What is "Gute" tea in Sweden

There is a franchie sort of line of shops called Tespecialisten (The Tea Specialist) where they buy tea from, AFAIK, Kobbs Te (Kobb's Tea), a wholesaler and importer of tea in Sweden (I think they are the largest next to Tetley, Lipton and the other usual brands in Sweden). If it was in such a shop you bought it in, or if Åhléns buys from them, I do not know. It is more and more common to see loose tea in the supermarkets but I think it is another company that supplies this tea. I've never checked it out since I buy from a Tespecialisten shop here in Gothenburg (Lillians Te & Kaffe).

The Gute tea is a blend which can be bought in most of the shops in this chain, but I have no information about how to identify the ingredients nor how to find a similar tea in England.

The shops and Kobbs themselves blends their tea so it might be difficult to find the same tea in another country.

My suggestion would be to send a email to snipped-for-privacy@kobbs.se, at least that's the address one should send comments about the website

HTH.

Jonas, this is excellent and thank you very much for your reply.

I have sent Kobbs an email to enquire. I had tasted the tea in various places and just happened to come across it in Hemköp underneath Åhléns City where I bought some. I sent an email also to snipped-for-privacy@hemkop.se I picked this address up from the web but I have no idea whether it is any good or whether they will be able to reply.

If Gute is a Swedish only blend then I might be lucky if some of the Telespecialisten shops do mail order.

If it were a simple case of identifying the basic tea that is mixed with the dried lemon rind then I might be able to source something similar in flavour in UK.

On the other hand if Gute is a mixture of black teas blended, then I probably will just have to treat it as a happy memory of my stay in Sweden - along with rödbetssallad, vaniljesas, etc :o(

Derek

Do please tell us if they respond. From what I saw in the chat channel on the page they aren't very talkative. But do remember that it is the vaction period in Sweden right now (we have the habit of taking

They *should* be able to answer since you mailed Kundtjänst, that is Customer Service/Information desk/Complaints in English. :-)

But on the other hand, that was Hemköp's service desk and not the teasupplier, so they probably don't know what tea the tea contains. Hopefully they can give you a good contact address to their supplier.

I seriously doubt so, but you might be lucky. I really don't know how to get a list of them though.

According to the, unconfirmed, information I have; the man behind Söderblandning has a shop at

The Tea Centre of Stockholm Hornsgatan 46 S-118 21 Stockholm Sweden Telephone: +46-8-640 42 10,

He *maybe* can help you.

HTH.

No good. I sent to snipped-for-privacy@kobbs.se and this was returned undeliverable. I also tried snipped-for-privacy@kobbs.se and this was undeliverable. So I guess this address no longer exists.

Many thanks for your help and good information. If I get any more details I'll post them here on the newsgroup to let everyone know.

Derek.

I see there is reference to Guteblandning on the web site

I notice on the page for accessories "te-tillbehör" one of those ball infusers you use in mugs (number 109). Have these a specific name?

Derek

The original Gute is from a tea shop, Kränku, in Visby (on the large Swedish island Gotland) <

Other sources say that the Gute mixture contains black teas, licorice, orange peel, and sunflower flowers.

blandning = mixture, so yes.

te-tillbehör = tea assasories (if you haven't find out already :-)

Usually we saw "tekula" or "teboll" (kula and boll are two words for the same thing, boll is ball, but kula can be both a ball and a bullet, in case t refers to a ball), and we don't distinguish between between the diffrent models as pictured on the page you mention. The all metal ones to the left are usually "kula" and the mesh ones are balls. But there is no standard of nomenclature. Usually we describe if we mean a certain kind of tea ball.

The text on the page calls it a "saxmodell" which translates, literally, to "scissors model". I have such a one at work and they are very nice, I can recommend them if you aren't familiar with them.

No 111 is a testrumpa, a "tea sock" or "tea stocking". In my opinion much better then the infuser "bag" in clay (?) I got with my clay (?) kettle, much easier to remove from the kettle and clean.

Are you thinking on try to ordering something from them? :-)

If you talk to them on the phone, you might be able persuade them to ship to you, the Sweden-only policy non-withstanding.

Good luck.

:-)

I usually clean my by holding it under running water and squeeze it to hold it opened and the let the water clean it from the outside and from the inside, if I make myself clear. I've used it for three years and it ain't dented yet. :-)

I just remembered; another common, and IMHO better name, is tetång, i.e. "tea tongs" or "tea pliers" (I don't know which name is most appropriate in English, it's not my native language after all...), for the "saxmodell".