Black Tea Blend
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English Breakfast is a full-bodied black tea blend designed to stand up to milk and a hearty morning meal, which is exactly how it got its name. It’s not a single tea from a single place, but a blend — most commonly a mix of Assam, Ceylon, and Kenyan black teas, though the exact ratio is up to each blender.
Despite the name, English Breakfast wasn’t invented in England. Its origins are disputed, with competing claims tracing it to tea merchants in Scotland and New York in the 1800s, long before it became associated with a traditional English morning meal of eggs, bacon, and toast. Over time the name stuck as shorthand for a strong, no-nonsense black tea blend meant to be drunk with milk, regardless of where it was actually blended.
Because the blend leans on robust teas like Assam, English Breakfast tends to be maltier and more tannic than a delicate single-origin tea like Darjeeling, which is part of why it holds up so well against milk and sugar without losing its character.
How to Steep It
English Breakfast is forgiving: steep at a full boil, 200–212°F, for 3 to 5 minutes. A longer steep brings out more strength and tannin, which is useful if you’re adding milk, since a weaker steep can get washed out.
Full-bodied, built for milk
Steep 3–5 min at a full boil
