Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Oolong
Where to Buy: Aromatica Fine Teas
Tea Description:
Taste the richness of the oolong at this tea’s base. This darker, roasted oolong presents upfront toasty notes and a hint of chestnuts. The orange is natural and balanced, but builds to a stronger citrus finish. Together, this is soft and smooth.
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn more about subscribing to Amoda’s Monthly Tea Tasting Box here.
Taster’s Review:
Yay! My Amoda Tea Box for November arrived yesterday! I’m always so excited to get this special parcel in my mailbox every month. I’m expecially excited about this package because all three teas are ones that I’ve not tried before. The first tea that I’m tasting is this Orange Oolong Tea from Aromatica Fine Teas.
The dry leaf has a very strong orange aroma. It smells as though I had just cut into a ripe, juicy orange! The scent filled the room as soon as I opened the pouch. Ordinarily, I will brew a flavored Oolong in my Breville One-Touch tea maker, but, I decided to grab my gaiwan to fully enjoy the strong, amazing orange fragrance. The tea brews up a dark yet transparent chocolate brown color and the aromatic wisps wafting out of the teacup are beckoning me to take a sip.
The first cup is very flavorful and has a nice balance between Formosa tea flavor and sweet orange notes. The tea has a pleasing earthy flavor that is slightly woodsy and warm with notes of roasted nut. There is a background note of fruit that is slightly peach-like, and I like the way this melds with the bright citrus notes.
Subsequent infusions were also quite flavorful. I found that as I continued to infuse this tea, the flavors became smoother and almost seamless. The orange notes remained a “sunny” kind of flavor in the cup, while the Oolong maintained it’s earthy, slightly nutty tones, but everything melded together in a very pleasant way.
A delightful and complex tea.
Acai Matetini Mate Tisane from Teavana
Tisane Information:
Leaf Type: Yerba Mate
Where to Buy: Teavana
Tisane Description:
The newest craze in cocktails inspired the infusion of real fruit, herbs, and flowers with mate tea. Our mock martini is a classy notch up, first blending acai, blueberry, raspberry, and blackberry. We added to the mix crisp apples and sweet pineapple, brightened with the zesty citrus notes of orange, lemongrass, and hibiscus. Cheers! SUPERFRUIT ENHANCED
Learn more about this tisane here.
Taster’s Review:
My very first impression of this Acai Matetini Mate Tisane from Teavana, based only on the appearance of the dry leaf, is that this tisane has a whole lot going on it it … maybe too much going on. I mean, seriously … this tisane looks a whole lot more like a fruit/herbal tisane than a yerba mate blend.
I can see some yerba mate in this, but, mostly what I see is HUGE chunks of dried fruit. Big pieces of assorted berries as well as apple and orange. I see some lemongrass as well as some hibiscus. Not a fan of hibiscus. You probably already knew that about me!
But, I decided to brew it up anyway. And it’s not too bad. It is very fruity, with lots of sweet and tart flavors going on to tantalize my taste buds. I don’t taste a lot of yerba mate – which shouldn’t be too surprising to me because I didn’t see a whole lot of yerba mate leaves in the dry blend.
I taste a lot of berry flavors, but the sweetness from the apple seems to curb some of the tarty flavors that I’d might normally experience from all those berries. It’s tart … but this is more sweet than it is tart. This tastes a lot more like a fruit drink than it does a tea.
In fact, what comes to mind as I sip this tea is my marinara sauce. Why? Because when my kids were younger, I used to puree zucchini and carrots in my marinara to add vegetables to my kids diet without them knowing it. I kind of feel like that’s what’s being done with this tisane. It’s like someone added all this fruit to the yerba mate to disguise the flavor of the yerba mate, because had I not known there was yerba mate in this blend (based on the name), I wouldn’t have guessed it by the flavor.
Overall, it’s tasty, but it’s not really my cup of tea. If you’re looking for a cup of energizing yerba mate … this is NOT the tisane for you. If you want a sweet, fruity drink that’s more fruit punch than it is tea … this might be right up your alley.
Smooth Orange White Tea from Steep This!
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: White
Where to Buy: Steep This!
Tea Description:
We love orange and our line-up seemed amiss without an orange offering of some kind. So we got straight to work on duplicating everyone’s favorite orange/ice-cream treat on a stick (the name is trademarked so bare with the generic description, people) and boy did we nail it. Seriously, you could sell this stuff from an ice cream truck. Same great taste, less running, begging for change and crying. Try it, it’s smooth!
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Oh, this is really good. I almost didn’t order this Smooth Orange White Tea when I placed my order with Steep This! because I thought … oh, wow an orange flavored tea … how boring. But, I’m glad that I ignored my inner voice this time and went ahead and added this tea to my cart. This is really tasty!
The earthy, crisp flavor of the white tea is a really delightful base for the bright, juicy flavor of orange. And the vanilla offers just the right amount of creaminess to the cup, accentuating the natural creamy notes of the white tea, to create a flavor that is very creamsicle-ish. Yes, this tastes like someone melted a creamsicle and poured it into my cup of tea, mixing it with a sweet and refreshing white tea.
