Spiced Apple Tisane from DAVIDsTEA

spicedappleTea Information:

Leaf Type:  Tisane

Where to Buy: DAVIDsTEA

Tea Description:

What does comfort mean to you? It might be a favourite sweater, an old family recipe or a perfect cup of tea. For us, it’s all about capturing warm and cozy flavours – like this sweet and spicy blend of apple, figs and chai spices. Laced with cinnamon and star anise, it brings back memories of apple picking, piping hot cider and fresh-from-the-oven pies. Basically, it’s like a hug in a cup. And whether you pair it with a good book or some great company, we guarantee it’s as comforting as it gets.

Learn more about this tea here.

Taster’s Review:

Spiced Apple was DAVIDsTEA’s September Tea of The Month though from the looks of it this tisane could seamlessly blend in with the Fall Collection. As it stands, every season is seems like DT finds a way to incorporate yet another new apple tea into the mix (this season Honeycrisp Apple). Personally, I feel like that’s a played out idea and each new one that they come up with excites me less and less. This season in particular feels especially saturated; but nonetheless here I am trying this newest tea regardless so I suppose I can’t complain too much.

Dry; this tisane smells more like those little cinnamon heart Valentine’s candies to me more than anything else – but I get apple too; it’s like some kind of mulled cider but heavy on the cinnamon. I wish I could smell the clove more. I can tell it’s gonna be sweet; star anise kind of instantly does that to tea. Now to try the hot brew.

Oh! Instant cinnamon hearts. Now that I’ve gone there mentally it’s hard to taste something else. With the level of anise-y sweetness and concentrated cinnamon (but not hot or dry cinnamon) you’d expect the liquor to look as bright, vibrant red as those little candies leave your tongue looking. I can taste clove, but it’s secondary to cinnamon and by quite a lot. The more I’m drinking, the more I taste the other components of the tea: apple, anise, and sort of a cardamom note too. I’m not really getting and distinctly fig tasting notes, and lowkey that’s what sold me on this tea in the first place.

I have to say, it started out alright but the flavour of both the ‘cinnamon hearts’ and apple cider really builds as my mug gets emptier and by the time I was on the last few sips I was already sick of this tea: it gets very cloyingly sweet despite having spicy elements working against that. I could never justify adding sweetener to this. I’m wondering how to best finish off the sample I got – currently I’m leaning towards cold brewing because that’s just what I do. My theory is that cold brewing would balance the flavours a little better.

Not bad, though. Certainly worth a try and worth taking the time to tweak it.

Enlighten Mint Yerba Mate from Guayaki

EnlightenmintTea Information:

Leaf Type:  Yerba Mate

Where to Buy:  Guayaki

Tea Description:

Enlighten Mint has a minty flavor with a touch of honey flavor, and an earthy note from the yerba mate.   It’s easy drinking and clean tasting, and not too sweet.

Learn more about this tea here.

Taster’s Review:

Continuing with the exploration of  Guayaki drinks, this is the one I was most skeptical about of the three I picked up. I’ve tried a few yerba mate and spearmint blends, and actually have one stocked right now so I know that it’s not a terrible pairing; in fact it’s a pretty popular pairing. It’s actually the honey aspect of this that scares me; when it comes to more commercial tea beverages, ‘honey’ usually means very sweet.

However, because Revel Berry maintained a respectable level of sweetness I was open to this one; hopefully it would do the same. I was poorly mistaken in my assumptions, however. This was assaulting; the spearmint was ridiculously strong and sweet in and of itself; like those Spearmint leaf five cent gummy candies that come in giant bulk bags. I’ve never been a fan of those. They taste so fake. On top of that the sweetness of the honey was equally as intense. The yerba mate, while pretty drowned up, did come through a little bit but it felt kind of grimy, and yet at the same time all three notes together conjured up the image of neon green slime.

