Earl Grey Tea

Earl Grey is black tea flavored with oil pressed from the rind of the bergamot, a citrus fruit grown mostly on the coast of Calabria, Italy. The base is often Ceylon or Assam. Brewed in a teapot at 95°C, it tastes of malt, citrus peel and a floral note.

Origin & Story

Open a tin of Earl Grey and the perfume arrives before the tea does: bright citrus, something floral, the smell of a kitchen where someone has just zested an orange. It comes from bergamot, a small yellow-green citrus fruit that is far too sharp to eat. Its rind is pressed for an essential oil, and that oil is what scents the black tea. Most of the world's bergamot oil comes from a strip of coast around Reggio Calabria, at the toe of Italy, and the local oil has a protected designation of origin.

Where the name comes from is a better story than it is a fact. The tea is named for Charles Grey, the 2nd Earl Grey, prime minister from 1830 to 1834. The Grey family's own tale is that a Chinese mandarin blended it for him, with bergamot to offset the lime in the water at Howick Hall, the family home in Northumberland. Jacksons of Piccadilly says Lord Grey passed the recipe to a partner in the firm in 1830. The paper trail is thinner. The earliest advertisements, from the 1850s, are for Grey's Tea, and the first one, from 1852, is credited to a merchant named William Grey. The first ads for Earl Grey that anyone has found appear in the 1880s, decades after the earl died in 1845. None of it can be checked, so enjoy it as legend.

In the cup, the black tea underneath matters as much as the oil. Many blends use Ceylon or Assam for malt and body, and some use a Chinese black tea for a softer, sweeter base. The bergamot sits on top. It is a volatile perfume, which is why a fresh tin smells vivid and an old one goes quiet. Cheaper versions often swap the real oil for a flavoring, so a label that names bergamot oil is worth looking for.

Drink it plain to meet the full perfume, with a slice of lemon if you like a sharper edge, or with a little milk for a rounder cup. Whatever you add, watch the clock: past four minutes the tannin builds and the bergamot gets harder to find.

Brew 3 g of leaf in 240 ml of water at 95°C, in a warmed teapot, for three to four minutes.

Reading the Flavor Profile

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