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Delicate tea bags hold whole-leaf organic teas in nine varieties from Teatulía. Above from top: lemongrass herbal tea, black tea and white tea. Photo by River Soma | THE NIBBLE.
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| WHAT IT IS: Organic tea from Bangladesh. |
| WHY IT’S DIFFERENT: The teas are very fresh and very flavorful—more so than some other organic teas (and bagged teas in general). The company is organic: the tea bags, their wrappers and the paper carton are easily biodegradable. |
WHY WE LOVE IT: Teatulía is more than a good tea producer: It is a good neighbor. Teatulia's initiatives to help improve the lives of impoverished people are impressive, and make us want to do whatever we can to support Teatulía’s efforts. |
| WHERE TO BUY IT: See store locator or buy online at Amazon.com. |
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Teatulía: Great Organic Tea Bags With A Great Cause
CAPSULE REPORT: Teatulía organic tea is named after the Tetulía region of northern Bangladesh, where it is grown. The company produces the most flavorful organic tea bags we’ve found to date. (The company also sells loose tea.)
The tea leaves are so fresh and the brews are so rich that we’ve gotten three mug-sized infusions from each tea bag.* Try that with most tea bags. And the flavor is so fine that we enjoy each variety straight, without milk or sugar. You can enjoy all the milk and sugar you want, but promise to at least take a sip of these delicious teas without them.
*The first two mugs were full-on flavor; the third slightly lighter.
A key difference is the freshness of the whole leaf tea. There’s no middleman warehousing the tea, then selling it to the companies that package and market it. It’s “fresh from the farm,” and you can taste it.
The tea is grown from the finest seeds on virgin land nestled against the Himalayas. Most of the nine varieties (black tea, Earl of Bengal [Earl Grey], Bengal Breakfast [English Breakfast], green and white teas) will be familiar to American tea-drinkers.
There are also several ayurvedic teas (more about that on the next page) made from the herbs lemongrass, neem, tulsi and a ginger/vasaka blend. Don’t let the strange names and “ayurvedic” reference turn you away. The teas are delicious, and 5,000 years of homeopathic medicine says they’re very healthy indeed.
The tea and all of its packaging is sustainable. But perhaps more importantly, in a country of such poverty, Teatulía offers employees—who are called caretakers of the tea—more than just a salary to sustain themselves.
The company is committed to helping its staff help themselves, by teaching them farming best practices so they can grow their own crops to sell for additional income. Each family also receives a cow. The milk provides fresh dairy for children who otherwise would have none, and the manure is used to fertilize the tea garden.
With such an uplifting story, you’ve got to love Teatulía.
- Join us on the the next page for the flavor profiles of Teatulía teas.
- Before you click away, take a peek at the article index below.
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