Our Blends

Indigenous, local teas that bring delight and subtle new flavours to discerning sippers. Each tea is carefully blended from just three ingredients picked and processed by hand.

No 1 : Rise
Birch Leaf 64%
Rosebay Willowherb Flower 18%
Mugwort Leaf 18%

Pleasingly astringent tannin notes; a good alternative to green tea
50g / 33 mugs

£6.60

This tea came out top in blind tastings when we first launched - it has the familiar affect of astringency we know from regular tea. We pluck our birch leaves in June, when they have developed tannin and lost their youthful tenderness but before they become jaded. We add to the uplifting effect of birch with a little Chinese variety of Mugwort, which we grow for its strongly aromatic flavour (it's related to Rosemary and Wormwood). Rosebay Willowherb flowers add a purple flourish, unfurling and fading as they brew.

No 2 : Relax
Rosebay Willowherb Leaf 56%
Hawthorn Blossom & Leaf 24%
Meadowsweet Flower 20%

Complex honeyed citrus notes with a hint of woody depth.
50g / 33 mugs

£6.60

Hawthorn blossom has been found to contain the best profile of natural medicinal elements when harvested at its most beautiful. We aim for that perfect moment on a sunny spring day to gather it. Hawthorn's complex woody flavour complements meadowsweet's honeyed overtones with a light citrus base from rosebay willowherb leaves.

No 3 : Refresh
Peppermint Leaf 34%
Nettle Leaf 33%
Bramble Leaf 33%

Refreshing peppermint sings with undertones of mineral-rich nettle and mild bramble leaf.
50g / 33 mugs

£6.60

We first grew Black Mitcham Peppermint on the recommendation of someone we trust, who said it makes the best mint tea. We agree. We blend it with two spring tonic ingredients - nettle, famed for its mineral content and blackberry bramble, lending a bit of tannin for a soothing, pleasantly astringent base.

No 4 : Rest
Wild Raspberry Leaf 47%
Fennel Fronds 33%
Rose Petals 20%

Delightfully floral rose top notes with fennel tones, rounded with raspberry leaf.
50g / 33 mugs

£6.60

This is a tangle of tea - You might not get exactly the same ratio of herbs in every brew! Two ingredients from the rose family feature in this blend, mixed with the sweetly aniseed flavour of fennel. Wild raspberry grows in abundance where we live and as with other brambles, the leaves make a good base, having just a little tannin to support sweet floral high notes. We grow Rosa rugosa for their beautifully scented petals and share the harvest with local wild bees, working hard alongside us in the hills.

Pick your own with this A2 poster showing you what Free Teas might be growing somewhere near you. Put this up in your kitchen and fill your cupboard with ingredients that you can blend yourself. The poster includes 42 common plants with advice about foraging.

£6.50 with free postage

What's special about Fine Pluck?

Fine Pluck is a celebration of what an upland small-holding can offer, with only a little intervention from we humans.When we launched in 2011, we couldn’t find any other herbal tea producers using only UK-grown herbs. As a nation, many of us are experts on a worldwide cornucopia of teas we’ve inherited a taste for. Yet for years, we have walked alongside leaves and flowers that we’re unable to identify, let alone know if they make good tea. We hope we can help to inspire a thirst for what’s local and good, and we don’t mind whether you buy our blends or go and pluck your own.

Only 3 ingredients

We're passionate about our blends being just three herbs. So many other herbal blends are named after one herb, then list about eight more ingredients!When we decided what to use our smallholding / emerging forest garden for, or more accurately, when we observed that it was already effectively a herbal tea garden, we knew that what would set our teas apart from the rest was being unique in producing all our blends exclusively from UK grown and harvested herbs but you probably already know that.We deliberately created each of our blends from just three herbs. By doing that carefully, we have crafted a balanced and flavourful cup of tea. Especially as some of our ingredients are likely to be unfamiliar, it's good not to blur too many flavours together. It's fun to detect the flavour and effect of each herb in the blend and enjoy the trio together.Our blends are the three herbs listed on the pack and have either grown wild or been cultivated, adhering to organic principles (we hope you take our word; we’re not certified organic). No pesticides or chemicals of any other kind have been used on the land we harvest from. Our herbs are plucked, dried, blended and packed; no hidden processes exist. Fine Pluck blends are periodically analysed for water activity to ensure they are dried sufficiently to prevent spoilage.

Ethics

Fine Pluck is a delightful business to be part of – it isn't a political or ethical statement. It developed from our love of foraging and new recipe development. But we are also permaculture designers who think it is high time we started thinking regeneratively, rather than just sustainably, about our partnership with the world we are part of. We're not especially political or ranty about that, it just seems to make sense.Our teas aren't certified organic, but rest assured that the permaculture principles we follow are in the same vein.

Medicinal herbal effects

Many plants affect the body, mild or powerful, positive or negative. For example, chamomile is commonly associated with a calming effect, fennel and mint are often used to aid digestion. Whilst many of the ingredients we use have a herbal effect on the body (extremely mild at the doses where pleasant flavour is the top consideration) we primarily blend for taste; however, we try not to put ingredients together that have clashing herbal effects.We have very limited knowledge of the Western medical herbal tradition, just enough to know the basics for our information.

Bitter is good

Many of our ingredients are listed as bitter or tannin. Don't let this put you off. What most people like about everyday builders tea (Camellia sinensis), whether black or green, is that it is mildly astringent through its tannin content. So, many of our teas with herbs containing tannin will be attractive to fans of 'normal tea'. We even list those that are black-tea or green tea like on our poster.A bitter taste on the palate is especially beneficial as a stimulant to our digestion and liver function. Drinking or eating something bitter at the beginning of a meal encourages digestive processes to kick in.

Fine Pluck, where did the name come from?

'Fine pluck' is actually tea harvesting terminology. When just the growing tip and one leaf were harvested (only for the Emperor of China and senior officials), this was called the Imperial pluck. Nowadays, the best tea is the fine pluck, the growing tip plus two leaves.So, the verb, fine pluck, describes what we're attempting to do; picking by hand allows us to select, during harvest, the best looking leaves, buds and flowers rather than using a machine to indiscriminately cut everything, stalk, dead leaves and all. Our name gives some people malapropic issues, but this isn't intentional. Honestly.

Contact

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Fine Pluck, Troed yr Esgair Barn, SY18 6RS, Wales
Company No: 04562258
VAT No: 350442724
Current Food Standards Agency Food Hygiene Rating: 5

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