Tea Reviews | It's All About The Leaf

Posts Tagged ‘Teabag’

Through my use of the tea tray, I have come to determine that it is a wonderful product.
At first, the tea trays seem a bit frivolous. The question that initially came to my mind is “Why would anyone spend money on something created specifically to hold used tea bags, when they could just as easily use a small plate, or even just dispose of the tea bag straight away?”
So, determined to answer this question, I prepared myself some tea (Tea Forte’s Orchid Vanilla, as the trays were clearly meant to be primarily used with Tea Forte pyramid bags).
Here were my findings:

Great things about the tea trays:
-They’re small, thus conserving the space used on one’s desk/table/etc. (This was especially helpful on my desk, which has a lot of papers and other items on it, and where a small plate for used tea bags would be a waste of space)
-They provide a drip-free resting place in the chance that you want to save the tea bag for another steeping.
-The tea trays are aesthetically pleasing, making them great to give as gifts or to add a bit of decoration at tea time.
-The size of the tea trays is such that they could just as easily be used with other tea bags as drip trays.
-The construction is really solid. These trays are not going to break easily if they are accidentally dropped.

Not so great things (that might not matter) about the tea trays:
-These trays really are not so special and innovative that one would go out and buy them to complete one’s collection of teaware.
-The shallow indentation in the tray was not deep enough, and the excess liquid in my teabag ended up overflowing the lip of the tray’s depression. (I may not have let the tea bag drip off long enough.)
-Because of the shallow indentation, when I picked up the tray to drain it off and clean it, the smallest tilt caused tea to run off the edge.

You can purchase the Tea Tray directly from the Tea Forte website.

Todays tea is the Kalahari Tea, Red Tea Kalahari Reserve. I personally love Rooibos tea, the sweetness and nuttiness of it. I was looking forward to a good cup of high quality Rooibos tea, with a name like Reserve, it sounds pretty exclusive!

From the Kalahari Tea website: “Kalahari Reserve is 100% pure red tea, selected from the tender tips of the Rooibos bush. With it’s sweet, smooth taste, it can be enjoyed by itself, or with milk, lemon or a sweetener. Rich in antioxidants, red tea tastes great and is naturally caffeine free. It’s the healthy drink you can consume all day long.”

First of all, I heated the water to 100 deg C, pretty standard for Rooibos. I brewed the teabag for 5 mins., again, pretty standard. There are no instructions on the bag teabag package, and it is not very attractive, with just a typed name on it. It would be nice to see some sort of design, something to say that this is more than a boring old teabag!

The tea is a deep amber, again, what I come to expect from a Rooibos tea. The taste is slightly sweet, with some spicy notes – unique for Rooibos, as I have not really tasted any spice in a straight Rooibos before. Unfortunately, that is the end of the distinguishing characteristics for this tea. The brew is bland, almost stale tasting. I don’t detect any nuttiness whatsoever, and I found that I did not enjoy the tea at all. Not an offensive taste, just non-memorable. I am still waiting an enjoyable Kalahari Tea, and I am sure that it is there, I just have not found it yet!

Can anyone suggest which of the following is a good tea to review from them: Ruby Grapefruit White Tea, Cherry Vanilla Chocolatte Red Tea, Highlands Honey Red Tea, Safary Lullaby Red Tea – I really don’t want to do any more negative Kalahari reviews! Leave your comments below.

You can purchase Kalahari Tea Kalahari Reserve Red Tea directly from their website.

I love Tea Forte. Every single tea that I have tried to date has been flavourful, without being overwhelming. I also quite enjoy Oolong Tea. To date, I have mostly focused on the darker, more oxidized Formosa Oolongs, and enjoy the robust flavours that they produce. With that in mind, I reached for the Tea Forte Silk Oolong this morning to give it a try.

First of all, Tea Forte has packaging nailed. The Chest that was sent to us contains the teas nicely, and the pyramid tea bags and wrapping are minimalist enough to let you focus on the tea, while giving you the impression that, even tho this is a teabag, you are about to embark on a high quality tea experience. In the past, I found for the most part the bags give enough room for the teas to expand, so I was not too worried about this here, even tho it is an Oolong that should expand enough to release all the flavours.

