Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black (Darjeeling)
Where to Buy: Teabox
Tea Description:
An exclusive in house creation by our master blenders. For this blend, lemon grass and fennel are mixed with aromatic Darjeeling black tea to create a medley of flavors.
The citrusy perfume emitted by the lemon grass is quite heady and gives a fresh twist to the chai. A must try for all chai lovers.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
This Darjeeling Masala Chai from Teabox is another ‘questionable’ use of the word “chai” – yes, I know that chai means tea (and I know that I’ve said that on more than one occasion too!) but we’ve come to embrace the word “chai” as a spiced tea – and those spices are generally a combination of the usual spices: cinnamon, ginger, cloves and cardamom – sometimes one or more of these is omitted and other spices like pepper or nutmeg are added.
This “chai” has none of the usual spices and instead has fennel seed and lemon grass. But what really piqued my interest about this particular chai is not the substitution of spices but the fact that this is a Darjeeling base! I can’t recall having tried a chai with a Darjeeling base before. That doesn’t mean that I haven’t, just that I can’t recall.
So, I was certainly interested in trying this chai. And while it isn’t at all what most might think of when they think “chai” – this is really quite good. I may call into question the liberal use of the word chai by Teabox, but this is still a really tasty tea!
This isn’t really a ‘spicy’ tea, but it does have some warm notes from the fennel. The fennel is both sweet and gently ‘spiced’ with notes of licorice. It adds a certain comforting warmth to the cup. The lemon grass adds a hint of bright, citrus-y flavor to the cup and a light creaminess to the Darjeeling which has a crisp flavor.
It’s a lighter bodied tea, it would make a nice afternoon tea. I like the fennel and lemon grass with the Darjeeling, they certainly add some interest to the woodsy, floral tones of the Darjeeling base.
Overall, a very interesting tea. I don’t know that I’d call it a chai, but I suppose it’s alright if Teabox does. I enjoyed it, regardless!
Kolkata Street Chai Tea from Teabox
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Teabox
Tea Description:
This particular blend has been created using rich Assam tea and exotic Indian spices, including saffron, cardamom, nutmeg and ginger to make an extraordinary cup of chai. The flavor is virile and aroma heady. Savor a cup of this tea inspired by the city of joy – Kolkata.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
The photo shows a few saffron threads in the Kolkata Street Chai Tea from Teabox, but I didn’t see that many when I measured out the tea into the basket of my Kati tumbler. In fact, I only saw one tiny piece of what might have been a saffron thread when I measured out my heaping bamboo scoop. There could have been more in there, I could have missed a small piece or two, but the picture shows numerous long threads of saffron. In reality, what I have is a fraction of a fraction of one thread.
I do realize that saffron is one of the most expensive spices out there (if not the most expensive) and to add it so liberally to a tea blend would be very costly. Given that they’re selling this blend for just under $10 for 100 grams of the tea, I can see why they need to be thrifty with the saffron threads, but don’t mislead the customers by showing a photograph with many saffron threads when the blend contains less than a fraction of that.
All that aside, this is a very tasty chai. The CTC Assam is very rich and malty. It’s somewhat astringent, but not overly so. It’s not bitter although I do get some bitterness from the saffron. I steeped the tea in near boiling water as per the suggested parameters on the website, and steeped it for only 3 minutes rather than the suggested 4 minutes. The black tea is full flavored and satisfying. It’s a good base for the spices.
I like the combination of spices here. Yes, I can taste the saffron (even a small amount IS effective). As I mentioned before, I get a slight bitter note from the saffron as well as a hint of honey like flavor from it. The honey-esque notes are a wonderful complement to the warm notes of cardamom and ginger, and I love the nutty flavor of the nutmeg in this.
I’m usually quite happy when I find a chai with nutmeg in the blend and of the many different chai blends that I’ve tasted over the years, I must say that this one has the most obvious nutmeg flavor to it! Quite a delight to taste!
I really enjoyed this tea despite my misgivings about the misleading photograph. The chai blend is very flavorful and I do recommend it. But I also would recommend to Teabox that they represent their tea more truthfully in the photograph. If someone buys this based on what they’re seeing in the photograph, they’re going to be disappointed when they open the package to find significantly less saffron than the photo suggests.
Organic Chai from Twinings of London
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Twinings of London
Tea Description:
Select black tea from Assam expertly blended with sweet and savoury spices including cinnamon, cardamom, cloves and ginger to deliver a flavourful tea with a warm, soothing aroma and a fresh, spicy taste.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
After trying two other rather lackluster teas from Twinings of London recently, I wasn’t sure what possessed me to actually try another today. But I tried to keep a positive outlook and without having too high of expectations, I brewed this cup of Organic Chai from Twinings of London.