To me, it tasted like one of those five cent candies dipped into a bottle of raw honey and then sprinkled with a little dirt. Why would you willingly put that in your mouth? I struggled through a third of the can and then finally called it quits and tossed it. It makes me more skeptical to try the third, and last, one I bought now knowing just how big the range between ‘hit’ and ‘miss’ from this company can be. Personally, I’ll be avoiding (and internally wincing) this flavor every time I pass it in the aisles at work – but if you’re feeling bold enough, and you like super sweet mint flavored things, I guess giving it a try couldn’t hurt.

Hard Candy Tisane from DAVIDsTEA

Hard CandyTea Information:

Leaf Type:  Herbal/Tisane

Where to Buy:  DAVIDsTEA

Tea Description:

Looking for a new way to satisfy your sweet tooth? This sweet and tangy tea is where it’s at. With sour cherries, kiwi and coconut, it has all the taste of a candy shop treat – at next to no calories. Brewed over ice, it’s a deliciously fruity, kid-friendly summer treat. And brewed extra-strong then topped up with sparkling water, it’s an unbeatably refreshing TeaPop. How sweet is that?

Learn more about this tea here.

Taster’s Review:

This is part two of a five part review of the DAVIDsTEA Summer Collection.

This year I found myself relatively interested in all five teas offered from DT’s Summer Collection so I decided to do a review of the whole collection here on SororiTea Sisters. Not all the teas are going to be prepared the same way; I decided to go with my gut and prepare each in the way I thought that they were best suited for. Now, because DT has marketed/designed these blends to be prepared iced that does mean most of the five teas were tried in a cold preparation style.

This is not an exception; for my first taste of the summer collection I decided to cold brew this one. Based on the initial stream of reviews on Steepster this blend seems to be pretty well liked; as of writing my review there aren’t really any bad reviews of this tisane. That’s definitely unusual, and it has me quite curious especially since this is the blend I was least interested in initially.

Dry I think this has a really intense aroma, and it reminds me a lot of Lipsmacker’s Strawberry Kiwi flavour. It’s very over the top, and really candy sweet. And as long as this doesn’t mysteriously pick up a ‘waxy’ taste then I think that’s a good thing because candy is obviously what DT was going for. I’m not totally sure where I’m getting strawberry from though since that is definitely not one of the ingredients in this: but it’s distinctly strawberry and NOT cherry or cranberry.

Steeped up and strained this has a powerful flavour; it’s incredibly sweet with just a hint of tartness. The first thing I noticed was actually the absence of a flavor – coconut in this case. DAVIDsTEA is really heavy handed with coconut as an ingredient, in fact three out of five of this seasons blends have coconut as an ingredient! It’s only the returning blends that don’t, and I can’t help but wonder if they were maybe so popular because of the lack of coconut. I definitely anticipated the coconut to be strong though – and I’m not getting it at all. It’s really weird, actually. And thinking about it, I don’t remember seeing any coconut shreds in the measured out leaf either.

The first flavor I’m actually tasting though is the kiwi – it’s much strong than I thought it would be. It’s followed closely behind by very plump, juicy cherry, cranberry and – yes, strawberry notes too. It tastes A LOT like Strawberry Kiwi Lipsmacker, no matter how hard I try to shake the comparison. Another popular comparison with this one is Jolly Ranchers; both cherry and watermelon. I can understand the comparison, but I don’t necessarily agree with it. Although, it’s reminding me a lot of a summer cold brew favourite of mine: Prickly Pear from Tea Desire, and now that I’m thinking about it not only do both teas have intense kiwi flavour but Prickly Pear also has a rich melon flavour so maybe I am subconsciously drawing melon comparisons too.

I may be the first ‘negative’ review of this one though; while I didn’t think it was bad I did think that ultimately there was too much going on about about half way through my cold brew I was just getting really sick of the intense sweetness and artificial fruit flavours. I get why it’s getting good reviews so far, it’s different from a lot of other tisanes from DT; but I’d call myself neutral at best. It’s not going to be a restock for me.