Murchie's developed this blend to commemorate their 125th anniversary (1894–2019), and I hope it sticks around.

A blind taste test might elicit a reaction like this: "Really nice black tea blend, but I can't quite place this interesting flavor it has under that." The black tea solidly dominates the green in dry-bag aroma, in-cup smell, in-cup flavor and wet-bag aroma. [Curiously, the wet bag, which fortunately is the least important of my rating elements except when absolutely outstanding, has a rather muddy aroma in this case.] For some cups I've needed to put conscious effort into teasing out the gunpowder tea's element from the prevailing flavor. Another way to advertise this would be, "a classic blend of black teas with a touch of green". Mainly I pick up the latter at the end of the sip and in aftertaste. The good news is that the black assortment used—Assam, Keemun, Ceylon, and Yunnan—is very well-balanced, smooth, and devoid of any offputting flavor elements on its own.

Anniversary Blend is a full-bodied brew, though not quite as much as a couple of their jasmine-infused green/black offerings. Importantly to the distraction-prone and forgetful among us, it forgives oversteeping better than the great majority of teas I've ever tried. This blend takes very well to sweetening, as I've noticed with a lot of teas containing at least some Assam.

My wife, normally not a big fan of most green teas nor green/black blends, like this one even more than I, and insists on making it a part of our regular "Murchies runs" (major mail orders a time or two a year). For U.S. buyers, the continuing favorable $CAD/$USD exchange rate makes this and most Murchie's offerings excellent values for teas of such good quality, especially at larger quantities (such as 100-bag boxes).

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