Fresh Cup Magazine, providing specialty coffee and tea professionals with unique insight into the trends, ideas, products and people that shape their world.
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hen it comes to beverages, France may be best known for its vibrant coffee culture and obsession with wine. However, the country also has a developed tea culture centered around its famed array of exotic blends. The epicenter of this tea scene is Paris, where delectable salons offering hundreds of teas are dotted between more pedestrian cafés. This summer I traveled to the City of Light and the nearby community of Dreux to get the scoop on French tea blending from three of the most respected authorities in the country's tea industry. What I came away with was an education on aroma, eclectic ingredient use and a unique style that sets the nation's tea industry apart from that of its European neighbors—and from the world as a whole. SNIFFING OUT A STYLE There are essentially two categories that dominate the French style of tea blending: mélanges and aromatized teas. Both are categorically distinct from British blends, which tend to feature multiple black teas and (with a few excep- tions) no added flavors. For instance, tea blender Kitti Cha Sangmanee of well-known French retailer and distributor Mariage Frères says his company's most popular segments are thés parfumé (aromatized teas) and mélange parfumé (aromatized blends), both of which he considers to be classically thés Français (French teas). "Originally, only foreign- ers said 'French tea' because the way of drinking tea here is com- pletely different," Sangmanee says. "Everybody but the French could accept [French tea]. Twenty years ago, shops all tried to be English style, Asian style. … Now we accept French tea." Between sips at one of his handful of Parisian tea "emporiums," Sangmanee defines a mélange quite simply as a "mixture." These teas have been combined with spices, vanilla, flowers and other ingredients—but they haven't been flavored. Mariage Frères translates as Marriage Brothers, so it's no surprise Sangmanee is passionate about bringing different teas and unique ingredients together. In the past, he says, "The French tea term mélange had a poor reputation, like old teas that were blended. Now it has a reputation for quality and flavor." The idea of mélange likely resonates with American tea profes- sionals (plenty of companies bring together loose-leaf tea with herbs and other materials for unique creations), but as we step into aromatized teas, we enter uniquely French territory. Sure, Chinese teamakers have long employed aromatization (notably with flowers such as jasmine blossoms and fruits such as lychee), and Earl Grey tea is defined by its powerful bergamot smell. However, aromatized teas have made an indelible mark on the French tea palate as a whole, and they are central to the brands of many French blenders. Tea sommelier, blender and perfumer Lydia Gautier defines aromatized teas as those that are blended with aromas and flavors. They may also be blended with other ingredients such as fruit, flowers and spices. Gautier explains that before tea companies like Mariage Frères, Fauchon and Hediard gained prominence for their aromatized blends, the nose-centric process was popular in products like yogurts and fruit juices. Tea followed the market trend in the 1950s, and aromatized teas started to become the norm in France during the 1960s. Today, Gautier says, many French consumers are forward thinking when it comes to unblended teas. But they still demand that aromatics remain a vibrant part of any tea company's selection: "They're not all prepared to taste only teas without perfume." CREATING THE FRAGRANCE As is true with most culinary traditions in France, the approach to blending aromatized tea is at once simple and complex: equal parts grandeur, reverence and whimsy. Some tea experts in the country compare aromatizing tea to creating a perfume. Sangmanee, who "becomes a [tea] 'per- fumer' in winter" when he isn't sourcing teas abroad, says that bringing the right scent to a blend "isn't just blending." The final product will ideally have a sense of delicate balance similar to an expensive fragrance. The creation process starts by finding the right base—a black tea in the vast majority of French mélanges and aromatized blends. Emmanuel Jumeau-Lafond, tea buyer and blender at distributor Dammann Frères, says the tradition of using strong black teas in French blends is rooted in the tea industry's constant battle to move consumers away from coffee. In France, it turns out, the bean holds great sway: When Mariage Frères decided not to serve coffee in its retail locations, for instance, the controversy became so enormous it elicited an article in The New York Times. continued on page 46 Fresh Cup Magazine 45 Essential oils locked in Dammann Frères' flavor room "cabinet of treasures" are among the most expensive tea flavoring agents in the world.