Çaykur Rize Turist Turkish Black Tea — Loose Leaf 200g, 500g & 1kg

If you ask in Turkey which tea is in the cupboard, the answer is very often this yellow pack. Rize Turist is one of Çaykur's classic everyday blends — Çaykur being Turkey's state tea enterprise, founded in 1971 and headquartered in Rize on the Black Sea coast, where almost all Turkish tea is grown. Inside Turkey the blend is nicknamed "Hakiki Sarı" — "The Real Yellow" — because the yellow brick pack has been on breakfast tables for generations. So which Çaykur tea is this? Rize Turist is the smooth, balanced one. Compared with stronger Çaykur lines, its blend leans toward a soft, easy-drinking cup with a deep amber-red color — the tea Turkish households brew all day, not just at breakfast. It is pure black tea from Rize province with nothing added. One detail worth knowing: tea in this region overwinters under snow, which controls pests naturally, and a published laboratory analysis of black teas from four countries found no pesticide residues in the Turkish samples. Brewing the Turkish way takes a double teapot (çaydanlık): put 2–3 tablespoons of loose leaf in the small top pot, pour boiling water over it, and let it steep above the simmering lower pot for 10–15 minutes. Pour the concentrate a third of the way up a tulip glass, then dilute with hot water — everyone adjusts their own strength. No çaydanlık? A regular teapot with a long steep works; just brew it stronger than a teabag tea. Black tea naturally contains caffeine. On sizing: the 200g pack is a sensible first try. Households that drink tea daily go through it fast — the 1kg brick is the format most Turkish families actually buy, and it is the best value per gram here. Store it sealed, away from light and strong smells, and the leaves keep their aroma for months.