Tasting Lab: 2023 Retrospective

Those that follow our newsletter will have noticed that we've been running a Tasting Lab Survey the past couple of weeks to gather feedback on your favourite 2023 Tasting Lab releases so far. If not--the survey is still up, link in our newsletter! Many of you have reached out in various forms already, from emails, to DMs, and reviews.

From the beginning, I wanted the Tasting Lab to be a mixture of my own interesting finds and experiments, with collaboration from enthusiastic tea-drinkers. To have a platform to explore ideas that are too small for a full store release, and maybe find new teas for our core lineup! So your feedback is valuable, and I'd like to share some of the results so far, and give an idea what to expect in the Tasting Lab's future.

Tasting Lab: No. 9

One of the more difficult aspects of reviving old recipes from our Blend Book, is that styles of tea production have changed over the years. For the particularly old blends, sometimes there's not a perfect analogue in available teas today. This leaves recipes open to interpretation, and can result in a lot of variation.

Tasting Lab: Evergreen

There's definitely an element of selfishness in bringing back discontinued teas, those I thought were under-appreciated, and giving them a second chance. There's heart behind every blend I come up with for Murchie's, but a couple are special. Evergreen is one of those eclectic blends.

It first debuted in 2021, a unique, unflavoured green-black tea with the addition of dried rosemary and juniper berries, for aroma. The result was an uncommonly resinous, piney blend that was meant to invoke imagery of wintery forests. It went through a few working names before settling on 'Evergreen'--namely 'Vintage Christmas' and 'Noel', but 'Evergreen' perfectly summarizes what it entails. A mix of three evergreen shrubs--the tea bush, the rosemary bush, and the juniper bush.

Tasting Lab: Tuscany Orange

Tuscany Orange is one of many legacy blends at Murchie's that has dipped and resurfaced over the years. It was eventually discontinued in 2018--not too long ago--but has maintained a loyal following, so it seemed especially fitting to bring back. What has always interested me is the is the history of the blend.

Tasting Lab: Bard's Blend

Bard's Blend was developed in conjunction with Poet's Blend, so it made sense to release them back to back. They're in a sense 'sister blends', following the same blending principles, despite how differently they turned out.

Whereas Poet’s Blend mixes black tea with floral-scented green and oolong teas for an aromatic, garden-in-your-cup experience, Bard’s Blend takes a different approach. Using a mix of malty and nutty black teas from India and China, they’ve been paired with smoky gunpowder green tea, and a blend of roasted oolongs. The result is a mix of toasted grains, and the barest hint of smoke. I’ve described it as ‘buttered toast’.