Tea Reviews | It's All About The Leaf

Posts Tagged ‘Coconut Flakes’

The way I’ve learned to make chai is a stove top method.  Rather than just simply brewing like tea, you do the following:

For each 2 cups of chai tea:
Take 1 cup water, bring to a boil on the stove in a small saucepan.  Once the water comes to a boil, add 1 tbsp. chai tea, and 1 tbsp. sugar.  Return to a boil, and let boil for 5 minutes.  Turn off the heat, and add one cup milk (the more milk-fat, the more flavorful).  Let rest on the stove for at least 10 minutes, and then strain, and drink.

This method of preparation takes most chai mixes and makes them amazingly flavorful.  I know it’s sacrilege to boil tea, but the spices in chai cover any over-steeped flavor, and it ensures you get the most out of the spices.

So, wanting to get the most out of this chocolate chai (because really, what could be better?  Chocolate *and* chai spice?  YUM), I prepared it in the stovetop method.  It surprised me.  It was a very mellow cup.  Like a mildly spiced chocolate milk.  The chocolate flavor is at the forefront, and there’s a taste of generic spices as an aftertaste.  None of the particular spices stand out, but there’s the sensation of clove, and a tiny burn from possibly a little pepper.

So, it’s very yummy, but a little less spicy than I was hoping.  If it wasn’t caffeinated, I could see drinking this at night as a soother.

I wanted to make sure it wasn’t the stovetop method somehow skewing the flavor of this tea.  So I brewed it like a regular cup of tea as well.  And no, it does MUCH better brewed stove top method.

Prepare for something lovely.  It’s a great cuppa.  Just don’t expect a lot of spice, and revel in the chocolate.

You can purchase the Chocolate Chai directly from the Mark T. Wendall Tea Company website.

Some days–okay, some weeks—you just need chocolate. In copious amounts. And after multiples of those Reeses’ peanut-butter-cup-snarfing, Oreo-bingeing weeks, one finally reaches the conclusion that one must find a more healthful alternative. Tea Forte’s Hazelnut Truffle provides plenty of the cacao-based yum with much less of the calorie-borne guilt.

The individual ingredients are big, pretty, and very visible inside Tea Forte’s trademark triangular bag. Chocolate is the first and foremost aroma in dry-leaf stage, and chocolate stays the first and foremost aroma as it steeps. The light color may fool you–fully steeped, it stays golden brown instead of the shade of a Russell Stover all-dark assortment. But it’s big on nutty, chocolate flavor with a coconut chaser all the way down.

Hazelnut Truffle is sweet enough on its own; no milk or sugar necessary to make this a real treat, either for yourself or (great gift idea) for your chocolate-loving sweet-tea.

You can purchase the Hazelnut Truffle directly from the Tea Forte website.

From what I can tell of the leaf, it contains cardamon, what looks like yerba mate, pu-erh, and cocoa. The aroma has chocolate, cardamon, and ginger notes.

The steeping instructions call for one cup of boiling water, one cup of boiling milk, to mix in the ingredients and to let it steep for 3 to 5 minutes. Sweeten to taste.

I did not add any sugar; the taste was fine as it is and I think better without it. The chocolate notes rounded out the ginger and spice that peeks through ever so slightly. It has a sort of grounded, chocolate, round, creaminess with a bit of hui gan bitterness at the end after you swallow which I think can be on account of the pu-erh bits mixed with the cocoa. I think adding sugar would ruin the taste as it would give it a sharpness which does not complement the taste of this beverage. The rounded, soft taste without the edge suits the creaminess and milky mouthfeel, with only the peeks of spice and ginger.

I would recommend only letting the ingredients steep in the milk and boiling water for the suggested 3-5 minutes then strain out all the ingredients from the pot. Do not let the ingredients sit in the solution as it will make the beverage taste very gingery and strong hui gan bitterness.

I like this blend. When I first read chai with pu-erh I thought that it would be a catastrophe but it works! If steeped correctly, it’s like a creamy (unsweetened) cocoa, with hui gan bitterness and the occasional peeks of spice and ginger to liven up your taste buds but still overall a soft and round beverage.

You can purchase the Chocolate Chai directly from the Rishi Tea website.

Teafrog has brought a lot of really unique blends to the table so I shouldn’t be surprised by this one. But still, Mango and yogurt? Hmm…

It’s a curious mix, can definitely smell the yogurt – reminds me of the yogurt covered raisins that always leave me with a twinge of ‘guilty pleasure’ after I eat them. Can smell all of the different fruits in this blend but the mango is definitely the most bold. Curious too is the fact that I have all the ingredients in my cupboard (except the yogurt) and it never occurred to me to blend them. Thinking this would make a fantastic snack, straight out of the bag.

Steeped it for five minutes and it’s a beautiful shade of mango (is mango a color, can someone check their Crayolas?). It’s an orangey peach color, if that helps. Oh, and it’s delicious, really tangy and tart at the same time. Must be the yogurt giving me the tart side of it, apple in the blend is helping it too. This is really good and I will need to order some more. It’s a fun tisane that holds it’s own but I’d imagine it would also be fantastic to add to other teas as well. I’ve got some Silver Needle that could use a little zest….

Oh and just so you know, it does make for a satisfying nibble, straight out of the bag.

You can purchase the Mango And Yogurt directly from the TeaFrog website.