Law school has meant no time and not much spare money. That means that not only have I not had a lot of time to write reviews but I haven’t really been buying tea. So, even if I wanted to write a review, a lot of my teas are so old that I don’t think my reviews would have been fair assessments of the teas. However, like so many of you, I am stuck at home riding out this coronavirus storm which means my schedule has just opened up. Plus, a wonderful friend of mine has shared plenty of teas with me and I have splurged a little so I also have new teas in my cupboard that I can review while they are still in their prime. One such new tea is a super cute blend from DAVIDsTEA called Unicorn Dream.
First of all, while some little girls (and boys) like princesses or mermaids, I was in the unicorn camp. Literally obsessed with unicorns. And while I am older now, I am still a unicorn fan. For my 25th birthday (a few years back now), I had a unicorn-themed sweet table complete with balloon trees. When my sister placed the order for the balloons, the party store thought she made a mistake and actually said it was for a birthday for a 2 and 5 year old, not a 25 year old. Basically, I am sharing this story to make it clear that I am 100% the target audience for this tea.
DAVIDsTEA doubles down on the unicorn fantasy with one of the prettiest blends I have seen in a while. This comes complete with gold sugar pearls, mini marshmallows, pink heart sprinkles, and pink and white unicorn sprinkles, all on top of a colorful fruity/herbal base. It has butterfly pea flowers in it too which means when it brews up, it is a lovely purple color. It really is quite awesome and would probably appeal to the kid in everyone on looks alone.
Looks aren’t everything when it comes to tea though and thankfully it delivers on flavor as well. It is meant to be cotton candy flavored tea. I like to cold brew it because in addition to a berry cotton candy flavor the comes through, it has a marshmallow fluffiness. This is honestly what I imagine a cloud would taste like in a world of unicorns. It is sweet and fruity and definitely candy-like. I might be a bit bias but I genuinely believe this is the perfect tea for any kid, whether they be a young child or a 28-year-old kid at heart like myself. It’s nostalgia in a cup and certainly a ray of sunshine in these crazy times!
Want to Know More About This Tea?
Leaf Type: Herbal
Where to Buy: DAVIDs Tea
Description
Warning: This tea will add some magic to your day. Our caffeine-free fruit infusion is filled with smile-inducing ingredients – from blue butterfly pea, yellow everlasting flowers & pretty pink hibiscus blossoms to unicorn & heart-shaped sprinkles. The result is an enchanting & addictive herbal tea that’s tart and lightly citrusy, with dreamy notes of sweet cotton candy and creamy marshmallow.
Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!
Jumpin’ Jelly Beans from The NecessiTeas. . . . .
Picture this: it’s Easter. You’re eight years old. You see a big ol’ bowl of jellybeans sitting on the kitchen table, waiting for family members to arrive to celebrate and nosh on.
Now picture this: you’re uncomfortable in your Easter dress. You’ve been at church all day. Your kitchen smells delightful, but you have to wait until everyone comes before you can eat anything. You just want A FEW JELLYBEANS, dangit. So you fish out as many of the green beans as you can find, toss them in your Easter hat and sneak away to have a little pre-dinner aperitif.
And then everyone comes for dinner and no one even questions the lack of green jellybeans in the bowl. If there aren’t any at all, did they ever exist in the bowl in the first place? Mwahaha.
You guys– this tea is a perfect recreation of those sugar-filled springtime holiday memories of yore. I iced my sample of this one, because hello– and that was the right decision. It’s a sweet, fresh, fruity candy-Cherry flavor, and makes for a delightful chilled treat anytime of the day, given its lack of caffeine. I could see this one being a great tea for little ones to sip on, as well. This one reads more like a treat tea than an everyday tea for me, but it was especially delightful and spot-on to the flavors noted. And would probably be a great sipping companion to an Easter-hat filled with green jellybeans. Not like I would know.
Here’s the scoop!
Leaf Type: Green Rooibos
Where to Buy: The NecessiTeas
Description
This tea is no longer available but click below for teas that are.
Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!
Grape Freeze from DAVIDsTea. . . .
Everyone has that one (or if you’re me, like, a thousand) weird stories from your childhood. Now, most aren’t going to go sharing them for all the world to know– but sometimes, in the name of tea, awkward stories must be told.
As a younin’, I LOVED all things fruit– real and fresh– of course, but fake fruity flavors, as well. All of it. Gimme.
Around the age of 3 or so, I came down with a bad cold and needed some medicine. Knowing I’d spit out that nasty bubblegum flavored medicine in a heartbeat (sorry, mom), my mother played to my strengths and picked up a bottle of Grape Dimetapp. You know the type– bright purple, tastes nothing like grapes off the vine? That’s the stuff.
