Rooibos

Rooibos

What it is

It is a legume, not a tea plant, and it grows commercially nowhere but the Cederberg — attempts to move it have failed on the soil and the fire cycle it depends on. Benjamin Ginsberg, a trader at Clanwilliam, is credited with curing the chopped shoots in barrels from 1904, which is what turned a local bush infusion into a product.

In the kitchen

It has so little tannin that it cannot go bitter: leave it an hour, boil it, reduce it — nothing happens but concentration. That is what makes it the infusion for milk, custard bases and brines, where black tea would turn astringent.

Goes with

Vanilla Cream Orange Cassia Honey Medjool date

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