Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Guayusa
Where to Buy: DAVIDsTEA
Tea Description:
Head for the Ju Ju Jungle, made with a guayusa herb and fruit blend that’ll make you feel like swinging from the vines and hanging from the trees. No wonder. Guayusa contains a combo of the natural stimulants also found in green tea and dark chocolate. People claim it protects you against snake bites, gives you courage, and helps you spiritually connect to nature. With its smooth flavour and natural buzz, we’ll just say it makes for a deliciously stimulating cup of tea.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Uh-oh.
So I picked up some of this a couple weeks ago ’cause I had sipped down Main Squeeze (also from DT), which has been a cupboard staple of mine for daily use a little over a year now, and I wanted to switch things up a little bit because drinking too much of the same thing can definitely get boring or begin to feel too routine. Well, I think I may have spent a year missing out because this was really, really good.
Overall I tend to prefer guayusa over mate; I like the wet, mossy, earthy flavour of guayusa a lot because it makes me think of petrichor so this tea already had that edge over Main Squeeze; dry it smells very fresh with a more raw, unrefined peach flavour. It’s not a soft, creamy peach: it’s peach fresh from the orchard with the skin and a bit of dirt. The papaya comes through in the scent as well, but it’s definitely not the focus despite the surplus of very large candied papaya pieces in the leaf.
And the taste was awesome; the guayusa was everything I could have asked it to be and the peach I got to experience in the dry smell translated perfectly into the taste. The papaya is stronger in the taste as well, and adds this lovely roundness to the flavour that highlights the peach, petrichor, and plush earthy notes as well as a tropical and exotic kind of vibe. And it tastes so fresh; it’s weird that it tastes both tropical and like it could’ve come fresh from a local orchard.
It’s sweet enough that I can’t ever see why you’d add anything to it but it’s still got a mellowness to it too. The mouthfeel was very full as well. I’m totally picturing myself drinking this on the walk to work and I think that’s an A+ idea. Really, I have zero complaints about this one other than my own idiocy for drinking it at 6PM and now being way too wide awake.
This could easily, and I predict will easily, make its way into my cupboard staples so long as it proves to provide a consistent brew. It’s not one of the fanciest/highest quality teas I own – but for every day drinking and that extra caffeine boost before going to work I think it’s perfect! Plus, it’s a totally fun summer kind of flavour!
Ginger Peach from theBeesTeas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black Tea & Rooibos
Where to Buy: theBeesTeas
Tea Description:
Black tea and peach red rooibos blended with ginger root, peach, and apricot. Ginger is known to help with stomach ailments, and act as a great digestive aid, It’s also great for helping to ward off illnesses such as colds, as it can aid the body in eliminating toxins in the body. This is a warming blend in the Winter as a hot tea, and a refreshing blend in the Summer as an iced tea.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
As much as I try to like teas that have red rooibos in them, that weird medicinal flavor just destroys teas for me. I really wish I liked them. There are some amazing sounding teas that sound so good and then I see that they have red rooibos in them and its all over for me. Green rooibos on the other hand is fantastic.
I steeped this one up in my One Touch Breville (212F-2 scoops-2 cups of water) and was excited to try this one hoping I could see past the red roobios. Unfortunately that isn’t the case.
The ginger and peach are the front flavors that you taste and smell when you first start to sip. But that after taste is that weird red rooibos flavor that I just can’t get past. I was really hoping that the peach, ginger, and apricot flavors would mask the red rooibos. Sadly. . no. The flavors that you taste are really good. This tea without the red rooibos blended in, I think, would be amazing and very good. There are no hints of articial-ness with this one and everything tastes fresh and tasty.
If you like red rooibos and a ginger style tea with a touch of fruit, I could see this being a winner for some. It just wasn’t the case for me. Can’t like ’em all.
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!
