Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Herbal
Where to Buy: Piper & Leaf
Tea Description:
A Juicy Fruit & Herbal Infusion of Pineapples, Papayas, Rosehips, & a Special Herbal Blend (lemon balm & mint).
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
In the past, I have tried different Piper & Leaf teas. What I have found is that you have to experiment with their steeping parameters to get the right flavors to really pop.
Orchard Peach is an herbal filled with huge chunks of peaches and a cluster of other ingredients including hibiscus and spearmint. As a dry leaf mixture, I didn’t really get any kind of notable fragrance. More or less just a sweet smell.
I brewed this up like I would any herbal (212F-5 min) and poured the mixture into a cup of ice. Yes, I know that this isn’t the true way to make the iced tea but I’m at work so I figured this was the easiest way to go about it. The mixture produced this beautiful dark red purple liquor. The color was stunning.
Took my first sip and blam- this tea packs some flavor. I was expecting to have to fumble with steeping longer or shorter. Not the case at all. This tea tastes like a fresh peach jam punch. The flavor is a bit hard to explain. I think because it looks more like grape juice, my head is saying this should taste like grape.
The first flavor that hits you is the sweet flavor. The peach notes aren’t like a fresh peach but more like a fresh peach jam that you picked up from a farmer’s market. There is a really slight syrup sweetness that I’m associating with a jam. After the sweetness you get this really nice tart flavor that brings in a beautiful contrast. Here and there I can pick up subtle lemon notes but they are very subtle and are more like a citrus note. The only flavor I didn’t pick up strongly was the spearmint. Being a mint fan that makes me sad but that is probably for the best. Not sure how a minty peach jam tea would taste. Maybe Piper & Leaf are just looking out for my best interest.
Out of all of the Piper & Leaf teas, this one surprised me with not having to try and figure out proper steeping parameters. This one packs a delightful punch and the ingredients that are left over in the tea strainer remind me of cranberry salad. That just makes me smile. I’m really happy with this one and it is hitting the spot on this hot summer day!