The result is a flavor that is a little bit tea and a little bit sweet treat and a whole lot of yummy. It tastes great hot or cold … but I prefer it hot. I find that the orange and vanilla flavors are more distinguished when the tea is hot. As it cools, it becomes more “melded” … with less distinctness in the individual notes.
This tea is good for several infusions too! I found that the second infusion was even tastier than the first, and the third was a little softer tasting, but still very flavorful … and I expect I could have gotten even more infusions out of the leaves!
So far, I’ve tasted two teas from this new company … and I’ve liked both of them … I might just have to call upon them again soon to try more!
OYGFIB? (Orange You Glad Frank Is Bananas?) Rooibos Blend from 52Teas
Tisane Information:
Leaf Type: Rooibos
Where to Buy: 52Teas
Tisane Description:
Orange you glad Frank is bananas? It’s true, I might be a little crazy. That twinkle in my eyes could very well be the sun shining in through my ears. But hey, my insanity might just be a great gift to the tea-drinking world. Like this week, in which I’ve created this awesome blend of caffeine-free African Rooibos with freeze-dried oranges and bananas and organic flavors. It’s a lip-smacking, tongue-tickling, tangy sweet treat. So again, I’ll ask, orange you glad Frank is bananas? Get yours today.
Learn more about this tisane here.
Taster’s Review:
This OYGFIB? (which translates into Orange You Glad Frank is Bananas?) Rooibos Blend from 52Teas tastes a lot like a smoothie. A warm smoothie, since I’m drinking it hot, but, the flavors of orange and banana together really remind me of a smoothie.
When I poured my first cup of this tisane, I could smell the distinct aroma of the woody rooibos. Since I’m not a big fan of the taste of rooibos, that scent worried me a little bit, but, the first sip changed my mind. This is tasty.
The bright citrus-y notes of orange are what I taste first. It is sweet and tangy, but not too tart. The banana is a little less distinguished. I can taste another fruit in this, but I can’t say that it tastes definitely like banana. When I take a casual sip, it tastes like orange blended with a nondescript, bland fruit that lends a little bit of creaminess to the cup. Not a bad taste … but again, I can’t say that it tastes like banana.
But when I slurp the tisane, then the banana comes through more distinctly. With the aeration of the slurp, I notice a pleasing balance between banana and orange. Sweet, and yes … still a little creamy, and tangy. Fruity!
It’s an enjoyable tisane. Not my favorite from 52Teas, but I like it and I’d happily drink it again.
Wild Orange Pu’er Tea from Teasenz
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Pu-erh
Where to Buy: Teasenz
Tea Description:
SMOOTH, FRUITY with ORANGE AROMA: A beautiful tea for the adventurous tea drinker. Definitely a master piece resulting from aging pu’er leaves in a hollowed out wild orange (clementines). Simply a must-have for any pu’er tea collector.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Even though I am rarely “excited” to try a pu-erh tea, I have to admit that I was a little excited to try this Wild Orange Pu’er Tea from Teasenz. Especially after opening the foil packaging and seeing the dried tangerine casing. Maybe it’s silly (my husband would say “nerdy”) of me to think so … but these tiny dried oranges filled with pu-erh are just … so cool and clever!
But how to prepare this tea? I can imagine someone new to tea might find the tangerine casing to be a bit confounding. And to be perfectly honest, I can’t tell you if I did it “right” or not … but I’ll tell you what I did.
Since I brew pu-erh in my gaiwan, I cut away the tight cellophane wrapping from the dried tangerine, and then I took off the little “lid” of the tangerine and cut into the side of the fruit. I cut off a portion of the dried tangerine peel, and then I scooped out some of the dark tea leaves and I put the bit of tangerine peel and the scoop of dark tea leaves into my gaiwan.
Then I brewed it the way I would normally brew pu-erh: with a quick 15 second rinse, and then I started infusing. My first infusion was 45 seconds, and then I added 15 seconds to each subsequent infusion. I got eight tasty infusions out of this one bit of Wild Orange Pu’er.
And from someone who tends to be timid when it comes to pu-erh, I like the tangerine flavor that the casing imparts on the earthy tea. The fruit notes balance out the earthy tones without making it taste too “sweet” and without making it taste as though it’s been artificially flavored. The tangerine comes through, providing notes of sweet and hints of tart.
If I had to choose just one word to describe this tea, that word would be mellow. The flavor of the tea is sweet with notes of deep caramel, but overall, it’s a very smooth and mellow taste. There is earthy notes but it doesn’t taste brine-y or fishy. The orange notes are also mellow, but they do a little more than just mellow out the earthy tones here … the tangerine also brightens the overall flavor.
This is definitely an ideal pu-erh for someone who – like me – tends to shy away from pu-erh because of its strong earthy overtures. The fruit notes soften the earthy notes … bringing a taste that is neither too fruity nor too earthy. This is just right. Even in the subsequent infusions, as the fruit notes tend to taper, I found that the tea kept it’s mellowness and did not ever taste too earthy.
A true delight!