I am having a hard time writing this review. This tea makes me think of nothing more than sitting outside on a sunny day in the short grass. Sun is shining on your face, and the sweet scent of the lawn washing over you. There even may be a hammock involved. All of that in just a little cup of tea. Bliss. It’s a lovely image, and a really nice cup of tea. Very mellow, smooth, just a hint of astringency at the finish, just making you want to take that next sip all the sooner. It has a hint of sweetness in the aroma – I can see where Rishi finds the “sweetly toasted chestnut” from it’s product description. There are no stand-out notes in this tea for me – just a blended mellowness that I’m really enjoying. I have a feeling that drinking this on a cold, snowy December might instantly transport you to a very spring-like place.

Unfortunately for this review – outside it’s a beautiful sunny day, and there actually is a hammock. Both the cup of tea next to me, and the entire back yard are telling me I need to take this tea outside and sit and enjoy it in the sunshine. I don’t think I can hold out any longer.

You can purchase the Jade Cloud, Organic Fair Trade Green Tea directly from the Rishi Tea website.

The leaves are small and black. The dry leaf smell is of tea, a really good quality Ceylon tea. I can smell the tiniest hint of green? Can this be possible in a Ceylon black tea?

I brewed up 2 tsp. in the ingenuiTEA by Adagio for 2 minutes. The tea package clearly indicates that brewing over 3 minutes will produce a bitter cup of tea. The leaves danced around in the hot water.

First sip note: This is not bitter. It is smooth, amber in color and smells like I think black tea should. It’s the kind of smell that invokes memories of yesterdays gone by, the sound of someone mowing the grass, the smell of fresh cut grass. I know this is a black tea, but I do detect a bit of “green” in there also. The wet leaves do have a green hue to them. You take a sip of tea, it is not flavored with anything other than tea leaves. This is a simple tea that does not require milk or sugar.

Added ice and WOW! Decided to do a second infusion and put in my iced tea pitcher for later this afternoon. It is nice hot, but the Pekoe flavor really pops when this tea is ice cold.

You can purchase the Organic Ceylon Tea directly from the Leaf Spa Tea website.

I was surprised at the size of this infuser. It is small. When you see it online, it looks really big. Filling it to the brim gets 16 ounces in the infuser. In reality, you are only making 12-15 ounces of tea with this infuser.

Now, I have water and tea leaves in the infuser. I wait the prescribed amount of time depending on the type of tea. A word of caution here, make sure the cup you intend to use is large enough to hold 12-16 ounces of tea and that the brim of the cup is as wide as the bottom of this infuser. When the tea is ready, place the infuser over your cup and gravity does all the work. Thank you Sir Isaac Newton! When you lift the infuser off your cup, the mechanism closes. No drips.

Here are a list of pros and cons to help you decide if the IngenuiTEA is right for you:

Pros
It is clear, you can watch the agony of the leaves as they unfurl. And with it clear, you can easily get it clean.
With it being gravity fed, it is effortless to pour a cup of tea.
The IngenuiTEA is microwave and dishwasher safe. I personally would never put it in either appliance, but you could if you wanted.
This is great for using loose leaf tea to make iced tea. It fits right on top of my iced tea pitcher.

Cons:
It is plastic.
The lid does not come off, so it sits at an angle in the drain board.

I would recommend this to any tea drinker. It makes the using of loose leaves easy and fun. This is great for anyone who travels or wants to make great tasting tea at work. The IngenuiTEA is smart looking. It would certainly start a conversation about tea.

You can purchase the IngenuiTEA directly from the Adagio website.

Company Product Description:
A tea blended in honor of Malachi McCormick, that tea author of Irish blood. His out-of-print book “A Decent Cup of Tea” is small, but speaks volumes concerning the difficulty in finding well-prepared tea in hotels.

I start each day with at least 1 black or black flavored tea…my day “tea day” progresses from there…each day a new tea adventure.  BUT…I always HAVE to have some good, solid Black or Black Flavored Tea Favorites or Standby’s nearby.  With all the tea I drink I MUST have a HUGE variety in my stash. 

Recently I sampled Malachi McCormick’s Blend from Harney & Sons for the first time.  I received it from a friend in a tea swap!  Let’s just say it’s very satisfying and I am fairly certain that’s on its way to my Standby Pile…if not my “go-to” pile! 

It’s a medium strength Black Tea that is toasty yet sweet and oh-so-smooth!  It seems to be the perfect tea to sip or – if you are in a rush – gulp.

I don’t know what it is about this tea…but I think it’s a winner!

You can purchase the Malachi McCormick’s Blend directly from the Harney & Sons website.

Big, bold, brassy. This tea is by no means a delicate wall flower of a green tea. Or a delicate anything, really. It comes right out and lets you know that it’s here, it’s a green tea, and that it means to be taking center stage, thankyouverymuch.

