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This is the tea that I should have reviewed for my inaugural Good Friday Tea Review.
Baxter’s Buns tea is described by its creators as having “all the fruity doughy goodness you would expect from a hot cross bun” and reader, they are not wrong.
Excitingly, this tea blend contains actual currants. There’s something very pleasing about seeing dried currants nestled amongst the tea leaves, and knowing that with the addition of boiling water, they are going to plump right up. It reminds me of soaking dried fruit the night before making a Christmas pudding or that bit in Danny the Champion of the World where they drug the pheasants.
There are all sorts of goodies in here: spices, obviously, and orange, but also chicory root and barley malt. The black tea at the base of this blend is a strong, dark, punchy leaf which welcomes its unusual supporting flavour characters with a cheerful bonhomie, much like the Ghost of Christmas Present in The Muppet Christmas Carol.
It might be even better than an actual hot cross bun. The depth of flavour is so spicy and warm and well balanced that bun manufacturers (or bakers as I think they prefer to call themselves) could use this tea as inspiration for their products. (I assume with foodstuff-inspired tea, it usually happens the other way round.)
This is the fourth and final tea from T2’s Baxter’s Bakery collection. And I think it is my favourite, although Lamington would give it a good run for its money. It’s funny, in my other Baxter’s Bakery reviews, I’ve mentioned the artificiality of the overall taste. This wasn’t an insult. It’s not something that other tea blends could necessarily get away with, but T2’s bakery teas are so fun and cheerful about it that I rather enjoyed it.
Baxter’s Buns on the other hand, doesn’t taste artificial at all. It tastes like something you might have lovingly baked in your own kitchen. (If all your baking efforts came out unexpectedly pourable.)
There wasn’t a single dud in the Baxter’s Bakery collection. I loved every single one of them. And, as I mentioned in my Banana Bake review, the packaging is absolutely as cute as a button. Although, if you’re wondering if there is any significance to the name ‘Baxter’ in Baxter’s Buns and Baxter’s Bakery, there isn’t. I wrote to T2 about it, and their very helpful customer support team told me that it “isn’t named after anyone in particular, and it’s just specific to T2”.
Well, as far as non existent bakeries that don’t sell cakes go, Baxter’s Bakery is simply the best. As I would have written on TripAdvisor, if they had a section for imaginary places, I enjoyed my visit and I am certainly planning to come again.
Today’s featured book is The Book of Idle Pleasures by Dan Kieran and Tom Hodgkinson.
