An organic evening infusion built on rooibos, with chamomile, orange blossom, linden flower and bourbon vanilla. Round, soft, honeyed and entirely caffeine-free. Chamomile and linden from France; rooibos from South Africa and vanilla extract from Madagascar, both fair trade. Made in France, compostable inner envelope, recyclable box, no plastic.
An allergy note first
This contains chamomile, which belongs to the daisy family (Asteraceae). If you are allergic to ragweed, mugwort, marigold, echinacea, arnica or chrysanthemum, you may react to chamomile — cross-reactivity within that family is well documented, and reactions range from mild oral itching to, very rarely, something more serious. If you have that kind of pollen allergy, be cautious with any chamomile drink.
Two smaller notes. Chamomile contains natural coumarins, and while a cup of tea is not a meaningful dose, it is conventionally mentioned to anyone on an anticoagulant. And chamomile is traditionally avoided in large quantities in pregnancy — a cup is a cup, but if you are pregnant and drinking a great deal of it, mention it to your midwife.
Rooibos, and why it is the right base for an evening drink
Aspalathus linearis grows in one place on earth — the Cederberg mountains of the Western Cape, in a narrow band of poor sandy soil — and nowhere else on the planet has ever managed to cultivate it commercially. It is a legume, not a tea plant.
Two properties make it useful here, and both are real rather than marketing.
It contains no caffeine at all — not “decaffeinated”, but naturally caffeine-free, since it is not tea.
It is very low in tannin. That has a specific practical consequence: ordinary tea's tannins bind non-haem iron and reduce its absorption from a meal, which is why anaemic people are told not to drink tea with food. Rooibos does not do that to any meaningful degree, which makes it a genuinely better choice with dinner if your iron is low. It is also why rooibos does not turn bitter however long you leave it — there is nothing in it to go bitter.
The other four
-
Chamomile — the classic European evening flower, apple-scented (its Greek name means “earth apple”), soft and slightly bittersweet.
-
Orange blossom — néroli, the flower of the bitter orange, and the most delicate ingredient here. Heady, floral, faintly honeyed.
-
Linden — tilleul, the flower of the lime tree, and the archetypal French bedtime infusion. Honeyed and slightly mucilaginous, which is what gives this blend its roundness in the mouth.
-
Bourbon vanilla from Madagascar — the thing that ties the other four together.
One point of clarification, since it confuses people: linden is not lime the citrus. The lime tree — Tilia, the tree that lines French avenues — has nothing to do with the green fruit. Same English word, entirely unrelated plants.
How to brew it
Fully boiling water, and give it time. Rooibos and dried flowers both need it. Five to seven minutes at minimum; ten does no harm at all, and rooibos genuinely improves with a long steep because there is no tannin to turn bitter.
Cover the cup. Orange blossom and vanilla are the most volatile things in the blend and they leave with the steam — an uncovered cup loses much of what you paid for.
It takes milk or oat milk surprisingly well, which most herbal infusions do not; rooibos with a splash of milk and this much vanilla in it is very close to a hot dessert.
What we are not going to claim
This product is commonly described as having the “soothing sweetness of chamomile” and the “calming power” of orange blossom. Those are health claims, so they do not appear here. EFSA has authorised no health claim for chamomile, linden, orange blossom or rooibos, and none may lawfully be made in Europe.
What is honestly true: it is caffeine-free, it is warm, and the ritual of making a hot drink at the end of the day does something for most people that has nothing to do with pharmacology. That is a good enough reason on its own.
Storage
Airtight, cool, dark, away from strong smells. Flowers lose their aroma faster than leaves, and the orange blossom will fade first.
Biohême
Biohême
Biohême
Biohême
