Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Southern Boy Teas
Tea Description:
This super refreshing and delicious iced tea will definitely get you in the mood for spring. We’ve blended our sweet organic Chinese sencha fannings green tea with organic cantaloupe, strawberry, blackberry and blueberry flavors. Be warned, this will disappear out of your fridge really fast!
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn about SBT’s subscriptions here.
Taster’s Review:
If you’re a frequent reader of our site, then you’ve probably already read a review of this Cantaloupe & Berries Green Tea from Southern Boy Teas! A few of the sisters are fans of Southern Boy Teas!
I recently acquired a new iced tea jar. I’ve been looking for either a half gallon or gallon sized glass jar (not a pitcher but a jar) and I’ve finally found one. This search started several years ago when I was still yearning to make sun tea – before I discovered the joy of cold-brewing tea.
Note: sun brewing tea is essentially the same thing as cold brewing tea. The big difference is that with cold-brewing tea, you don’t leave the jar out in the sun, you stash it in the fridge. This bestows one obvious benefit onto the brewed tea: it’s COLD when it’s finished brewing. I don’t think the sun actually ‘brews’ the tea. The steep in the water brews the tea. I don’t know that the sun actually does anything to the flavor. But, I don’t think you could have convinced me of that a few years ago before I actually tried cold-brewing tea.
So I don’t know why it was still important for me to have a jar. I have an awesome iced tea pitcher that works great for cold-brewing tea. And to be honest, I prefer my awesome iced tea pitcher over the new tea jar, primarily because this jar has a very annoying lid. It screws on, the way most jar lids screw on, but the threads don’t line up as easily/nicely as I’d like them to, making it more of a chore to screw on/unscrew the lid than it needs to be. It’s a minor annoyance, certainly, but, because my awesome tea pitcher doesn’t have this annoyance, it makes it the preferred iced tea vessel.
But one advantage that the new tea jar has over my awesome iced tea pitcher is that the tea jar has a 1 gallon capacity. Therefore, I could hot-brew a whole GALLON of this tea all at once and didn’t have to stash the tea bag in the fridge to resteep. I got my full gallon during one brewing session. (Well, technically, it took four infusions to fill the gallon tea jar.) Plus, it freed up my iced tea pitcher for another tea so I can have 1 1/2 gallons of iced tea in the fridge for the warm weather ahead.
So, yes, I brewed a gallon of this tea. I steeped it one quart at a time, bringing the water to 170°F and then allowing the bag to first steep for 1 1/2 minute and adding 30 seconds to each subsequent infusion.
Refreshing! I like the combination of cantaloupe and berries. The berries offer the strongest flavor – with strawberry and blackberry dominating, but not by much. I also get a nice amount of blueberry flavor. The berries are sweet with that familiar berry tart note. The cantaloupe offers a sweet, delightful melon note that contrasts nicely with the tart and tangy berries.
The green tea is a little lost in this – but I do get a hint of buttery flavor as well as a hint of that buttery mouthfeel. I also get just a hint of a fresh, grassy taste. These notes are subtle and even though I think I’d like the green tea flavors to be a little more distinct, I found this tea very enjoyable overall.
Peach Apricot Iced Black Tea from Southern Boy Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Southern Boy Teas
Tea Description:
Here’s our organic Iyerpadi black tea paired with the sweet, juicy flavors of peach and apricot. This is a great thirst-quencher and palate pleaser. Serve some of this to your guests and watch the double-takes you get out of this delicious iced tea.
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn about SBT’s subscriptions here.
Taster’s Review:
This Peach Apricot Iced Black Tea from Southern Boy Teas is a glassful of yummy, ice cold refreshment!
The flavor is spot-on! I’m not sure if it’s the way that the Iyerpadi single estate tea melds with the apricot and peach flavors or just the flavors themselves, but it tastes like someone pureed a peach and an apricot and strained it into a glass of black tea. The flavors are very true to the fruit!
The black tea is a smooth tasting tea – it’s strong enough to assert its flavor into the sip without being too aggressive. It doesn’t taste bitter or astringent. Just smooth and delicious.
Together with the authentic flavors of peach and apricot – this tea has a taste that’s sweet – the kind of sweetness that you experience when you take a bite of a sweet, juicy peach or a tree-ripened apricot. It doesn’t taste overly ‘sugary’ sweet and it doesn’t have a fake taste to it.
There are a lot of ready to drink iced teas on the market out there and peach seems to be a flavor that those RTD tea companies embrace – but they are all so loaded with sugar. This is so much better than anything I’ve tasted RTD!
Jasmine Green Tea by Whittard of Chelsea
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Whittard of Chelsea
Tea Description:
The gently perfumed taste of Jasmine Tea makes it one of the most popular scented teas in China. It is a hugely elegant drink that fills your mind with oriental splendour every time you take a sip.
Believed to date back to the Song Dynasty, Jasmine tea was originally a tea for China’s elite, drunk only by members of the Imperial Court. It’s beautiful taste is achieved through its very precise preparation. The beautifully aromatic jasmine flowers are picked at dusk, just when their scent is headiest. At night-time they are layered with the long leaves of fine green tea, the petals infusing the tea with their perfume. The result is a sweet, aromatic tea that captivates the senses.
Jasmine tea is a naturally flavoured green tea with an unmistakable floral taste. It is a great-tasting and reviving tea to drink throughout the day.