California Sweet Peach Herbal Tea from M&K’s Tea Company
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Fruit/Herbal Tisane
Where to Buy: M&K’s Tea Company on Etsy
Tea Description:
Sweet orange peel roasted in honey, real grade-A Madagascar vanilla beans, actual peaches! California Sweet Peach is our signature herbal infusion. We are proud to roast our own orange peel in local honey and use peaches straight from California! Our natural peach flavor is supplied by Silver Cloud Estates and is a blend of different natural extracts and oils, enabling us to boost the taste of peaches. This blend is part of the Original 20 M&K’s Blends. Note: California Sweet Peach contains no tea, as it is an herbal infusion. We chose to include the term “herbal tea” in the title due to its categorical popularity.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
This California Sweet Peach Herbal Tea from M&K’s Tea Company is an interesting tisane. As I sit here, sipping it, I’m trying to determine whether or not I like it. I can’t say that immediately upon taking my first few sips that I was blown away by it. At the same time, I can’t say that immediately upon taking my first few sips that I wasn’t intrigued. I felt the need to keep on sipping. It’s interesting enough to keep me sipping but there’s something about it that hasn’t yet ‘won me over’ – at least not yet.
I like that the hibiscus is not a strong presence in this cup. Normally, when I am about to taste a tea or tisane with hibiscus, my thought is “why?” Why hibiscus? But, after drinking about half a cup now, I can see why the hibiscus is in this blend. It adds a little bit of body to the cup (but I wouldn’t recommend steeping it longer than 6 minutes or so to avoid having a thick or syrupy body) and the little bit of tartness that it brings to the cup adds balance to the warm notes of the licorice and the sweetness of the peach, honey and vanilla notes.
The star of this cup is – obviously – the peach. I like the flavor of the peach here and I think that’s what’s keeping my interest. The peach is a genuine peach-y note. It doesn’t taste chemical or artificial. It tastes true to the fruit. I also like the orange in this. The orange adds a touch of bright flavor to the sweet peach notes.
Now that I’ve finished the cup I can say that I enjoyed this. It had a strong peach flavor but there was enough other stuff going on in this that it didn’t end up being all about the peach. I liked the different flavors going on. And even though this does have hibiscus in it – like so many other fruit/herbal tisanes to – this is not your ordinary tisane.
Just as an aside: it’s something when I finish the tea before I finish the review. Take that for what it’s worth, but it doesn’t happen often. I must have enjoyed what I was drinking!
Yeah. I’d drink this again. I enjoyed it. This one has earned my approval. Even if it does have hibiscus in it!
Georgia Peach Iced Black Tea from Southern Boy Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Zoomdweebies
Tea Description:
Our premium organic Iyerpadi black tea blended with sweet organic peach flavors. This may not be as crazy as Garlic Toast or Maple Bacon, but this will make you happy inside.
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn about SBT’s subscriptions here.
Taster’s Review:
When I first saw that Southern Boy Teas created this Georgia Peach Iced Black tea as their tea of the week for the first week of January, I thought, Oh! That sounds good! Then I thought, kind of boring though, isn’t it? Then my mind wandered to the ready-to-drink peach flavored iced teas that are mostly sugar and flavoring and very little tea. Bleh!
So, as I was brewing this, I was hoping that it wasn’t going to taste like the stuff you can find on the supermarket shelves. I was hoping that I’d taste tea that’s been flavored with just enough peach flavor that I could taste the peach and still enjoy the flavor of the black tea.
And that’s exactly what is in my glass right now. Well, actually, I should say that’s exactly what WAS in my glass, because I’ve finished my third glass of this iced tea in a matter of a half an hour. This stuff is good. I know that Southern Boy Teas is embracing the slogan “tea that’s meant to be shared,” but my mind is embracing the notion that I need to drink this before anyone else realizes how good it is. All for me, none for you! Share? Ha!
The black tea that Southern Boy Teas has been using for their black tea blends is an Iyerpadi estate black tea that’s brisk and has a solid black tea flavor. It’s not an aggressive tea, but it isn’t too shy either. It doesn’t hide behind the flavors. It’s a tea that’s rich, smooth, not astringent or bitter, and just … really good.
The peach flavoring starts out subtle. My first few sips, the peach flavor wasn’t strongly apparent, but there was something luscious there that kept me sipping. About midway through that glass, I realized – LOVELY peach! Yum! The peach is a sweet flavor but not candy sweet, it’s more like a true to the fruit sweetness.
Really nice!
And please don’t forget about Frank’s Indiegogo campaign that’s going on right now! He’s looking to enhance his iced tea business so that he can take it to the next level! Please help this small business achieve its goal!