Five o’clock, French style: less milk than across the Channel, more pastry, and a green tea by preference. This is the idea behind French Afternoon Tea, which Mariage Frères presents as the French Tea Time and sums up in a phrase, “hype and chic”.

The base is a silky green tea, speckled with blue flowers and scented with a flavouring; these are the three declared ingredients, and the blend may contain traces of nuts. The blue flowers scatter their touches of colour through the dry leaf and give the blend its look.

Delicate as a cotton flower, according to the house, the golden yellow liquor caresses the palate more than it asserts itself. The notes are pastry-like: first the roundness of white vanilla, then the indulgence of pink pralines, those of Lyon confectionery. The green tea, in the background, brings freshness and stops the vanilla becoming heavy; the finish stays clean and light.

It is an afternoon tea by definition, to serve with a financier, a madeleine, cream puffs or a praline tart. It is drunk without milk or sugar, the vanilla being sweet enough, and appeals to those who find vanilla teas on a black base too heady. In summer it makes a soft, golden iced tea.

Three minutes is enough, with 2.5 g of leaves per 200 ml of water at 95°C; beyond that, the green tea would harden the sweetness. In a box, allow one muslin sachet per 200 ml. French Afternoon Tea is available loose leaf, weighed and packed to order in our shops in Bordeaux and Nice, from the 5 g sample to the kilo, in a box of 30 round cotton muslin sachets (75 g net) and in an airtight black metal tin of 100 g, presented in its gift box.