Learn more about this tea here
Taster’s Review:
Warm and spring-like weather, to me, is perfectly suited to Jasmine tea. Hence, today was the perfect opportunity to give these tea bags a try! I used 1 bag (which looks to contain maybe 1.5tsp of leaf), and gave it 2 minutes in water cooled to around 180 degrees. While tea bags have the advantage of convenience, they can suffer in terms of the quality of the leaf. This looks to be the case here, as the bag contains primarily very fine-shred fannings. No variety is specified for the green tea, either, so I can only assume it to be a blend. The resulting liquor is a medium yellow, the scent lightly floral.
To taste, this one comes across as a very mild, light, jasmine flavoured green tea. The initial sip is a primarily a smooth, slightly buttery green. There’s a tiny bit of bite towards the end of the sip, almost verging on bitterness, but it’s actually quite pleasant in that it gives what is a very mild-tasting tea a little texture and depth. It doesn’t impact on the overall flavour, which is fairly sweet and floral, too much.
The jasmine emerges in the mid-sip, and adds a sweet, floral accord. It’s not a heavy, perfumey jasmine, and it’s by no means overpowering. It’s still possible to taste the green tea base underneath, and it really just gives a taster of what jasmine as a flavouring can add to a tea. It fades fairly quickly and doesn’t leave much of a lasting impression.
I think this would make a good introductory Jasmine tea for those who are uncertain or who are just beginning to explore this category. It would also be an excellent choice for someone who likes jasmine in principle, but who doesn’t like overly strong, overpowering jasmine that can be found in some varieties. As someone who falls into the latter category, I have to say that this one is a touch too mild for me, but it still gives the impression of jasmine without too much lingering floral. The green tea base is pleasant, if unremarkable, and the cup as a whole is eminently drinkable. It makes for a refreshing cup on a warm day, its only failing being that it’s a little lacking in flavour.
Green Nightly Calm® from Twinings Tea
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Twinings Tea USA
Tea Description:
A comforting green tea perfectly balanced with soothing chamomile, cooling spearmint and the subtle flavor of lemongrass.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Ever had that kind of day that you just couldn’t wait to get home to make yourself a cuppa and veg? That is the sort of day I have been having all week. I am ready to pop my feet up and watch some Big Bang Theory, Elementary or Daredevil with my boyfriend.
One of my favorite rituals that my boyfriend and I do is that each night I make up a pot of tea for us to enjoy while we watch our shows. He isn’t picky. I always ask him what he wants and he always tells me to pick something good. So tonight, I went the easy way out and threw 3 teabags into my Breville and hit the green tea option. About 3 minutes later I was filling our mugs.
I like this one for a bagged tea. The green tea flavor is first and foremost. It isn’t the best green tea I’ve ever had but it is decent. It seems to have a more grassy green tea flavor profile versus the rich buttery flavor I usually enjoy. The chamomile and lemongrass are lightly there and the spearmint is the last flavor I’m coming across. All in all it is good. I can’t say that I will always need to have this on hand but when I come across it at the store I will probably grab a box or two.
All my boyfriend said about this one was that it tasted like Wrigley gum. I’m not sure if that is a good thing or bad.
This is just an easy tea to make after a rough day where you don’t have the energy to make a proper pot. And now its time to relax and watch Elementary.
Passion Fruit Cheesecake Iced Black Tea from Southern Boy Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Southern Boy Teas
Tea Description:
Passion fruit and cheesecake? Does it get more decadent than that? Well, yes, actually it does, when we combine the organic flavors of passion fruit and cheesecake with our premium organic Iyerpadi black tea to make an iced tea from heaven!
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn about SBT’s subscriptions here.
Taster’s Review:
I made a half-gallon pitcher full of this Passion Fruit Cheesecake Iced Black Tea from Southern Boy Teas last night, and now (less than 24 hours later and I’ve only been drinking this for about 3 of those 24 hours!) the pitcher is nearly empty. I think I have one glass of this tea left in the fridge!
In other words: this stuff is so tasty that I don’t want to stop drinking it!
The black tea base is a very harmonious flavor with the added flavors of passion fruit and cheesecake. The natural fruity notes of the Iyerpadi single estate black tea marries well with these flavors, allowing the flavors to come alive in my glass of iced tea while still managing to maintain its own presence there. It tastes brisk and refreshing. It’s strong without being aggressive or overwhelming. It’s not astringent or bitter. Just really, really lovely.
The passion fruit is a very well-defined flavor here. The cheesecake is less pronounced but it adds a really lusciously smooth and creamy taste to the sip. The tangy note of the cheesecake is there too, it’s a subtle little note that hits about mid-sip. A slight contrast from the sweet and creamy that is quite welcome and keeps the tea from becoming cloying.
Every once in a while, I also pick up on light buttery/pastry type of notes. This buttery/pastry flavor seem to mostly be hidden within the ubiquitous cheesecake note, not really standing on it’s own so much as being part of the collective ‘cheesecake’ but every once in a while, I taste a little more of that flavor, as if it is trying to stand up and shout: “Hello, I’m here too!”
So I guess if I were to offer any sort of criticism at all about this tea, that would be it. I might like just a tad more of that buttery/pastry flavor here. But as I mentioned at the start, I’ve nearly polished off an entire half-gallon of this magical liquid in fewer than four hours.
I think I’m going to be needing more of this.