Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Herbal.
Where to Buy: M&K’s Tea Co
Tea Description:
The non-oxidized, green counterpart to the redbush rooibos you may have heard everyone talking about! Less red, more green, less autumn, more spring! Green rooibos tastes much more vegetal and refreshing and less robust than regular rooibos.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
The weather is getting warmer and the spring bug is starting to set in. I’ve noticed that my iced tea intake has gone way up. My kids have the bug too. Everyday they ask me if they HAVE to go to school. My five year old who goes to a pre-K program has already declared himself as being done with learning and school. I had to inform him that he has many years ahead of him and that next year he will be going all day next year versus the half day he currently goes now.
This tea reminds me of springtime. The dry leaves smell very vegetal and have a hay/grass like smell to them. Brewed up (212F-3tbsp-5 minutes in my Breville-then poured into a tumbler of ice) this is honey goodness.
Beautifully done. Smooth and honey like. A well done yet simple tea. I’m not picking up any kind of vegetal flavor like the description had said. That is fine with me. This hit the spot. Just wish I would have brought more along with me. I could drink this all day. Yum!
Canton Chocolate Tea from Canton Tea Co.
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Canton Tea Co.
Tea Description:
Specially created for the Chesterfield Hotel in Mayfair, this luxurious blend of Indian Assam, Chinese Yunnan black, Madagascan vanilla pod and Peruvian cocoa nibs is served daily with their famous Afternoon Tea., It is deep, rich and moreish with a velvety mouthfeel. Extremely satisfying with smooth, malty Assam and a hint of plum from the Yunnan black adding an additional layer of dark fruit. The cocoa nibs and vanilla pod provide the depth and sweetness which complements the heady flavours.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
This Chocolate Tea from Canton Tea Co. is one that I’ve been wanting to try for a while! Let’s face it, whenever I see a new-to-me chocolate tea from just about any tea company, my interest is piqued, but when it comes from a company that I associate with high quality, top-notch teas like Canton Tea Company, then let’s just say that my interest sizzles into very lusty desire.
Yes, I lust for chocolate.
And this tea lived up to my crazy high expectations that I put on it. This is deliciously chocolate. Even with the hint of Madagascar vanilla in this, the flavor is still delightfully dark chocolate-y. Rich and decadent and sweet. Mmm!
The black tea base is rich and satisfying. The combination of Assam and Yunnan is a thoughtful one. The rich, malty notes of the Assam add to the sweetness of the tea. The fruit notes of both teas play to the deep berry notes of the cacao nibs. The slightly spiced notes of the Yunnan enhance the overall experience. The black tea base tastes robust and it’s a solid background of flavor, allowing the flavor of the key ingredient (the chocolate!) to really come out and express itself in a sumptuous, seductive, chocolate-y way.
So good!
The chocolate is a rich, dark chocolate-y flavor as I mentioned before. It has a luscious, creamy taste that Canton describes as velvety and I find myself in complete agreement with that assessment. The vanilla is not overly done, there is just enough vanilla here to add that velvety texture and taste. There is just enough to give the cup some dimension and depth without diminishing that deep, dark chocolate flavor.
If you’re a fan of chocolate teas – put this at the top of your must try list!
DigestTea from Raizana Tea Company
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Herbal
Where to Buy: Raizana Tea Company
Tea Description:
You shouldn’t have eaten that monster burrito or third slice of pizza, and you’re paying for it now. Get relief from gas, bloating and sensation of fullness with DigestTea, our natural remedy for digestive problems.
DigestTea is gentle enough to soothe stomach problems in children. Raizana uses natural herbs sourced in California to provide all-natural support for gas and other digestive problems.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
I have issues with eating certain kinds of food and then feeling disgusting, heavy, and bloated. This especially happens when I have any kind of carbs. So lately I have been doing a lot of research to see if there was some herb or tea that I could drink that would help. That is how I stumbled upon this company, Raizana. They have several different kinds of herbal remedies for what “ails you”. I don’t necessarily believe that there is a skinny tea out there but I do believe that some herbs can make you feel better. So I decided to take a chance and pick up their sampler.
Now to be honest, I am a huge fan of herbal teas. I love chamomile and adore lemongrass in teas. I’m also a huge mint fan and tend to like most mint teas I come across. The biggest reason I picked this tea up was because it had cilantro in it. I had never even heard of a cilantro tea before. I have a love affair with cilantro and sneak it into as many foods as I can. The ingredients also list dill weed and passionflower. I just had to try it!
When I popped open the bag, holy sweetness is all I can say! This definitely has a very sweet bakery smell to it which I think comes from the papaya flavoring and stevia. I steeped this one up per their parameters and was pleasantly surprised. This is one of the sweetest herbal teas I have ever had. And it isn’t that artificial sweet taste. This has an almost dessert quality to it. Like a freshly baked treat. I don’t taste the cilantro at all but definitely pick up the minty notes and chamomile. The lemongrass is also prevalent and letting itself be known but not in an obnoxious way. I even tried this one iced and still had the same outcome. A lemony baked treat. Yum!