However, in its efforts to inform the world of it’s intentions, it may scare some people off. It almost scared me off. Opening the pouch of tea, the scent is an inviting green tea aroma with an enhanced nutty quality, brought about by a roasting step during the processing of the leaf. Steeping the tea, it’s a delicate, pale green color with just a hint of brown; the very picture of an inviting cup of tea. But then, sipping shocked me. Very astringent. Almost a sour quality. And the drying sensation wasn’t restricted to just the mouth, it went down the throat as well. As the brew cooled, the sour faded, leaving a sweeter quality to the cup.

To try and get the best out of this tea, I tried multiple steeping parameters. My first two tries, I used the method referred to on the packet – 1 tablespoon per 5-6 oz of water, steeped in 180 degree water for 3-5 minutes. Their website also recommended trying more leaf with a shorter steeping time. This method resulted in a brew where the sour flavor held on, even once cooled. I then tried the old tried and true proportion of 1 tsp per 8 oz. This resulted in a much lighter brew with reduced astringency and reduced sourness, and a hint of nuttiness at the back of your mouth.

If you are a fan of the big, bold and dry red wines, you will likely love this tea brewed to the original directions. I preferred the weaker brew, but other greens have tickled my fancy more than this one.

You can purchase the Rishi Teas Organic Green Needles (Lu Zhen) Roasted directly from the Rishi Tea website.

As I was sorting through samples that we have received over the past few months, I had a craving for green tea, and came across Chloe from The Simple Leaf. I don’t recall tasting it before, and decided that it would be as good as any to review today!

Chloe seemed unusual for me, as it is a Darjeeling tea from the Pussimbing Estate. Unusual because I have not tried a lot of Darjeeling greens, even tho I know that they are becoming more and more available. I am used to strong, grassy greens from China and Japan, and expected similar here.

The Simple Leaf website describes this tea as: “Light, smooth and refreshing, these gorgeous large leaves make a mellow liquor that is perfect for late afternoon sipping. Subtle hints of fruit and freshly cut grass give this tea a remarkable flavor.”

So, I heated up some water to about 75 deg C (approx. 170 deg F), steeped it for 3 mins, and prepared myself for a great tasting experience.

First of all, the liquor is a light, honey color, light enough that I wondered if I steeped it long enough. The scent was similarly subtle, slightly fruity with the classic grassy tones that I associate with green tea.

The taste, I have to say, is a bit too light for me. As described by The Simple leaf, it was mellow, and I get the hits of freshly cut grass, and was perhaps, a tad sweet, but I did not get any fruity notes at all. It was in the end, a bit bland, and did not have a lot of character. A good beginners green tea to ease you into the complexities, but for the more experienced green tea drinker, I think that this is neither subtle or complex enough to truly enjoy.

All in all, it was not a bad or offensive cup of tea at all, just not interesting enough for me personally to make a staple in by cupboard, and certainly not what I expected from the region known for the “Champagne” of teas!

You can purchase Chloe directly from the Simple Leaf website.

Orange Blossom is a deliciously fragrant tea blend from Rishi Tea. Rishi describes it as “a refreshing and floral blend of green teas with sweetly-scented blossoms, lemongrass and tropical citrus fruits”. The listed ingredients are organic and fair trade certified green tea, organic lemongrass, organic osthmanthus flowers, organic lemon myrtle, natural essential oils of orange, lime and tangerine.

Out of the bag the tea seems to be more lemongrass than green tea leaf – a very pretty combination of light and dark green with a scattering of golden osthmanthus flowers. Not surprisingly, the scent is strongly citrus – the orange, lime and tangerine combination almost mimics bergamot; with a nice fruity undertone provided by the osthmanthus.

After brewing, the blend maintained it’s refreshing aroma and produced a nice amber cup of tea. I really couldn’t taste the green tea in this blend, but it had a very pleasant taste; the citrus flavors were mild and not too sharp, and the floral notes added a sweetness rather than a perfumed taste. The lemongrass did a nice job of softening and tying all of the flavors together; although I think that between the lemongrass and the lemon myrtle, someone who didn’t like the taste of lemon may not like this tea. The lemony scent and flavor was not overwhelming for my tastes, but I was expecting stronger notes of orange based on the name of the tea.

Organic Orange Blossom Tea is available for purchase as part of the Xuan En Yulu Organic Fair Trade Sample Set from Rishi Tea.

You can purchase Rishi Tea Orange Blossom directly from their website.

African Summer is a very pleasant herbal tisane from Red Leaf Tea it is a blend of Honeybush, Lemongrass, Lemon Myrtle, Rose Hips, Eucalyptus, Hibiscus, Safflower, and Marigolds. I was intrigued by the description on Red Leaf’s website: “The beguilingly hot climate of the African Serengeti serves as the inspiration for African Summer tea, with its unique combination of herbs that are known for their healing and nourishing properties. Its main ingredient is honey bush-which is related to rooibos-and additional vitamins and minerals are provided by eucalyptus, hibiscus, safflower, and marigolds. African Summer also contains citrus and rosehips that help boost your immune system.”

