Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: 52Teas
Tea Description:
Smoked Lapsang Souchong blended with imitation bacon bits and all natural bacon flavor.
Learn more about this blend here.
Taster’s Review:
I was a little bit apprehensive to try this Smoky Bacon Flavored Black Tea from 52Teas, to be completely honest. I had seen one review of this and the taster said that it was so bad that she had to go brush her teeth after drinking it. That’s bad. Funny … but bad.
So, I worried about whether this would be a tea I’d like. I mean, I love bacon. Seriously, it’s one of my favorite foods. And the moment I saw that 52Teas had offered a maple bacon tea way back when (for the week of November 16, 2009 – wow … time flies!) I was buying it as quickly as I could. That became my very first purchase from 52Teas.
But, with my prickly history with Lapsang Souchong, I was really unsure if this was a tea that I’d like. But, when a “Bacon package” was offered as one of the rewards on the recent campaign fundraiser that 52Teas had, I decided to choose that as one of my rewards. I figured, hey, if I don’t like it, hopefully, I’ll find someone who does and I’ll send it their way.
And, I’m enjoying this. There is more Lapsang Souchong flavor than there is bacon-y flavor, and I’d like there to be more bacon. I think that a slightly lighter base (perhaps a blend of Lapsang Souchong and a Keemun and a little bit of Ceylon to soften things up a bit?) might have offered a less robust background so that the bacon flavors could develop more.
However, I am enjoying this. I’m wondering how it will taste when I combine this with some of the maple bacon tea. I’m thinking yummy.
I brewed this the way I would brew a Lapsang Souchong, by first giving it a quick rinse and then steeping it for 2 1/2 minutes. I added a pinch of Kosher salt and about half a teaspoon of turbinado sugar to the brewed tea.
The result is a strong tea that has a good amount of smokiness, but it doesn’t completely overwhelm the bacon-y goodness. The sugar brings out some of the sweeter notes of the bacon, and the Lapsang Souchong does give this a nice “smoky bacon” kind of flavor. As I said before, I’d like more bacon-y goodness, but bacon is almost like chocolate as far as I’m concerned: more bacon = better.
Overall, a really enjoyable cuppa. It’s difficult to compare it to other bacon teas because as far as I know, there aren’t any other bacon teas out there with which to compare it except for the bacon teas that 52Teas has created: Maple Bacon (after I wrote this review I found a better way to brew the tea and I’ll be doing a follow up review for this blog sometime in the near future), Chocolate Bacon, and Pineapple Bacon Rooibos. Of these four bacon teas, I think I enjoyed the Chocolate Bacon one best, then again, I’m a chocoholic who loves bacon.
By the way, yeah, I’m aware of the “bacon” teas that some of the Adagio customers have custom blended, but those aren’t bacon teas that have been made with bacon flavoring, instead, they’re teas made with Lapsang Souchong and other teas that are supposed to trick the taste buds into thinking that they’re tasting bacon. Nice idea, I suppose, and I haven’t actually tried those so I don’t know how close to the mark they are.
But I do know that this tastes like smoky bacon to me. As the tea cools slightly, I notice an almost “burnt” kind of flavor to it, kind of like the edges of the bacon that got a little too done. But I like my bacon crisp so it works for me. A good bacon interpretation.