Anyways, my three-year-old palate, having no idea this was medicine and not candy, slurped my little plastic dosing cup down willingly. A few hours later, when my mom asked my sisters and I what we wanted to drink with dinner, I of course enthusiastically replied, “DIMETAPP!”
I got water instead. (Thanks, mom. Sorry, mom.)
All of this to say: you guys, I still love that fakey fruity flavor. I am allll about it. It’s not real grape, of course. But it’s delicious nonetheless. And what does this have to do with tea, you ask? On ice, this tea is a Dimetapp dead-ringer. Slightly more adult, mind you– hints of the green tea base in the background, not nearly as saccharine-sweet– but otherwise, spot on. Is it an everyday tea for me? No, probably not. But it is a fun summer treat, harkening back to the quirky palate of my youth? Yup. And it’s a tasty one, at that.
Now if you’ll excuse me– I have a dinnertime beverage to pour for my inner child.
Here’s the scoop!
Where to Buy: DAVIDsTea
Description
This tea is no longer available but click below for teas that are.
Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!
Nature’s Candy – Coconut Chamomile from Petali Teas
Fruit is nature’s candy– a phrase I heard said by many health-nut, earth-loving parents. But it might just be true in the case of Coconut Chamomile from Petali Teas. I got a taste of this blend from my Amoda Tea subscription. With rainbow colors and fun shapes, this tea almost feels like a handful of candies. It includes green kiwi pieces, pink hibiscus, red rose hips, yellow apple pieces, almost-purple cherry slices, and bright white coconut.
The fragrance of this tea blew me away as soon as I opened the bag, giving me a strong whiff of the fruity, sugary, pop of cherries and berries. There are huge slices of dried cherries, bright curls of coconut, and the little round blossoms of chamomile. This blend smells like sour cherry straw candy, or even a bit like traditional, pink bubblegum. The fruit flavors are very forward, but the chamomile base and some creamy coconut help smooth out the tartness into something super sweet and relaxing. The only downside is that this tea is best when brewed with lots of leaves, so I only got two cups out of my sample.
Part of me wants to make sure I always have this blend on hand, like the omnipresent dish of hard candies at grandma’s house. Something simple and sweet to offer the occasional passerby that gets stuck for a while in my living room.
Here’s the scoop!
Leaf Type: Herbal
Where to Buy: Amoda Teas
Description:
A beautiful herbal tea with large pieces of fruit you almost want to eat! Floral flavours of chamomile, delightful fruit, hints of coconut and a perfectly sweet finish. Sip this in the evening and let the chamomile relax you.
Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!
Bubblegum from The NecessiTeas. . . Let the childhood memories begin!
Before I start, I just want to say that The NecessiTeas certainly knows how to fill a tin. I have been opening up new tins of their blends all day and I have spilled tea out of almost every tin. Granted, I may not have been particularly careful and I probably should have learned after the first spill but I am so used to tins being less filled that I didn’t really think about it. Oh well, more tea for me I suppose, especially since it looks like I didn’t even use any tea yet since the tins are still that full.
This particular tin is filled with not only tea but gum as well. Not just any gum either. This blend is filled with the colorful gumballs of everyone’s childhood. The 25 cent gumballs dispensed out of the giant red gumball machines. It’s definitely a blend to bring out the nostalgia in you.
So it might be colorful and look fun but what really matters is the taste. Like all the other NecessiTeas blends I have tried, this one tastes pretty true to its namesake. Sweet and sugary but not cloying in the slightest. Add to that a bit of fruitiness and you got this tea. The green tea base remains completely hidden which is good since I doubt a vegetal flavor would go very well with the rest of what’s going on here.
All in all, like the gumballs for which it is named, this is a sweet treat to have every now and then. It’s got just enough flavor to keep things interesting without being over-the-top. Plus, it is certainly a fun blend for those who want a little bit of novelTEA in their lives.
Here’s the scoop!
Leaf Type: Flavored Green Tea
Where to Buy: The NecessiTeas
Description
We all remember that sweet pink bubblegum flavor as a kid. Contests with your best friend to see who could blow the biggest bubble and then having it pop and stick to your entire face. Chewing it for hours until our jaws ached or falling asleep with it in our mouth which meant waking up with a big sticky mess in our hair! This blend takes me back to all those childhood memories and will be loved by adults and children of all ages. Feel free to steep the actual gumballs or pop one in your mouth and work on your bubble blowing skills while your tea is steeping!
Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!