Tea Reviews | It's All About The Leaf

Posts Tagged ‘8oz’

Sencha, mango, strawberries, and ginger. Which is the odd one out? When I first read the list of ingredients the ginger stuck out at me and I thought about what the tea may taste like. Sencha has a vegetal taste, while strawberries and mango are fruity and sweet; the ginger if done wrong could really negatively affect the taste of the tea as ginger is sometimes quite potent and has a bit of a sting. Yes, the amount of ginger pieces blended in the tea must be added with caution I would think.

The nose off the dry leaf is sweet and fruity, and gladly no overwhelming ginger aroma. I steeped 1 tsp. in 8oz of boiling filtered water for 3 minutes as per instructions.

The taste was like a bubblegum taste, there was a natural sweetness to it, and rightfully just the right touch of ginger. The vegetal notes of sencha however could not transcend the fruity bubblegum taste. There was definitely more flavour than tea notes here.

Not a bad tea if you like sweet, fruity, flavoured teas with more flavour and less tea. Personally, I prefer the other way around – subtle flavour and more tea. I could drink teas like this when I need a change from my usual routine though. It’s good to change it up a bit.

You can purchase the StrawMango Ginger directly from the The Necessiteas website.

SpecialTea Brew is an online outfit out of my neck of the woods – the Pacific Northwest (of the U.S.). According to their origin story, the op was inspired by tea with a grandmother. This is the third “tea with grandma” foundation tale I’d heard, and – you know what? – it works on me every damn time. I never had tea with my grandparents, so I feel like I missed out on something growing up. Perhaps my tea exploration would’ve begun sooner had I a “tea with grandma” story of my very own. But I digress.

Their Mountain Berry herbal blend consisted of hibiscus, rosehips, orange peel, cornflowers, and blueberries. The last bit, they did NOT skimp on. There were big, plump pieces in the medley; same with the rosehips. Usually, freeze-dried fruit additives are small or cut-up in blends like this. Not so here.  My only nitpick was the fragrance; it was dry and tart, usually a sign of too much hibiscus. However, there was a citrusy follow-up thanks to the many chunks of orange peel present.

Brewing instructions per the vendor site recommended a four-to-five-minute steep in 208F water – 1.5 tsp. per cup. I did about a tablespoon in 8oz. for the full five. It was a berry blend, so naturally it could take a lot of infused abuse.

The liquor brewed up cherry red – as is to be expected from anything with hibiscus. The nose was, oddly enough, mostly berry and citrus – hibiscus tartness was a distant second. There seemed to be sweetness to the scent as well. Hibiscus did rear its red-tart head in the taste, dominating the forefront, although I welcomed it. The fruity aspects picked up right after, and the flavor lingered to a rind-like finish. Other than the blunt introduction, I rather liked this blend. I’m certain that the best way to have it would be sweetened and/or iced. On its own, though, it holds up well enough.

You can purchase the Mountain Berry directly from the SpecialTea Brew website.

Inspection of dried leaf shows tiny bits of ginseng, berries, rosehips, peppermint, and dandelion. Steeping instructions are to steep the tea for 5 minutes in 8oz. of boiling water. Dried leaf smells of ginseng and steeped infusion was a dark brownish-yellow colour with more of a dandelion aroma.

There is a bit of a tang when you first put it in your mouth. I think on account of the berries, rosehips, and peppermint. Then comes the ginseng and dandelion giving a bit of a lemongrass taste, with the mintyness always in the background, and finally a lingering sweetness. I’m not too fond of the sweet and cool feeling left on my tongue after I sip it. I did not like the fruity sweetness aftertaste coupled with the ginseng and out of place peppermint. The peppermint and dandelion seems to interrupt and the ginseng does not go too well with the sweetness.

Just too much going on here. I could not finish my cup. It does have the detox factor going for it. A detox tea can increase your health, energy, and sense of well-being. It does this by removing toxins and contaminants from your body. But then again, I’d probably choose a different detox to drink. Last week’s Hampstead Ginger Green Detox, although not great, is better than this one. I prefer the grassy mellower flavour to this sweet mash-up of numerous strongly flavoured tea components.

You can purchase the White Ginseng Detox directly from the Rishi Tea website.

Ingredients for this were thankfully simple. Along with the touted natural blueberry flavoring were Bai Mu Dan (White Peony) leaves and cornflowers. Telling them apart wasn’t a difficult feat, even for a bespectacled boob such as myself. The tea leaves were forest green-to-brown – wilderness-like in appearance – with flecks of bold purple interrupting the jungle-ish canvas. Cornflowers aren’t considered a flavor enhancer. They’re added to blends for the sole purpose of making them look pretty, such as with Earl Greys. They certainly did their part here. As did the blueberry flavoring; one would’ve thought a blueberry had bled for this blend.

Brewing instructions called for a water temperature of 80C (176F) and a one-to-two-minute steep. That actually seemed rather light for a Bai Mu Dan in my opinion. Peony is generally a very resilient white. Usually, I went with a 165F (or above) steep for three minutes. That said, I went with their recommendation; a heaping teaspoon worth in 8oz of water, steeped for two. Just in case.

The liquor brewed up to the usual pale yellow associated with most white teas, albeit a tad darker since it was a Peony. The steam aroma was about as blueberry as anything could get, even in comparison to actual blueberries. The fragrance was also surprisingly sweet, giving the impression of fruit candies. Y’know…the roll-up kind. No surprise, but the flavor echoed the smell to the letter. Most flavoring agents dilute a bit upon infusion, but this stayed afloat like some sort of – uh – berry boat. (What? It was all I could come up with?!)

For connoisseurs looking to taste some Bai Mu Dan with their blueberry, I regret to inform you won’t get much of an impression of the white tea base. The problem with blending white tea is that so subtle a foundation gets lost in the botanical fray. This is why the most successful white tea blends use petals and blossoms, so as to enhance their subtleties. Actual freeze-tried or sun-dried blueberries probably would’ve worked better with this. That is, if the goal was to have a White Peony presence. But for something that blares with bombast about it’s “blueberry”-ness, this succeeds in spades.

You can purchase the Blueberry White Tea directly from the TeaFrog website.

This tea from Shanti Tea is aptly named “Red Chocolate” as it is made of Rooibos (Red Bush) and cocoa shells. Rooibos is a herbal tea that grows naturally in the wild in South Africa. It is naturally caffeine-free which makes it a perfect beverage for the evening as well as for kids and expectant moms.

Right when you open the bag, your senses are treated with an aroma that is similar to red wine, on account of the mix of aromas coming off the rooibos and the chocolate. It smells almost like the liquor inside the cherry-filled chocolates.

When it is steeped the liquor is a lovely, bright, coppery orange infusion. The scent becomes very chocolaty, and at times if I smell it for an extended period of time, it can even become kind of heady. The taste, however, is not as it smells. It does not taste like liquor, so don’t worry you won’t get tipsy from drinking this!:) Rooibos is very forgiving; it’s hard to steep this incorrectly. As a matter of fact you can steep it for as long as you want. Extended steeping will make the infusion darker but it will not get bitter. I recommend steeping 1 heaping teaspoon per 8oz for 4-6 minutes with boiling water. It doesn’t taste like many flavoured teas where any one element of the tea stands out and overpowers the other tastes. The chocolate and rooibos blend well into a singular taste where you don’t know where one begins and the other ends. It is quite natural in this way. For anyone looking for unique, lasting aromas and subtle, natural tastes, I would recommend this tea.

You can purchase the Red Chocolate directly from the Shanti Tea website.