This is the tin of Kusmi tea I recently found at the back of a drawer.

Further investigation has revealed that this was in fact a Mrs. Teaist purchase, based on a colleague’s recommendation.

I’ve enjoyed Kusmi tea in the past – their Kashmir Tchai and Prince Vladimir blends are perfectly drinkable, but this…

This tea just seems to have been the result of marketing people interfering just a little too much in the product development process.

It’s as though they’ve twigged on that “detox” is “big” right now, so they’d better have a “detox” tea on the market asap pdq. They ran it up a flagpole and everyone saluted, etc.

Garishly coloured packaging? Check! Trendy graphic design cliché of spelling key word backwards on same? Check!

Someone in the marketing team then quickly scanned a trade magazine and came up with a list of trending buzzword ingredients – maté, rooibos, guarana, dandelion – right, chuck them in!

Hmmmm…might be a tad bitter. Wait! Fruit teas are “hot” this week. Can we cover that with a fruity flavour? We can!? Grapefruit – that gives off a “healthy breakfast” vibe! Get it in!

Does green tea still have the highest “healthy” rating? It does?! I think we have a winner….! Boom, etc!

The aroma when opening the packaging was sickly sweet. To be perfectly frank it smells like cheap discount-store pot-pourri.

I spooned the correct amount into a paper tea filter. I went with the lower end of Kusmi’s recommendations as far as water temperature and steeping time went – 85°C for 3 minutes.

I steeped the tea in an old stainless steel teapot of the type popular in British cafés I sometimes take out on the road with me – there was no way on earth I was going to use any of my regular teaware, as I was terrified I wouldn’t be able to get the smell off.

To be fair the overpowering sickly sweetness had faded somewhat in the finished tea, only to be replaced by a similarly chemical-like taste of mint. I had three sips before giving up. I tried, I really did, but no, just…..no.

The tea left an awful after-taste in my mouth. After eating a banana, a handful of raisins, and a few grapes I finally felt that I had cleansed my palate and returned it to something like its normal state. Gargling with bleach and chewing on wire wool would have been an option, too. Boiling bleach, just to be sure…

I can only assume that Kusmi must believe that the target audience for this tea won’t actually care how it tastes – in fact they might subscribe to the point of view that if it tastes this bad then it must be really doing them a whole lot of good.

As far as I’m concerned, we have a small decorative glass bowl that I’m going to fill with this tea, and then put it to work dans le WC, si vous comprenez….