Tea in London is serious business, as you may imagine. We went to the big name tea stores, but often felt they were more flash than substance. However, Postcard Teas (9 Dering St, London W1S 1AG) is the perfectly understated answer to the glitzy superstore. Postcard Teas’ stock in trade is in providing a curated variety of teas from small tea farms all over the world. Now these are really small farms, less than 15 acres. Postcard Teas is tucked away on a side street right off of the hustle and bustle of Oxford street. The store is truly an oasis of calm, and is very beautifully arranged with 60 tea varieties in cute tins alongside an assortment elegant handmade teapots from Japan. Taking up one wall of the store are all of the tea varieties available.
The 60 teas available at Postcard Teas range in type and price from tiny tea estates throughout Japan, China, India, Vietnam, Taiwan and Korea. Most of the teas are black, oolong and green, but there are also purh-eh and flavored teas. The choice is almost overwhelming, but the staff is very friendly and knowledgeable. Even for such specialized teas, the cost is pretty reasonable. We also appreciated the nice artwork on all of the tea ins, which each come with information about the provenance of the teas and brewing instructions. The amount of care that Postcard Teas puts into informing its customers about tea is very apparent – they even offer classes!
You can pay to sample any of the teas (£2), but the fee is waived if you end up purchasing the tea itself. This is not just dipping a teabag into some boiling water though. Each tea has a specified steeping time and temperature and the gentleman who helped us at the store prepared our tiny cups of tea with the precision of a surgeon. We sampled the rich English breakfast tea that is a mix of Indian, Japanese and Chinese teas. We also tried a delicate Darjeeling from the Mineral Spring Tea Farm in Darjeeling, India. We really liked both of our choices, and it was remarkable how different each was (Darjeeling is on the left, English breakfast on the right).
The coolest aspect is that you can actually send a “tea postcard” (£8.95-12.50). You can select from one of their tea varieties and put it in a special envelope and mail it directly from a little red postbox right in the store, to pretty much any location. You pay the extra for postage and they take care of the rest for you. We sent ourselves the tea postcards and a few weeks later they arrived – what a nice souvenir! We would highly recommend Postcard Teas to any tea lover visiting London, they truly promote the very best of global tea culture.
Eating The World 