Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Herbal
Where to Buy: Simpson & Vail
Tea Description:
Pomegranate Olive Leaf Blend from Simpson and Vail offers the perfect balance of tart and sweet meet in this all organic herbal tisane. It brews to a pink cup with a bold fruit flavor and a light herbal aftertaste. Delicious hot or iced.
Ingredients: Organic Olive leaf, organic green rooibos, organic orange peel, organic hibiscus, organic spearmint, natural pomegranate flavor, organic red cornflowers
Brew tea at 212º – steep for 5 minutes.
Certified Kosher. Caffeine Free
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Pomegranate Olive Leaf Blend from Simpson and Vail is a blend I’ve had my eye on for some time. Simpson and Vail is one of my favorite tea shops. They are a wonderful company to buy from. Their care and compassion for their customers shows in their website, newsletter, and how they interact with their customers. I just love trying out their teas! They always taste fresh and crisp!
This particular blend was one I had my eye on for a while and I just had to try it. The blend is different. An Olive leaf and green rooibos blend mixed in with spearmint and pomegranate. So just by the description alone, you can imagine a blend that totes notes of honey, sweetness, tartness, and mint. An odd combination to say the least but I have to say, one that works!
I actually cold steeped the tea in a mason jar so I could enjoy this blend as a lovely iced tea during the day and I can’t say I would try this blend any other way. The blend itself is a lovely sight that reminds me of wildflowers. The different pops of colors amongst a green base makes me think of wildflowers in a lush green park area. Serene and vibrant. Which is a great way to describe this tea.
This tea is an unusual blend for sure but a wonderful sort of unusual. The tea has a subtle grassy like flavor mixed with a sweet honey like note and a tart minty finish. Like I said, very unusual, but one that I am digging. As a cold brew tea, this tea is refreshing, soothing, and just what the doctor ordered on such a hot muggy July summer day in the Midwest.
Pomegranate Olive Leaf from Simpson and Vail is just another wonderful example of their great fresh and crisp tasting teas I just can’t say enough about them!
Pomegranate Mojito from Zest Tea
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Zest Tea
Tea Description:
ZEST TEA ENERGY BLENDS
Winner of Best New Product at the 2015 World Tea Expo, Zest premium energy teas offer the same kick of coffee without the negative side effects. Despite our teas having comparable caffeine levels to coffee-about three times the levels of traditional teas-the amino acids in Zest help create a steady and prolonged alertness, instead of the jitters and crash of other caffeinated products.
All of our full-leaf blends are enhanced with natural caffeine from tea leaves & packaged in biodegradable sachets, making for the perfect healthy coffee substitute.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
At work it seems sometimes it is easier to grab a bagged tea than a loose leaf tea. I have all the instruments and vessels to brew up a proper cuppa but it can sometimes come down to time. When I don’t even have time to grab lunch, brewing tea isn’t always on the top of my things to do.
Today was one of those days so I grabbed a tea that I had recently picked up from Amazon. This tea sounded amazing. A Young Hyson green tea mixed with pomegranate, mint, and lime with an added caffeine boost to keep you going thru your day. Sounds pretty fantastic to me. I have actually tried this tea both hot and cold. And I have to say, one way is way better than the other and it completely surprised me.
This tea just screams “Make me into a nice ice tea” but I have to say, it isn’t what I hoped for when I cold brewed this tea. The tastes are lovely and the smells you get from the dry leaf mix in the sachets is to die for. It smells exactly how it is described. I thought for sure this would be a lovely tea that would remind me of a gorgeous sunny summer day.
Brewed in my water bottle for a few hours with ice and two sachets, this tea delivered a sound flavor but it almost had a dirt tasting finish. I was a little surprised by that. You can taste all of the lovely ingredients and the taste was ok when you first take a sip, but then there is a weird dirt aftertaste.
So after that experience, I tried this tea hot. And wow, did it every blow me away. Who would have thought hot this tea would have been stellar. The green tea gives off a nice bitter green note that helps calm the tart pomegranate and lime flavors and the peppermint leaves you feeling refreshed. Really well done and the fact that this is a tea bag makes prepping it easy and no fuss. Gotta love that. And that dirt flavor wasn’t present in this style of brewing.
I have a feeling that maybe with a touch of sweetener, this tea would make an amazing iced tea. Glad I have a few more tea bags to experience with!
