Tea shops · Brighton, United Kingdom
Tea shops · Brighton, United KingdomMDTea
A Brighton blender that began in a tearoom, now with a counter in the Open Market and a list from a 6,50 £ breakfast blend to Silver Needle.
Named blends with a story on the label, straight leaves beside them, and the gentlest prices on this page. The counter under the market roof is small; the list is not.
MDTea tells its own story on its site: the blends were created for the owners' newly opened tearoom when the loose leaf they could buy did not satisfy them, were worked up with an established master blender, and proved popular enough to spawn an online shop and a wholesale side supplying cafés, restaurants and hotels. The range began as fifteen blends and now runs past twenty-five, plus a handful of single-origin teas. The shop is Unit 27 of the Brighton Open Market on Marshalls Row, open Tuesday to Saturday 10:30–17:30 and Sunday 11:00–16:30, and the stockists list runs from Metrodeco on Upper St James's Street to cafés in Hove and Shoreham.
The names are the house style. Chrysler Breakfast Tea is the Assam and Uva blend at 6,50 £ for 100 g; Shades of Grey is an Earl Grey with rose and orange peel at 7,90 £; Brighton Campervan is the shop's take on Russian Caravan, Darjeeling, Kenilworth Estate Ceylon, Formosa Lapsang and oolong, at 7,50 £. Beside them sit straight leaves: a Devagiri Estate Ceylon OP1 that the shop says it buys direct from the Sri Lankan estate, at 8,00 £; Golden Monkey from Yunnan; a Chinese gunpowder green at 7,90 £; and a Taiwanese Oolong Poppy at 6,40 £, all per 100 g, with 250 g pouches behind each.
The quiet end of the list is Silver Needle, young buds picked in spring, at 10,00 £ for 50 g with a 125 g pouch at 22,50 £, and the house chai, Masala Chai Express with red peppercorns, at 8,60 £ for 100 g. Most blends also come as 'fuso' bags, large pyramid tea bags in packs of 20 and 100, and as taster boxes by tea type that make 24 cups. The shop sells handmade ceramics too, hand-painted gaiwans, small teapots and a matcha set, and the site keeps a page of stockists and a form for cafés that want to carry the range.
- prices
- 8
- tea types
- 5
- from
- £ 6.40
- shops
- 1
Where it is
Brighton Open Market
Unit 27, Brighton Open Market, Marshalls Row, Brighton
Hours: Tue–Sat 10:30–17:30 · Sun 11:00–16:30
What to buy here
English Breakfast
Chrysler Breakfast Tea
from £ 6.50 · 100 g
The house breakfast blend, Assam for body and Sri Lankan Uva for brightness, in 100 g, 250 g and 500 g pouches and in 'fuso' pyramid bags. Gutsy and malty, it is the everyday tea of the range and the cheapest way into it.
See our page on this tea →Ceylon
Devagiri Estate Ceylon OP1
from £ 8 · 100 g
A long, wiry OP1 leaf from the Devagiri Estate in Sri Lanka, which the shop says it buys direct from the estate. The one single-origin black on the list to try before the blends, in 100 g and 250 g.
See our page on this tea →Gunpowder
Gunpowder Green Tea
from £ 7.90 · 100 g
A tightly rolled pinhead gunpowder from Zhejiang that opens to the whole leaf in the cup, in 100 g and 250 g and in 20 'fuso' bags. Robust for a green tea; the leaf to buy for Moroccan-style mint tea at home.
See our page on this tea →
The one worth the trip
Brighton Campervan
from £ 7.50 · 100 g
Brighton Campervan, the shop's own take on Russian Caravan: Darjeeling, Kenilworth Estate Ceylon, Formosa Lapsang and Oolong Poppy, with honey and a thread of smoke, named after trips in the owners' campervan. It is the one pouch on the list that carries the city's name, in 100 g and 250 g, and a gentler smoky black than most caravans.
See our page on this tea →All prices
Open a tea to see who else sells it.
| Tea | Type | Price | Size |
|---|---|---|---|
| Taiwanese Oolong Poppy Tea | Oolong tea | from £ 6.40 | 100 g |
| Chrysler Breakfast Tea | Black tea | from £ 6.50 | 100 g |
| Brighton Campervan | Black tea | from £ 7.50 | 100 g |
| Shades of Grey | Black tea | from £ 7.90 | 100 g |
| Gunpowder Green Tea | Green tea | from £ 7.90 | 100 g |
| Devagiri Estate Ceylon OP1 | Black tea | from £ 8 | 100 g |
| Masala Chai Express | Chai | from £ 8.60 | 100 g |
| Silver Needle | White tea | from £ 10 | 50 g |
Teas you can find here
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