About Teadrops:
Elaborate tea ceremonies have a time and place. However, if you desire high quality tea and are short on time and tea props, then meet Teadrops.
Each Teadrop is a portable morsel comprised of finely sourced tea from India, natural sugar, and aromatic spices creating a blissful tea blend that can be enjoyed any time, any place, with just hot water. No special tools, no steeping time, no tea expertise necessary.
About Golden Amber Teadrops:
Imagine yourself immersed in a tropical valley of vanilla orchids, watching the amber sun as it magically dances across the distant mountain peaks. This beautiful image is what Golden Amber Teadrops evokes when one drinks it. A simple vanilla white tea, that is gentle to the senses, soothing, and sweet. White tea is the mildest of all tea varieties and subtly blends with pure vanilla in perfect harmony.
Learn more about Teadrops here.
Taster’s Review:
After tasting the Cardamom Spice Teadrops, I was very excited to try the other flavors that this company has available. The next teadrop in my teacup? Golden Amber! It’s made with white tea leaves and vanilla.
When I opened the little cellophane wrapper of the Golden Amber Teadrop, I could smell the vanilla. It smells so good!
This is really quite tasty. The white tea base tastes like a fine quality white tea. I taste white tea: sweet, crisp, light, refreshing, with notes of hay and a slight earthiness. I also note hints of melon which is complemented nicely with the sweet, creamy vanilla flavor.
The vanilla is soft and this accentuates the soft, subtle notes of the white tea in a really lovely way. There seems to be just the right amount of vanilla in this tea for me – enough to provide that luscious, sweet flavor of vanilla that I love but not so much that it overwhelms the delicate quality of the white tea. A really delightful balance has been achieved with this product.
As with the Cardamom Spice Teadrops, these are also sweetened. I wished there wasn’t sugar added to the Cardamom Spice, and I wish there wasn’t sugar added to these Golden Amber Teadrops. However, they aren’t too sweet. That is usually my big complaint with pre-sweetened products: they’re too sweet. Like RTD teas. Way too sweet. But this … isn’t. This is sweet but not cloyingly so, and I like the way that the light sweetener here highlights the vanilla notes.
This product also does have the sediment at the bottom of the teacup. But as I mentioned with the other teadrops I tried, none of that sediment affects the sip until I get to about 1/2 inch to the bottom of the cup. Once you reach that point, stop drinking and you won’t get floaters in your sip.
As you may remember in my review of the Cardamom Spice Teadrops (you can check out that review by clicking on this link), I mentioned that I felt that this company should consider developing a “refill” box option for their teadrops. The beautiful wooden “slide” box is amazing, but, I felt that for those customers who wanted to buy teadrops again … well, they might not need another wooden box, you know? So, why not offer a refill option at a lower price for those returning customers.
Well, they listened to me! (I love it when that happens. Occasionally, I do have good ideas.) They now offer a refill option for their three tea flavors. Nice! They also offer free shipping on all their orders: more niceness. And these Golden Amber Teadrops … are also very nice!
I am really happy with this product. These would make a really nice gift for a tea drinker who is a frequent traveler, or someone who needs some convenience with their cuppa!
Blood Orange Tisane from Chai Diaries
Tisane Information:
Leaf Type: Fruit/Herbal Tisane
Where to Buy: Chai Diaries
Tisane Description:
The first thing you’ll notice about this holiday blend is the color: a vibrant amaranth red that grabs you by the lapels and demands your attention. Then the aroma: enticing vanilla, sophisticated orange peel, hints of rose and lemon all tangle for a share of the stage in this bold elixir. Finally, the first divine sip.
Learn more about this tisane here.
Taster’s Review:
I have to disagree with the above description … the first thing I noticed about this Blood Orange Tisane from Chai Diaries is not the color. What I noticed is that this is not a one with an overload of hibiscus! Yes, there is hibiscus in it, but, after steeping for six minutes, the tisane is not heavy, thick or syrupy the way a tisane with too much hibiscus would be.
The fact that the hibiscus is not overdone gets bonus points from this reviewer … because as you are probably aware (if you’ve read very many of my tisane reviews!) I don’t like hibiscus! In small amounts, hibiscus can be beneficial to a tisane. It adds a little bit of body and color to the brewed cup, as well as a distinct flavor – tartness! – not to mention significant health benefits. But too much hibiscus can mean a very tart, syrup-like thickness to the brewed tisane. Not very appealing, at least, not to me!
This tisane, on the other hand, is very appealing because the hibiscus is done the right way … as are the other components to this tisane. It is sweet with enough tartness to keep it interesting. The vanilla in this adds a very enjoyable creamy note to the cup, tasting a bit like a one of those creamsicle frozen treats!
While it is good served hot, I found that I preferred it iced! I recommend brewing it stronger when you want this one iced, because the flavor softens a bit as it cools. And brewing it stronger means adding more dry leaf to the teapot … not steeping it longer. Keep the steep time to 5 – 7 minutes to minimize the hibiscus’s impact on the final product.
This is sweet enough that it doesn’t need any sweetener – and this would be a fantastic alternative to overly sugared sodas for the kids (and adults!) in the summer!