Organic vs Not - Can you really taste the difference?

This is a loaded question. First of all, I think it depends on your definition of organic. If you mean certified organic, then that cuts out a huge chunk of tea from farms who cannot afford the exorbitant fees required for an “organic” stamp.
Second, its difficult to determine which tastes better unless you can use the same soil, rainwater, fertilizer, shade and so on for two control batches, one organic and one not. There are so many factors that go into it. You could have one that was “organic” made with weak soil which would taste nasty and another with great soil/fertilizer that isn’t organic and would end up being delicious.
Even the way the wind blows can make or break a tea. Part of the certification rules are that it has to be a certain distance from exhaust fumes or what not, but there is no way to guarantee that your bushes won’t be exposed with the changing weather patterns,

Also, if you want to avoid pesticides, there are ways to minimize risk without going “organic”.
The two I’ve figured out are to buy legitimately better quality teas which are more likely to be highgrown (on a mountain) and have less pollution/cleaner air… and to buy earlier flushes, ideally the first one. Pesticides are generally used as the summer gets hotter, to prevent the bugs from eating the plants. There is less risk of this if it’s too cold for many of the bugs to come out.
Also, it should be noted that copper sulfate is considered a safe and organic pesticide. It’s more or less washed/burned away through rain and processing by the time the tea reaches your cupboard. Here’s a brief summary- http://www.actahort.org/books/876/876_48.htm

Aaaaanyhow, if I had to hedge a guess, I’d say that all factors being equal, organic would likely taste better… however I do not know this for certain.

First, congratulations on the business. It’s a tough and kind of weird business but, frankly, a lot of fun. It looks like you and I have several things in common: a love for tea and sailing, and a tea business inspired by both. We’re also neighbours (just south of the border). Hopefully we’ll cross paths on the water.

About organic tea (rant alert) …

As you probably know, the word “organic” has a pretty loose meaning, but particularly in the tea world. Since it commands a higher price, people are tempted to attach that word to their product at every stage of the manufacturing/distribution process. And, the way tea distribution is so incestuous, it is very difficult to prove one way or the other, quite frequently. This is improving … maybe. The difficulty lies in the fact that, although certifying bodies are getting better at regulating tea crops, the vast majority of organic tea is exported, meaning it changes hands, often several times even before reaching the retailer.

But, as most of the responses here have confirmed, most folks buy “organic” tea because they believe it is less likely to have harmful chemicals. And, that is probably a fair expectation. A product labeled “organic” is “less likely” to have harmful chemicals. But, that’s about the extent of the assurances.

The claim that a person can tell the difference, if the product was not labeled, I would say, is suspect. Since humans don’t have a very refined sense of taste, their taste experience is informed/influenced by many factors such as sight and smell, but not the least of which is expectation. That is, what we taste is tremendously governed by what we expect to taste. A great example of this is underscored in the recent admission by Kellogg’s that all Froot Loops are identically flavoured, regardless of colour, despite people’s insistence for years that they could taste differences.

Or, recall the Judgement of Paris in 1976 (and again in 2006). Those judges, some of the most refined wine tasters in the world, were famously fooled by their own expectations … twice.

You can prove this to yourself. Ask a friend to help you pick the better of two teas. One is a very expensive hand-picked product, the other, you bought at the grocery store (or whatever back story you want to give). But, just serve the same tea, from the same steeping. Almost everyone will be able to describe differences. The more you tell them to expect, the more they will perceive. Ask questions like, “Tea #2 is clearly more bitter. On a scale of 1-10, how much more bitter would you say it is?”

However, I will qualify that scepticism with the observation that, although humans have a fairly undiscerning sense of taste, their sense of smell is relatively refined. And, the smell of a tea does much more to inform the taste experience than the actual taste itself. Indeed, holding one’s nose while drinking tea will almost completely flatten the taste experience. Furthermore, I know that I can smell some/many agricultural chemicals on some dry tea, without even wetting it.

So, it is possible, though I think that very few people can honestly tell the difference. The problem with testing it is that you can’t do a side-by-side comparison. Two teas, side by side, will not vary solely on whether or not each is organic. There are too many other variables. You just can’t compare apples to apples. The only real fair test is to have a person sample, say, 10 teas, some of which are known to be organic (by some specific definition). Then, have the person identify which are and which aren’t. But, I guarantee that if a person believes they can reliably tell the difference, they will declare some teas to be organic, even if all 10 are not, or vice versa.

One problem is that widespread use of the “organic” label harms more conscientious sellers who may have a very clean and wholesome product, but do not meet the criteria for the label (which is different from place to place). They have to compete against people who falsely label products to raise prices on their exported tea.

For folks who don’t know, almost all tea is certified by a foreign agency who may or may not have applied for certification under the USDA or EU programs (for example). This application is mostly procedural. That is, USDA (for example) is mostly concerned with documenting that a foreign agency claims to be checking for the right things, and that they claim to have procedures in place to do so. There is very little actual verification that these things are really happening. And, for most small producers, the cost and procedure of certification is prohibitive, even though they may, in fact, have a better product, if they are following the rules, they are shut out of the organic market.

Kind of a hot button with me .. this subject.

Cheers.

I prefer Organic, for not only health and taste reasons, but to connect to the earth as purely as possible.
When I see ‘flavourings’ added on the list of ingredients, it makes me think of food scientists experimenting away, trying to get us end users to become hooked because it tastes so good.
I’m still learning a lot about different organic teas, but I for sure could tell the difference if it was enhanced vs straight and clean.
That being said though, I simply have to trust the ORGANIC labeling.

My pet peeve is artificial flavoring. Why? Seriously, I am amazed at the number of teas with otherwise excellent ingredients marred by the black box that is “artificial flavoring”. All bets are off once that little phrase is found on the label. You have no idea what it is.

Sometimes artificial flavorings are excessively strong and cause the blend to be unbalanced. But maybe even reading those words compromises my experience of the tea. I basically never eat artificially flavored foods, so why should I drink artificially flavored tea?