Tea Reviews | It's All About The Leaf

Posts Tagged ‘Hot Tea’

Hmm, the scent of this dry rooibos is legit. And by legit, I mean it legitimately smells like vanilla. Not fake vanilla like is used in various desserts, but real vanilla. Adding three teaspoons of this tea and steeping it in two cups of water for six minutes, I was left being tantalized by the aromas of vanilla wafting from my teapot as I waited. The tea smells sweet, but not in a fake sweetener way. It is more like the sweetness that comes from plants like mint or various fruits. The liquor is clear, yet a very dark red-brown.

My first cup smells warm. And not just from the hot tea. It just has a warm, and soft, aroma about it. It softly caresses the senses and lingers in the nose. Eagerly, I take my first sip and am immediately surprised by how sweet it tastes. The sweetness is very passive, but it is definitely there, and a quite pleasant surprise. This tea’s mouthfeel is thick and smooth. The flavour of vanilla is, of course, at the forefront. The rooibos, sadly, seems to have taken a backseat in this brew, as it does not show its head much, except in the aftertaste.

The flavours do not change much throughout the rest of the pot. I very much enjoyed drinking this tea. It is good, it is unique, and it is well worth a taste or two. I give it a 77/100 on my personal enjoyment scale.

You can purchase the Vanilla Rooibos directly from the TeaFrog website.

One of the perks of being married 25 years come September is the marital right to stick just about anything under your spouse’s nose and say, “Smell that!” without getting clobbered. In the case of nice tea from India, the response was “Wow! There’s something clove-y going on, isn’t there?”

While neither of us have a professionally trained tea nose, we did pick up some nice spicy, fruity notes in the dark dry tea. I suspect it has something to do with the area in which Banaspaty tea is grown — evidently the perfect greenhouse environment for teas.

The fruity tones come through loud and clear when this tea is brewed. Because I prefer my Assams on the meatier side, I let it steep a full four minutes before a taste test. Assam Banaspaty has the nice thick heft you’d expect from an Assam tea, but was surprisingly mild in flavor. While I don’t think milk and sweetener would harm this gentle brew, it certainly doesn’t need to be toned down any.  This would be a good introductory selection for someone new to the world of fine loose leaf tea.

You can purchase the Assam Banaspaty Organic directly from the TeaFrog website.

I was excited for the opportunity to review this cup, as I had seen it while browsing the Tea Forte website and appreciated the clever-looking design.
In reviewing Tea Forte’s Cafe Cup, I decided to create a simple pros and cons list. This is not a complete list by any means, merely a list of the things which most stood out to me.
Pros:
-Comes with a lid, to hold the heat in while steeping.
-The lid keeps your tea hot, even when you leave it for some time.
-The cup is quite pretty, in a simplistic way.
-The hole in the lid is perfect for the tag and string from the tea bag.

Cons:
-The construction of the cup is such that, because of the heat emanating through the walls, it is necessary to hold it by the handle alone.
-The size of the cup in comparison to the handle makes for a slightly awkward or unwieldy experience when lifting a full cup, especially because it seems the handle is not meant to be held with more than one finger through it.
-The lid gets quite hot while steeping tea, which can be problematic when you try to remove it to drink.

The biggest improvement I think could be made to this product is if it came with a saucer, to catch any drips, and provide a resting place for the hot tea cup, so that items under the tea cup are not in danger of being damaged by the heat.
Over all, it is a very nice cup, and the wooden box it comes in makes for a very nice gift all together.

You can purchase the Cafe Cup directly from the Tea Forte website.

I had a number of teas that I was going to review but these were pre-empted in order to cover the JOEmo XL Tea Travel Mug. I have been on the lookout for a good travel mug for loose leaf tea for a long time now, and when I found this one I was so pleased I just couldn’t wait to get the word out.

There are a number of tea travel mugs out there, from the Teas Etc. mug, to the Mighty Leaf Travel Mug, but nothing has seemed just right. Most travel mugs just have a filter to keep the leaves from getting into your mouth. That is fine, as long as you are going to leave them in there to steep the whole time. Personally, I like to steep my leaves for a certain amount of time, and then remove them, especially when it comes to greens and blacks. Inside the JOEmo, the key to the whole thing is a removable stainless steel mesh basket. It locks in place to either:

A) Keep the tea in the water and out of your mouth – if you are leaving the leaves in.
B) Keep the leaves out of the water, once you remove the basket.

The mesh filter is super fine, and even with Rooibos teas, which are notoriously slippery when it comes to getting through mesh filters, it kept all the leaf right out of the water once the basket came out!

The JOEmo body is double walled stainless steel and very rugged (perfect for banging around during those canoe trips). Being double walled, no matter how hot or cold the liquid is inside, you do not feel it on the outside. No condensation from very cold, and no heat from very hot tea. This makes it pretty comfortable to hold!

The vacuume sealed lid keeps your liquid hot or cold, whatever it went in as. This leads me to one warning – it works almost too well! After steeping a black tea with boiling water, and removing the basket, I sealed it up, and promptly forgot about it as I went about my day. 3 hours later it occured to me that I had some tea to drink, and without thinking, sipped away and came close to scalding my mouth! 3 hours later, and the water was almost as hot as it went in as! So be careful….

The mug is very easy to drink from; you simply push a button on the lid and it opens for drinking, another push of the button closes the lid when you are done. You can sip from anywhere around the rim – no single spout to find while driving in the car! Even with the lid “popped” the heat does not escape the mug.

Hands down, I recommend this to every single loose leaf tea drinker out there. The ONLY downfall that this has is that removing the basket can be messy if you are on the go and have nowhere to put it. However, the length of time that the water keeps warm, and the ease of drinking out of the mug more than makes up for this minor inconvienience. I have already placed my order for 4 more for my family members, and as a bonus, they are on sale at TeaFrog right now!

In conclusion, I love it, I use it, and in my opinion, to date, this is the best travel mug for loose leaf tea that is out there today!

You can purchase the JOEmo XL Tea Travel Mug directly from the TeaFrog website.

“Luscious, succulent raspberries highlight this ruby red hibiscus flower infusion. Pleasantly tart and extraordinarily sweet.”

Well, that about says it all! Tea Forte has become one of my favorite go-to tea companies for robust tasting teas. So far, they have not disappointed on any of the teas I have tried, and this one is no exception.

The second I put the unique (and quite neat!) pyramid shaped tea bag into the water, a bloom of red spread throughout the water, so deeply red I had to check myself for cuts! Then the scent hit me, and I knew without a shadow of a doubt that this was a raspberry tea I was about to indulge in.

Forget the ingredients list, this is purely raspberry, through and through. A tangy, mildly sweet taste of raspberries straight off the vine filled my mouth at the first sip, and lingered long after I licked every drop out of the cup! If you are not a raspberry fan, then this is not for you, as there is no doubt this is all raspberry, and nothing but the raspberry!

There is not much more to say, other than, again, Tea Forte delivers. I do have to say, that it is a little high in the price range for the bagged tea, so go loose if you are going to purchase it directly from Tea Forte. For my money, this is one I would actually consider stocking the cupboard with, as I can imagine that as an iced tea, it would be just as good as it is a hot tea, and a perfect refreshing drink for a hot summers day.

You can purchase Tea Forte Raspberry Nectar directly from their website.