing Chocolate and Ginger. 

How my sample arrived: 

                                                                            

Once again I was very impressed with the quality of the product, it came in a lovely sealed bag, which made sure the tea was fresh and ready to use. The tea bag is made of material rather than paper and it has small holes in it, which allow the air and water to move around the leaves inside the bag. 

Once placed in a cup, I began to pour the boiling water over the tea bag I left it to brew for some time to allow all the flavours from the bag to be released and create a lovely cup of tea. You can see below the brewing process.

                                                                               

                                                                              

During the brewing process I got a really strong flavour of chocolate. I was really excited to try this tea as I love hot chocolate and was hoping this maybe similar. This would certainly be a hot chocolate which would be better for you! 

Just like the Blueberry tea that I sampled the depth of smell from this little bag was incredible, it was so strong and I was really looking forward to trying the tea once it had cooled down. 

After 5 or so minutes, when I began to try the tea, to be honest I was a little disappointed. I had been so spoilt with the smell coming from my cup that I expected the same level of taste. For me this did not live up to it's expectation. It was sweet to drink and you could certainly taste the ginger coming through but the chocolate that smelt so wonderful seemed to get a little lost in the flavours. Even though the tea was left to brew with the teabag in for a good 3 minutes there seemed to be a lack of depth of taste of the tea. This was something that I didn't find with the blueberry bag. 

Just like most of Shibui tea's this one can be purchased as bags or as loose tea. For a tube of 15 bags its £3.95, I think this is extremely reasonable. If you buy fruity tea bags from the super market you can pay more than this, this is a family run business, who personally I would prefer to support. You are getting good quality in these tea bags and good service. 

If you would like to purchase these or see what other teas are available please visit their website: Shibui Tea

I would like to thank Shibui Tea for sending the samples in exchange for an honest review. Please check back for more reviews of their teas.