Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: The Veda Company
Tea Description:
“Revitalize” your mind, body and spirit with refreshing and rejuvenating essences of wild mint, cinnamon and traditional Ayurvedic Indian Gooseberry. Each blend is mildly caffeinated with green tea, one of nature’s antioxidant wonders.
Learn more about the teas from TeaVeda here.
Taster’s Review:
Indian Gooseberry is not something that I’m well acquainted with, so I googled it to learn more. Based on the information that I could find, it is high in vitamin C, it is an antioxidant and does all kinds of other good for you things like enhances brain function, heart support and it’s good for your skin and hair among many other benefits.
OK, sounds good to me.
The berry is supposed to offer a very strong sour and bitter taste. Bitter and sour are not two of my favorite words when it comes to describing tea.
So maybe the Indian Gooseberry is starting to sound less good to me.
But, hey, there are other ingredients in this tea too. Not just the gooseberry. Cinnamon and wild mint. I like them. And I like green tea. So, maybe these other ingredients will help make the Indian Gooseberry more palatable.
So, I’ll try it. Hey! That’s what I do. That’s why I’m here. And that’s why you’re here. You’re here to read about what I’m drinking. And I’m about to drink this tea.
To brew it, I heated freshly filtered water to 175°F and I got out my favorite teacup. Unfortunately, it isn’t the gorgeous Revitalize teacup from the TeaVeda collection. But I like my sunflower teacup anyway!
I let the tea sachet steep for 2 minutes. The aroma has a strong fruity essence with light background notes of cinnamon and a whisper of mint.
The flavor is strong. It has a strong, berry like flavor that is indeed both bitter and sour. The cinnamon and mint do balance this strong flavor out though. I’m finding the flavor a little surprising because cinnamon and mint tend to be very strong, aggressive flavors and it surprises me that the Indian Gooseberry is a stronger flavor than the other ingredients. The gooseberry is what I taste – front and center – while the other flavors seem to temper the bitterness and tart character of the gooseberry.
That said, I find the flavor to be enjoyable. I am not a big fan of bitter and sour flavors, but, because of the presence of the mint and cinnamon, these two flavors are much more acceptable to my palate … not just acceptable, but actually enjoyable.
I don’t taste a lot of green tea here and if I’m to offer a complaint about this tea, that would be it. I would like to have a stronger green tea presence. After all, I’m drinking tea. I want to taste the tea.
I found this tea to be quite interesting, and I could notice myself feeling revitalized after I finished it. I would certainly drink this again if the opportunity presented itself.
Gooseberry Flavored Matcha from Red Leaf Tea
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green (Matcha)
Where to Buy: Red Leaf Tea
Tea Description:
Deliciously tart gooseberries can acquire a more balanced and mellow taste by adding the well loved Matcha twist. A Gooseberry Matcha drink is the perfect refreshment after a hardworking day. It can also be a cool fruity drink on warm balmy days when someone wants to soak in the sun with a trendy drink at hand to sip and relish. This fine drink can easily become the favorite in the special occasions of young children because of its fruity charms and sweet sharp taste. Gooseberry Matcha is also a wonderful addition to any refreshment offering on special occasions.
Learn more about this flavored matcha here.
Taster’s Review:
I’m not sure exactly what possessed me to order this Gooseberry Flavored Matcha from Red Leaf Tea, to be honest with you. I can’t tell you that I’ve ever tasted a gooseberry, because I don’t think I have. Or if I have, I was unaware of it. I don’t know that I’ve even tried a tea with gooseberry in it. And if I have, it wasn’t memorable enough for me to recall at the moment.
But I figured if I am not *crazy* about the flavor of gooseberry, this is always a Matcha that I can add to my smoothies or blend with other flavored Matcha … so I figured, what the heck, why not!
So I prepared this Matcha the way I usually prepare Matcha – first, I scoop the Matcha into my wire mesh strainer to sift it into my chawan and then I add hot water to the sifted Matcha in the bowl and whisk the Matcha with my chasen (bamboo whisk). The Matcha produced a nice frothy cap, and the bubbly froth stayed around. That is, it didn’t disappear quickly. I got to enjoy the foamy froth for a while.
Mmm! Sweet and tart. It has a fruity taste that sort of reminds me of grapes and peaches. It almost has a “candy-like” flavor to it because it is so distinctly sweet and tart, reminiscent of the sweet tart type of candies.
The sweetness starts at the start of the sip, and the tartness comes in toward the tail, and lingers long into the aftertaste. Even a full minute after my last sip, I’m still tasting that tart, tingly berry taste that tickles the tongue after eating a ripe berry. Of course, I don’t know if one experiences that tarty, tingly, tickle on the tongue from gooseberries, but, I know that I experience it with other berries that I’ve eaten!
The Matcha tastes sweet, vegetative, buttery and it has a smooth and creamy texture. For this particular batch of Matcha, I went with my “usual specifications,” which are Red Leaf Tea’s classic grade of green Matcha and the distinctive level of flavoring. These are my usual go-to specifications because they usually produce a flavored Matcha that is a good balance between Matcha and flavor and that is true with this blend. I like that I taste the fruity elements here as well as the delicious taste of Matcha.
Now, I can’t say that this is my favorite flavored Matcha that I’ve tried from Red Leaf Tea – because it isn’t. But I am enjoying it, and I’m really glad I tried it. Definitely a little bit different, but not so different. There are some familiar notes in this one, and I like it.