Now to whether or not it helps with my digestion, that I really can’t say. I have completely overhauled my diet as of late and am cutting junk food out all together, which was a major cause for a lot of my discomfort. All I can say that this is great for when I have that sweet tooth craving and am looking forward to having this one again.
Premium Dian Hong Gong Fu Black Tea from M&K’s Tea Company
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: M&K’s Tea Company on Etsy
Tea Description:
A young tea (first crafted in 1938), Dianhong Gong Fu tea is a fantastic, full-bodied tea of Yunnan. For a black tea, it is distinctly mellow with subtle fruity notes and a slight maltiness. In the context of tea making, “Gong Fu” can roughly be translated to mean “great skill”, or the skill required to craft the tea, while “Dian Hong” (or Dianhong) means “Yunnan Red” (Dian being short for Yunnan and hong meaning red (as in red tea)).
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Mmm! This Premium Dian Hong Gong Fu Black Tea from M&K’s Tea Company is wonderful!
It’s a smooth, flavorful tea with a note of tangy astringency toward the finish. I notice that the astringency starts out rather faint but as I continue to sip, the astringency builds. It doesn’t become really strong or anything, but, it is definitely stronger now than when I first started sipping on this cup. It’s a drier finish now than when I first started drinking this tea.
It’s a full-flavored tea but it’s not an overly aggressive tea, as the description above implies, it has a mellowness to it that I quite like. This would be a great tea to serve in the afternoon as a pick-me-up, but not a tea that I’d reach for in the morning when I want that boost of gusto.
Nice fruity notes – I taste plum! There are notes of malt but not a strong ‘sweetness’ to this tea. There is a balance between sweet and savory.
Overall, a really enjoyable cup of tea. I don’t know that this is the best Dian Hong black tea that I’ve tried, but it’s a mighty fine one.
Caravan Triad Tea from Brooklyn Tea Blends Co.
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Brooklyn Tea Blends Co.
Tea Description:
BROOKLYN TEA BLENDS CARAVAN TRIAD is a perfect marriage of three black teas. Blended together to achieve a memorizing complex but smooth taste. Richly and malty yet with great harmony of spices, fruits and wealth of smolderingly smoky aroma.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
I was excited when I heard about Caravan Triad Tea from Brooklyn Tea Blends Co. Not necessarily because it’s a caravan tea which to me means ‘smoky’ and I’ve mentioned more than once that I’m not a huge fan of smoky teas, but because it was a new to me tea crafted by a new to me tea company!
So I contacted them immediately and they sent me a sample. You can also get a sample (a very generous sized sample!) of this tea for a limited time (the website says that the samples will be available through May 2015).
And while this is indeed a smoky tea that is composed of 60% Lapsang Souchong, I like that when I opened the pouch, I wasn’t overwhelmed with smoke. And now that I sit here with a cup of the brewed tea in front of me, I’m not being overwhelmed with a smoky aroma wafting out of the cup. There are some smoky notes, yes, but they don’t overpower the cup. I also smell some really lovely fruit notes to this cup and I like the way those notes mingle with the smoke.
I’m loving the flavor of this tea! Yes, the smoke is a dominant flavor profile, but, there are so many lovely layers to this Caravan Triad! It doesn’t impart a heavy smoky taste on the palate and I don’t experience a residual smoky aftertaste, which I really like.
I am picking up on a strong fruity essence to this. Notes of plum! And just as I enjoyed how the aroma of smoke and fruit mingled, I am also enjoying how the smoky flavor mingles with the plum notes. It evokes thoughts of a plum that’s been smoked over a plank of pine wood.
Unlike some other ‘smoky’ teas, I appreciate that the pine notes don’t taste ‘burnt’ or ‘charcoal-y.’ The pine adds a certain crispness that is similar to a minty crispness but without the mint overtones. This is nicely round with sweet and savory notes.
This is a tea I’d recommend for late morning or afternoon sipping. This isn’t the kind of tea that I’d want to reach for first thing in the morning. It doesn’t have that same ‘gusto’ that I want for my first cup. This is more of a contemplative type of tea, something that you want to take a moment and sit back and take the time to explore the dimensions of flavor. There are so many delicate nuances to this tea that are just waiting to be discovered!
This is definitely one of the nicer smoky blends that I’ve tried, mostly because the smoke is gentle and unassuming here. It doesn’t aggressively assert itself into my tea drinking experience the way Lapsang Souchong can do. It allows me to sit back and enjoy subtle notes of smoke as well as the many other delicious layers of flavor. I highly recommend this tea to anyone who would typically shy away from a ‘smoky’ tea because they find it too overbearing. This tea will surprise you in a very good way!