Coffee? Tea? When in doubt: rooibos espresso!

Are you one of those eternal doubters who can’t decide whether you feel like coffee or tea? Drink coffee tea! Like the new rooibos espresso.

You have tea and you have coffee, and you have coffee tea. A category all its own, found everywhere from Africa to Hong Kong. In Yemen, people have traditionally drunk tea made from the husks of sun-dried coffee cherries: kishir, which is packed with caffeine.

Cascara

In South America, they drink this husk tea under the name cascara. And in Hong Kong, you order yuanyang like a true local: a mix of coffee and tea with sweetened Friese Vlag milk from a can.

And even though it may sound strange, all these variations are unexpectedly delicious.

Cederberg

As many as ten years ago, a group of South Africans added an espresso made from rooibos tea to this collection of coffee curiosities under the name RedEspresso. No caffeine, but plenty of antioxidants, as it comes from the wild rooibos bush in the high-altitude Cederberg mountains on South Africa’s Western Cape—the only place in the world where rooibos grows.

Rooibos espresso became an instant hit in the coffee shops of Cape Town and its surrounding area.

It’s not that the patented, ground rooibos espresso has a completely different composition from unadulterated loose rooibos tea. It’s mainly about different brewing methods.

Crema

Because a relatively large amount of rooibos tea is used to make the espresso, the drink has the concentration of an espresso plus the typical layer of crema. But with a distinct rooibos finish.

Rooibos espresso became an instant hit in the coffee shops of Cape Town and its surrounding area. Especially as a latte and cappuccino. Soon, the American and Asian markets were interested too, and the coffee tea was showered with awards.

George Clooney

Yet over all those years, the tea espresso never managed to break through in our emerging coffee market. Perhaps because rooibos tea’s popularity followed the opposite trajectory from espresso drinks?

Now RedEspresso is here too. Even in pods for George Clooney machines. In today’s health craze, the time may well be ripe for this rusty-red coffee tea, which you can also drink chilled or enjoy as a chai, cocktail, or smoothie.

Isn’t it time for a rooibos revival anyway?

Importer/distributor: Culticuli

Image: RedEspresso