This countdown is a bit more difficult for a couple of reasons. First, it’s iced tea. I don’t drink a lot of iced tea, especially in the winter, although I certainly do drink some. But, drinking a whole half a gallon in a day? No, I don’t usually drink that much each day.
It’s also a little more difficult because it takes a little longer to produce a cold-brewed pitcher of iced tea. It needs to sit and brew for at least a few hours to get full flavor out of the tea when it’s cold-brewed, and I usually leave the tea in the fridge overnight. So, the difficulty becomes … waiting for the tea to brew.
Butter Beer Iced Tea
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: 52Teas
Learn more about Southern Boy Teas here.
Taster’s Review:
When 52Teas/Southern Boy Teas first introduced this tea as an iced tea, I got very excited, because the original Butter Beer Tea from 52Teas is one of my FAVES from 52Teas. Partly because I asked Frank from 52Teas to create a butter beer-ish sort of tea (yeah, I’m a Harry Potter nerd), and part because it’s just so dang good. So, I was very happy that he decided to add this to his iced tea line.
Cold-brewed, the flavor is a little underwhelming with this tea. Perhaps the issue is that I loved the original Butter Beer Tea so much that maybe this just isn’t living up to that. But I remember that tea being so much more … Butter Beer-ish.
It’s still good, but, it’s a little less than what I envisioned. The black tea base tastes nicely round, and I can taste a butter-scotch-y sort of taste with the flavoring. I’m not getting a whole lot of the chicory notes that were in the original, and I don’t taste a lot of licorice either. I taste hints of root beer, but this tastes more like a cream soda flavored tea than the Butter Beer Tea that I remember.
The hot-brewed, re-steeped tea pouch produces a much more flavorful pitcher of iced tea than the cold-brewed first steep. This tells me that this particular flavor (just like the pink lemonade flavor) should be hot-brewed instead of cold-brewed. But, based on this re-steep, I would say that it’s certainly worth it. This is more of the Butter Beer flavor that I was looking for. I still don’t taste much of the chicory, but, I do get a lot of the butter-scotch-y notes and hints of root beer-ish notes. I find myself still looking for some licorice and the chicory.
When I get around to hot-brewing my second pouch of this tea, I’ll be sure to update you on how well that comes out. In the meantime, this one is good, but, I think that the original was better.