Tea Reviews | It's All About The Leaf

Posts Tagged ‘Tea Blends’

I tend to like tropical tastes. Much to the chagrin of my family, when I order pizza, I usually choose pineapple and ham as toppings. This just grosses people out but I like it. So how about pineapple tastes in tea?…keep that thought in mind, okay now add to it guava. This combination makes me think that you’ll either love it or hate it. As separate food and drink items, I like it so I’m game to try the combo too. Not too sure about the flower petals in it though. We’ll see.

Opened up the package and found a mesh-stitched teabag filled with not small fannings or dust in the teabag but whole leaves that looked of good quality and only a tiny bit of blue flower petals. Steeped the teabag in boiling water for 3 minutes as per the instructions. Aroma is very fruity and floral. A very pleasant fragrance.

I agree with Mighty Leaf that the “green tea blends harmoniously with the sweet tropical fruits of pineapple and guava” and this may be part of the problem. It would have been more distinctive had the green tea had some of the characteristic grassy or vegetal notes of other green teas. Because of this, it tasted more like a tisane than a green tea blend. The taste of pineapple also seems to be lost in a stronger base note of the sweet guava. The blend does seem to come together quite naturally with the floral notes. It is an okay beverage but tastes too much like many fruity, floral teas I’ve tasted. It doesn’t stand out but it’ll do. I could take it or leave it.

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

Dry smell of the leaves brings forward a “sweet” wafting.

Dry appearance of leaves: At first glance, it appears to be just broken tea leaves, but upon further inspection you notice the small black pellets known as Gunpowder. Gunpowder is made up of leaves hand-rolled into tiny pellets. These resemble gunpowder, thus the name! (Now, that is a cool fact). Small green Mint leaves against the black Ceylon leaves and the blackish pellets create a nice mixture. I admit I did not notice the gunpowder pellets at first, but now they are what I see first! It is funny how your perspective can change when you have gained new facts.

I was curious about the gunpowder pellets so I took just one and put in hot water and watched in amazement as this teeny little speck turned into a tea leaf that measured over 1″ in length! As I am watching the agony of the leaf, I realize that whatever amount of gunpowder that is in my infuser basket has not unfurled all the way. I can see a second and perhaps a third infusion in my near future and that is what makes loose leaf tea so affordable. Not only are you getting a better cup of tea, it is also cost efficient costing just pennies per cup, NOW that is a bargain!

Brew this tea like you would a green tea. A quick 2 minute brew and my first sip is a mild peppermint sensation. The more I drink the more I notice the peppermint taking center stage in this blend. Not the lead role, but certainly a good supportive role. Since this is a blend the astringency was masked from my detection radar.

I do not taste the Ceylon base or the Green tea base, one over the other. It is just a mild peppermint in a good tea base. I have been drinking black and green tea blends lately and I like what I taste. The bitterness of a black tea base is camouflaged by the often times grassy taste of a green tea and vice versa. Separately I have to put additions in most black teas and I pour out most greens that I brew. But together, they forge a mild tea with a lower caffeine level that is most enjoyable after a meal. As this cools down the peppermint is less noticeable and the black Ceylon has come forward to take a bow.

As I finish up this pot of tea, my mouth has become very dry. One way to combat the amount of astringency in teas is to brew at a lower temperature and/or a shorter amount of time. My last sip is much cooler and a bitterness has set in that I did not notice when I first started this review. I like this tea well enough to play around with the brewing parameters a bit until I find just the right combo for my finicky taste.

I do agree with TeaFrog, this tea should be a staple in every tea lover’s cabinet.

You can purchase the Asian Mint directly from the TeaFrog website.

Ginger Peach is a popular flavor combination.  It’s also a very difficult one to pull off.   Too much ginger and the peach will disappear.   Too much peach and any discernible ginger is gone.  Sometimes popular dessert combinations do not translate well to tea blends.   Red Leaf does a better job than most with their Ginger Peach offering.

The dry leaves have a distinct peach aroma and it’s very difficult to pick up traces of ginger.   But that’s a good sign:  the ginger should not overwhelm the peach in the tea liquor.  After a three minute brew, the leaves looked bright green and I wondered if Red Leaf had mixed some green in with the black tea.   The underlying tea is certainly black, but the short, choppy green leaves were attractive.   The dried peach and ginger bits had expanded, of course, and looked quite nice.  The scent of the steeped tea proved a contrast to the dry tea in that the ginger stepped forward and claimed its primacy.  It was not a very strong or tangy ginger.  The aroma was more subdued and not at all piquant.

The tea is a pleasure to drink.  The ginger and peach seem to be engaged in a stately gavotte in which each flavor takes the lead by turns and then politely turns over the position of primacy to the other.  I’ve never experienced a ginger peach that was as successful in allowing each flavor to shine so distinctly.  

I recommend this tea for a quiet afternoon drink or as an accompaniment to a meal that includes some ginger components.  It would also be a great choice to serve as a dessert tea and would be brilliant for a themed dessert.  Whip up some Ginger Peach Pandowdy or Ginger Peach crumble and serve this tea with it.   You will have a sensational hosting moment!  The tea does not need sugar, but I added some for my second steep and the sugar did not overcome the tea at all but enhanced it nicely.   Red Leaf has another success to add to its already impressive resumé of teas.

You can purchase the Ginger Peach directly from the Red Leaf Tea website.