Finely chopped, decaf, food-service black teas in wax-paper wrappers don't inspire a great deal of confidence, so I guess this offering managed to exceed my low expectations.

I got a few of these as a restaurant and took one home to brew in good water, for fairness' sake, since the cafe was in a town with sketchy water quality. The dry-bag smell of the stated orange pekoe and pekoe-cut black tea was modest but not offputting. While it still had a somewhat flat, very faintly metallic tinge to the flavor at home, I was surprised it tasted quite a bit like a lower-grade green tea. Double-checking the contents of the wet bag (which also smelled at least as much green as black) showed black tea. That was hard to explain. Perhaps something in the "natural" decaffeination process—whatever that is—renders such an effect. The main negative I sensed was a decided mustiness to the in-cup aroma that didn't show up inside the mouth at all. Regardless, the beverage was tolerable, not holding a candle to even mediocre-quality non-decaf bagged black teas, but I've certainly had worse decafs.

Curiously, this is one of the few teas I've ever gotten packaged in wax paper, and the only one I can recall using a narrow plastic ribbon, instead of a strand of fabric, to connect tag to bag.

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