mbanu said

Any good sources for Russian-style brick tea?

By “Russian style”, I mean compressed tea made out of black tea dust and tea fannings (ie “tea tablets”). Any high-quality sources?

The Russians invented this type of tea in the 1860s (I think) to take advantage of two key facts about the Chinese black tea trade of the time: First, tea dust was not widely commercialized, being considered a waste product. Second, taxes and export duties for compressed teas were significantly less than those on loose leaf tea for some reason.

People seem to forget this aspect of the “Russian Caravan” tea trade… possibly because the only tea dust bricks I’ve ever seen seemed to be made out of low-quality tea and sold for strictly decorative purposes.

Are there any Chinese factories still putting out black tea bricks made from high-quality tea dust? (From fine pluck tea?)

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