Scenting is a process, not an ingredient
Traditional jasmine scenting layers fresh blossoms with finished green tea overnight, several times over several nights, and removes the spent flowers each time. Tea is highly absorbent and takes the aroma readily. What is left at the end is tea that smells of jasmine and contains no jasmine at all.
Which is why the flowers are not a good sign
Loose blossoms in a packet of scented tea usually mean the tea was sprayed or blended rather than layered, and the flowers are there for the buyer’s eye. A good jasmine green tea often contains no visible flowers. This is one of the few places in the catalogue where the more attractive packet is reliably the worse product.
The scenting botanicals
Jasminum sambac in Fujian is the largest by volume. Osmanthus in Guangxi gives the apricot note of gui hua cha. Magnolia bud in Anhui works on the same layering principle further north. Rose is layered into black tea in Guangdong and Yunnan. Lotus stamens scent tea in Hanoi at extraordinary cost — a kilogram of finished tea can take over a thousand flowers.
Bergamot is different
Earl Grey is flavoured with an oil rather than scented with a flower, and the oil comes from the rind of a sour citrus grown on one stretch of Calabrian coast. Most bergamot flavouring in commercial tea is synthetic or nature-identical, and blenders who use real Calabrian oil generally say so, because it costs enough to be worth mentioning.
Aroma without flavour
Scenting botanicals share a property: enormous smell, very little taste. Brewing jasmine buds alone is a mild, faintly green drink that surprises anyone expecting jasmine green tea. Almost all of that familiar character is the tea underneath.