Casale’s Green from 212 Tea
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: 212 Tea
Tea Description:
Named after our friends Chris and Melissa Casale, owners of The Fix Barbershop here in lake Oswego. They were the first local business to serve our tea and instantly fell in love with this blend. Casale’s Green is the perfect blend of Pacific Northwest Peppermint and roasted Japanese Houjicha. The result is a smooth toasty green tea note followed by a clean mint finish.
Mellow with a sweet mint flavor, a pleasant toasty note and hints of chocolate.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Alright, do yourself a favor. . .if you haven’t tried or checked out 212 Tea take a moment and do just that. They are a tea company out of Portland that know how to do tea right. They are passionate and enthusiastic, attributes that you want in a tea company. They even encourage you to send them tea jokes. Now that is seriously my kind of tea company!
This particular tea is something special! I instantly fell in love with the toasted sweetness I was picking up along with traces of mint from the dry leaves. I couldn’t get water into my tea kettle fast enough!
Brewed this delight up with water at about 190 degrees and allowed the tea to steep for about 4 minutes. I didn’t even allow the tea to cool off. I instantly took a sip and was greeted with some tea loving! This tea had lovely notes of a rich buttery base of green tea that had a nice well balanced solid note of a roasted flavor while the mint gave the tea a freshness that made you just devour it as fast as you could. Seriously, I have already inhaled about three cuppas of this delight from one session and am warming water for a fourth. It is that amazing.
The tea is a cooling refreshing one that warms at the same time. One of those teas that help you melt the day away while indulging your taste buds. I will say towards the third infusion I was getting a slight chocolate note but for the most part I didn’t really pick up any chocolate and I am completely fine with that. I’m loving the cuppa that I’m getting out of the tea right now!
Moroccan Tea by Alokozay
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Alokozay
Tea Description:
Moroccan Tea is a perfect balance of Gunpowder Green Tea and dried Peppermint leaves, this stunning classic is refreshing, reviving and inspiring.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Sometimes the teas that hit the spot are the simplest teas that you ignore in the back of your stash. I haven’t been ignoring this one per say but I don’t always drink tea bagged tea anymore. I seem to leave those as a last resort. For shame on me once again!
I have noticed this brand several times on Amazon but never really took a second look. For a Moroccan Tea this one isn’t too bad. The mint is strong and the green is tea is nice and refreshing. This tea didn’t provide any kind of wow factor that I usually look for.
Not sure I would love to own more of this but to try it, I’d say its decent. I just really enjoy some of the other tea companies versions of this tea like Tealated. Telated has a marvelous Moroccan Tea that is simply done but there is a bit more complexity to it with a roasted finish.
Like I said, I wouldn’t run right out and pick more of this up, but I definitely favor this bagged tea over others. I’m curious now about this brand and want to try some more. Looks like they have some interesting flavors on their site. I do have to say it is nice to have a reliable tea on hand for when guests are around or when you don’t want to mess with loose leaf tea. This one could fit that bill pretty well!
Alps Breeze from Lipton
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Herbal
Where to Buy: Lipton
Tea Description:
Don’t see this one listed on the website anymore but I did find a Steepster review page. This looks to be an older tea or one that is available only overseas.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Still on my journey to drink down some of my tea cupboard when I came across this delight. Yes. Another tea bag. And to my surprise, I’m drinking Lipton. I can’t remember the last time I drank Lipton so I’m curious to see what I think.
Lipton seems to be one of the tea companies a lot of newbie tea drinkers tend to stray towards. I think its more of a convenience factor. You can find Lipton teas pretty much at every grocery store around. This particular tea is a mint and eucalyptus herbal tea. I couldn’t find it on their website but I did find a Steepster entry for this blend.
Brewed this like I would any herbal- 5 min with 212F for the water temperature. I took a sip and felt that the flavor wasn’t as strong as it should be so I let the tea bag stay in the water for a few more minutes.
Took another sip and I can’t say that I don’t like this but I can’t say that I like it either. This is one of those teas that you like just about everything in the flavor profile except for one ingredient. In this one, I think it might be the eucalyptus. I’ve had eucalyptus in tea before and liked it but maybe mixed with mint, this one has a weird one off flavor. Or maybe this is just an older tea.
I have a few more tea bags of this one so I’m going to try a cold brew to see if the weird flavor mellows out a bit. Regardless, it was still a fun tea to try!