Four o’clock in the afternoon, a slice of buttered bread, a pot of blackcurrant jam: Rooibos Baies Noires & Cassis Bio has the fragrance of that snack. It owes this to a blend in which dark and red berries rest on a base of natural rooibos from South Africa.

Elderberries from Ukraine, Bulgaria or Croatia come just behind the rooibos. Next come blackberry leaves, strawberry, redcurrant and blackcurrant in fruit, with natural blackcurrant, raspberry and strawberry flavourings. The plants and fruits, for their part, are grown organically. The rooibos is the dried needle of a shrub of the Fabaceae family, Aspalathus linearis, which contains no caffeine.

The dry blend, dark garnet, smells of jam just beginning to set. The deep mahogany liquor combines the malty roundness of the rooibos with the dark, slightly tangy fruit of blackcurrant and elderberry; the strawberry softens the middle of the palate, and the redcurrant lifts the finish.

Steep it in boiling water, 100 °C, for seven to ten minutes, using fifteen to twenty grams per litre, or three to four grams for a single cup. It is drunk from morning to evening, plain or with a splash of milk. Iced, it makes a summer drink of dark fruit: let the infusion cool, then pour it over ice cubes. It accompanies a blueberry tart, a clafoutis or fresh cheese.

Store it in a closed tin, in a dry place and away from light.