My initial thoughts: this is better than both the two previous recent tastings of this company’s teas. I can taste the robust Assam tea beneath the bold spices. I like that all the flavors that I expected to taste are represented.
About now is where I might say something like “the flavor of the spices are well-balanced,” but I can’t really say that because they aren’t well balanced. I taste more clove than any other spice. I taste a hearty cinnamon flavor and in contrast, there is very little ginger flavor. The cardamom is tasted, but, it’s not as strong as the clove and cinnamon.
But! I do like the Assam here. It’s a rich and flavorful tea. It’s almost creamy because of its thick, malty texture and I find that very enjoyable.
Overall, it’s not a terrible chai. It’s certainly not great though. It’s not the tea that I’d keep stocked in the cabinet. There are so many great teas out there and this is simply average or perhaps even just slightly below.
Product Review: Gingerbread Chai Latte from Coffee Revolution
Product Information:
Where to Buy: If you live in Vancouver, WA: Coffee Revolution.
Taster’s Review:
As I’ve said before, I don’t stop in to my local coffee shop(s) often. Here in Vancouver, Washington – and pretty much anywhere in the Pacific Northwest – there’s a coffee shop at street corner, it seems. My husband and I often joke at the number of Starbucks that there are. If you happen to pass by a Starbucks, you don’ t need to turn around and go back, just keep going and there will be another one coming up on the next street corner. In Portland, I understand there’s a Starbucks inside a Starbucks.
So I was less than impressed a couple of years ago when Coffee Revolution appeared in Vancouver at a location not far from my house. I don’t usually go to the coffee shop, why would I go to this one?
But they hooked me in with their fancy digital billboard sign outside of their shop. It beckoned to me: Gingerbread Chai. How do I resist that?
As it turns out, I wish I would have. Essentially, this is the original Oregon Chai concentrate that’s been enhanced with Gingerbread flavored syrup. The result: an overly sweet concoction that tasted like gingerbread (with gobs of extra icing).
Yeah, I taste the chai. I don’t really taste much of the ‘black tea’ that is supposed to be in the Oregon Chai concentrate. When I’ve tried this brand of chai concentrate in the past, I didn’t taste the black tea either, so it’s not the sickeningly sweet gingerbread syrup’s fault that I can’t taste the tea. It’s the concentrate’s fault.
The good: I can taste the gingerbread. If this were not as sweet, I’d be a lot more pleased with it though. As it is, it’s just too sweet. It’s cloying. It’s so sweet that if I were a diabetic, I’d be worried about diabetic coma at this point.
On another note, I do feel bad. Because as I was standing there, waiting for the very cheerful barrista to finish with my latte, I’m sure she could see just how disgusted I was that my chai was coming out of a carton. It wasn’t her fault. She was just doing her job. So, if she happens to be reading this, I’m sorry if I came off as a tea snob. I am, in fact, a tea snob and I don’t apologize for that, but just because I’m a tea snob doesn’t mean that I should be rubbing others the wrong way with it. Sorry.
Pipers Chai from Pipers Loose Leaf Tea
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Pipers Loose Leaf Tea
Tea Description:
Black tea infused with black pepper, cloves, ginger, cinnamon, cardamom and vanilla and orange flavor. Add milk and your preferred sweetener or sweetened condensed milk for a rich, spicy chai.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
This Pipers Chai from Pipers Loose Leaf Tea is the first tea from this new-to-me company that I’ve tried. I was in the mood for something satisfying and warming from the inside out and this tea certainly fits the bill.
I brewed this chai in my Kati tumbler, using 1 1/2 bamboo scoops of tea and 12 ounces of boiling water. I steeped it for three minutes, and it produced a really strong, warming cup of tea! Nice!
The black tea is a robust black tea. The description doesn’t tell me what type of tea is used here, but I think – based upon the richness of the tea – it’s an Assam. There are also some faint notes of bitterness which hint further at the Assam.
The spices are bold. There’s a lot of clove in there though. I find myself tasting more clove than any other spice. The cinnamon and cardamom are warm and the ginger and pepper add some kick to it. I think it would be better if the clove were not quite as strong so that the other spices could shine through better, it might make for a more balanced spicy note.
The vanilla is the best part of this blend. It adds a nice creaminess to this and accentuates the malt notes of the black tea base. It softens some of the edges to the tea and it gives a slight ‘latte’ taste to the cup without going latte with a dairy addition. It also adds a pleasant sweetness so you don’t have to add too much in the way of sweetener to this (I suggest tasting before you sweeten so you don’t add too much and overwhelm the tea.)
The orange is a nice flavor here too, however, I think it could be even better without it. I don’t mind the orange, it tastes good with the orange notes, but I think that it detracts a little bit from the spice and I find myself wanting to focus more on the spice and a little less on the citrus.
Overall, I enjoyed this chai.