Sourcing Bergamot: A Premium Fruit, Not Just Flavoring
By Peter Keen
The difference between an outstanding Earl Grey and a good one largely reflects the quality of the bergamot that creates its distinctive keyboard of flavors. The gap that separates a good and a lackluster one is bergamot “flavoring” and chemical additives versus the oil from the fresh citrus.
Bergamot, like a Darjeeling first flush or Taiwan High Mountain oolong, is unique to a specific region. Climate and terroir: Calabria, a 3,700-acre (1,500 hectare) restricted area in the deep south of Italy, extends six miles along the flat coastline of the Ionian Sea. It can be grown elsewhere, but it’s not the same; the chemical composition of Calabrian is much higher in compounds that affect flavor and healthiness. And, as with the terroir-dependent teas, there are issues of authentication, truth in labeling, and adulteration and counterfeiting. The oft-cited figure of Darjeeling producing 10,000 metric tons of leaf but 40,000 being sold is paralleled by Calabria’s harvest figures. It produces more than 90% of the world’s true bergamot oil essence used in fragrances, lotions, Earl Grey and high-end foods: under 100 tons. However, over 3,000 tons are marketed as real bergamot essence, not flavoring.
ALSO: Tea Flavoring Trends
Sourcing bergamot is not a matter of placing a bulk order but in many ways directly comparable to making and distributing a fine tea. It is a citrus fruit that combines the characteristics of a sour orange, lime, and grapefruit, with complex, almost musty flavor in the pulp. It’s harvested from November to March, but the finest is picked in the earliest six weeks. This “first cold pressing” demands careful handling and timing. It produces the liveliest and most subtle essence that is extracted from the peel of the fruit. It takes 2 trees to harvest the 200 kilos that make just 1 kg of essence. This is a smallholder industry of around 1,300 family-owned farms who sell to cooperatives and processing firms, though there are moves towards vertical integration. Sourcing is, as with fine teas, very much based on relationships.
The quality of an Earl Grey blend rests on a fine-tuned balance between the tea and the flavoring. There’s little sense in using a fine blend of, say, Keemum, Ceylon, and Darjeeling leaf with a synthetic petroleum-based chemical colored with chlorophyll, or deaden the superb flavors of Calabrian Bergamot with low-grade tea fannings.
There’s obviously a spectrum of quality choices, with the very, very best sourced for expensive perfumes. But tea firms like Bigelow aim high and the best blenders exploit the full flavor range of Calabrian bergamot. Others use second presses, mixing in of other essential oils, prills (a way to pelletize solids to approximate the essence) and chemical additives. The bottom end bergamot “flavorings” belong in a lab, not a teacup.