The loose leaf is a pleasing earthy mix of color – fresh greens of lemongrass, myrtle and eucalyptus, mellow brown and yellow honeybush leaf, safflower and marigold and bright splashes of hibiscus and rose hip. The lemongrass seems to be predominant in the blend and the citrus scent comes through before and after brewing.

I was surprised at how dark the brewed tea was with nice red tones – certainly a family resemblance with rooibos. The flavor, not surprisingly, was mild and mostly lemony with the honeybush hinting sweetness and the floral notes contributing a bit of tang. Happily I didn’t notice a strong enough eucalyptus flavor to remind me of a cough drop. Overall African Summer is a pleasing cup of tea; very refreshing, and according to the Red Leaf people – good for you too!

Red Leaf is currently shipping orders of more than $40 for free and also have a promotion running – “Buy 4 Teas get 1 FREE / Buy 7 Teas get 2 FREE”.

You can purchase Red Leaf Tea Rooibos Africana directly from their website.

Mighty Leaf is one of few popular Canadian tea companies. As a Canadian, I celebrate that fact, and always look forward to sampling a new Mighty Leaf tea. However, in this case, I am left with a bit of a *meh* feeling.

I picked out the Green Tea Tropical from the samples that Mighty Leaf sent us, anticipating visions and flavours of tropical vacations to Mexico and Costa Rica, and the initial scent of the un-brewed leaves gave me just that. It is of course, packaged in the signature Mighty Leaf stitched pillow teabag, and the leaf appeared to be fairly large and full, and as such, of seemingly high quality.

The first brewing was as suggested, 180 degrees for 3 minutes. As the teabag went in, the scent started to become more muted. After 3 minutes, I was left with a dark amber liquor, and mildly tropical scented water.

As I sipped, I noted that the tea was not in the least bit astringent (aka “bitter” for some), leading me to again, believe that the green tea was of good quality. However, the flavouring of the tea was strangely blended together, not really allowing me to sort out different tropical flavours, tho the scent was “Guava” like. I found overall, the tea not “incredible” – but a decent cup of tea, but yet, unremarkable, leaving me with that *meh* that I mentioned before – a take it or leave it kind of feeling.

As I make notes on this tea, the taste does slightly linger, while leaving my teeth feeling a bit fuzzy, and my mouth a bit dry, again, green tea characteristics. The problem I think here, is that the actual green tea flavour gets lost in the tropical fruit flavouring, never really rising to the top to be complemented by the flavours. The second steeping (4 min @ 180 deg) was even more unremarkable, with a little flavour, but less so that the original, and again, the green tea not coming to the fore.

So my overall impression of this tea is that it would be a good starting tea for a convert, someone that is not used to green tea and could get turned off by the earthier aspects of a straight green. This tea has maybe a wider appeal, but I am not sure if it is good enough to be called a “premium” tea or to charge premium prices for.

All that being said, it is not a bad tea, and Mighty Leaf produces some top quality teas, which is maybe why this one leaves me wanting more.

You can purchase Mighty Leaf Green Tea Tropical directly from their website.

EDIT: I was informed by an astute commenter that Mighty Leaf is NOT a Canadian company, and much to my chagrin, they are correct. My apologies for the mistake in this review!

This rooibos blend from Tea Frog Tea is well named – I LOVE this tea!! According to Tea Frog: “Our most popular Rooibos blend, the Love blend is an aromatic delight that you will not be able to resist! This tea is so good, we sample it at every show, and sell out at every show! The scent and flavor are simply to die for!”. The ingredients are listed as Rooibos, Safflower, Sunflower, Calendula Flower, Roses, Cornflower and Orange Peel.

The loose tea is a striking combination of colors; red rooibos leaf and rose petals, pieces of orange peel and sunny yellow calendula flowers, contrasting with vivid cornflower blue. Even before brewing the aroma is heavenly – the familiar sweetness of rooibos with strong orange notes, and although it isn’t listed as an ingredient there is a hint of vanilla.

Following Tea Frog’s guidelines of 1 teaspoon per cup and steeping for 5 minutes resulted in a rich rooibos red (how’s that for alliteration?) cup of tea losing none of its delicious aroma in the process. The taste didn’t disappoint and the combination of flavors is just right – sweet but not sugary sweet with a refreshing taste of citrus. I was able to get a second brewing with a milder but still pleasant flavor.

I haven’t tried yet, but I’m sure that this blend would lend itself to an excellent iced tea – mixed 50/50 with either lemonade or orange juice and float some fresh flower petals on the surface for presentation – yummy!! With the weather getting cooler I’m more inclined to drink my tea hot but as soon as winter is over and the summer returns I will definitely give it a try.

You can purchase TeaFrog Love Flavoured Rooibos directly from their website.