I have to say, that this is the first Tea Forte that has disappointed me. Perhaps my expectations were too high going into it. First of all, clearly there was not enough room for the tea to expand in the tea bag. After brewing it at about 195 deg F for about 3 minutes, the tea leaves were straining the confines of the bag. Usually, you can get a nice scent of the tea through the bag, and certainly once it has hit the water, but here, I found the scent to be very muted and almost undetectable.

The tea it’s self is nothing to write home about. It is very light, bordering on almost tasteless. It is certainly smooth as the name “Silk Oolong” implies, but has no interesting aftertaste that lingers, and is overall, unmemorable. Perhaps being used to stronger Oolong infusions I was prepared for a stronger tea, but this certainly is not that. It leaves me feeling indifferent enough to it that I am not even going to bother with a second or third infusion.

Maybe if you steeped it for much longer, you could coax more flavour out of it, or even cutting the leaves out of the bag, buy why do that when you receive it in a bag? You can purchase the loose leaves from Tea Forte directly, but for the price (Tea Forte teas can tend to the expensive side), I don’t see the value on this tea.

Overall, Tea Forte is a fantastic company producing fantastic teas, but in this case, it is one tea that I would remove from the lineup, as it does not seem to fit into the flavourful, memorable teas that I have come to know Tea Forte for.

You can purchase Tea Forte Silk Oolong 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!

Let me start with the statement that I do NOT consider myself a tea snob. My philosophy is, any tea, any time, any way. However, it was with some trepidation that I approached the Celestial Seasoning Sleepytime Vanilla Tea.

You see I grew up drinking tea via teabag. You know, Tetley, Sleepytime, etc. When I discovered loose leaf tea, I felt that I had moved on, forever putting behind the regular boring old teabag. Much to my surprise however, a shipment from Celestial Seasonings showed up on the doorstep for review, so I thought, why not? Of course I will try it, I am not a snob, they must have come a long way since I was a kid, after all, it is their 40th anniversary, so there must be something to the tea!

The scent when you open up the package was amazing – sweet and minty like peppermint candy. I could feel myself starting to drool already! I was really looking forward to this cup of tea. I extracted a teabag, and the butterflies started. They are the regular old teabags we all know – paper, attached together and perforated for “easy” separation, (I ripped 2 open trying to “easily” separate them…) but the smell… mmmmmm…

When I examined the bag’s contents, it was pretty much what I expected, not just small leaves, but pretty much dust, not much recognizable here. Preparation numero uno was boiling water, 5 minute steep. This produced a golden amber liquid, with distinctly distinguishable scents of Chamomile, Mint and Vanilla. As I went to remove the teabag, it occurred to me that there is no string attached! That is odd, and unexpected, and, well, inconvenient if you did not have a spoon around, as that water is HOT!

As for the taste, the best way that I can describe it is hot, and frankly, tasteless. I was so incredibly disappointed. The scent to this point, and even now as I reminisce about it, was incredible, the buildup to tasting almost unbearable, making the actual tasting experience a total of a letdown. I thought I was in for something different, but memories of drinking tea as a child flood back as I sip hot, tasteless, colorful and beautiful scented, water.

What to do? Well, why not go back to my roots I figured, so I added *GASP* sugar! Just a bit, maybe half a teaspoon – that could not hurt it right? Well, with just that bit of sugar, all of a sudden the tea came alive, and I could taste the Chamomile, and the sweetness of Vanilla and even the Peppermint goodness!

So, in the end, all is well that ends well, I would recommend that if you are not a sugar person, avoid this tea, as the taste of the tea by its self is remarkably unremarkable, but with that sugar, it is a good tea, delivering what you would expect. The only question left is, will Celestial Seasonings Sleepytime Vanilla Tea put me to sleep tonight, or will I be tossing and turning all night, ruminating how this tea could have been so much better?

You can purchase
Celestial Seasoning Sleepytime Vanilla directly from their website.