Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Herbal
Where to Buy: Rington’s Premium English Teas
Tea Description:
An exciting and invigorating herbal infusion of pure peppermint leaves to revitalise and refresh. Peppermint has been shown to aid digestion.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Peppermint is a classic herbal if ever there was one. It’s hard to go wrong with something so simple, and it’s a good stomach settler to boot. Rington’s pure peppermint is provided in a standard square paper tea bag, each one containing a generous amount of finely shredded peppermint leaves. I gave 1 bag approximately 3 minutes in boiling water for my cup. The liquor is a mediun golden brown, the scent mildly minty.
To taste, this is pretty much a standard peppermint tea. It’s exactly as you would expect – fresh tasting mint, with the wonderful hot water/cooling mint contrast that makes peppermint tea such a refreshing choice (and particularly suited to summer, if hot tea is your drink of choice when it’s 30 degrees out, as it is for me!) It’s a reasonably gentle mint, not too strong or reminiscent of toothpaste, but still identifiably mint. A well balanced choice.
There are so many similar peppermint teas available that it’s hard to make one stand out. Peppermint is an evergreen staple of the herbal tea world, after all. This one has no bells and whistles, but it’s clearly of quality – that much is evident in the drinking.
China Fujian Cinnamon ‘Rou Gui’ Wuyi Rock Oolong from What-Cha
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Oolong
Where to Buy: What-Cha
Tea Description:
Rou Gui has a great cinnamon taste combined with a thick texture and sweet taste.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
I love Rou Gui and the reviews I’ve read for What-Chas have all be positive so I thought it was about time I bought some to try for myself. Usually, I like to do Gong Fu sessions with Rou Gui and I’m sure I’ll try this that way eventually, but when I showed this to my mom what she said was that it smelled like it’d be good cold; and since she so rarely weighs in on how I prepare the teas I share with her I decided to honor her suggestion and make my inaugural tasting a cold brew.
I have to say, this was definitely an interesting blend to me. One of the things I most like about drinking Rou Gui Gong Fu is the progression of flavours and drinking a cold brew with an extended six or seven hour steep time really makes that progression of flavour blur together. So, I tasted qualities I think I normally would have in the first few steeps of a Gong Fu session as well as ones I probably only would have noticed in the last few infusions.
The most obvious taste was, of course, the sweet flavour of cinnamon. I find ‘cinnamon’ has such a varied flavour; it can be spicy like you’d find in Chai or very drying (have you ever done the cinnamon challenge?) or it can have this lovely pastry/baking sweetness. Of all the ways cinnamon can express itself, I definitely get the latter example here.
Other dominant flavours are honey, wood, leather, and floral notes. Maybe just a hint of cream as well. It’s a weird contrast between bold flavour notes and delicate ones too; the overall affect is a medium bodied, smooth tea with a very rich, thick mouthfeel and clean taste with a pleasant, lingering finish. One of the nice things about cold brewing this is that I got to skip the more ashy/char notes and biting astringency that usually accompany the first few infusions of a Rou Gui; but I still got leathery, wood notes! No additives are necessary. In fact, they’d probably detract from the taste more than anything else.
If there’s one thing I’d have liked to see which I didn’t it’s more of a fruity note – but maybe that’ll come out more when I inevitably Gong Fu this.
O’Malley’s Escape from Treehouse Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Herbal
Where to Buy: Treehouse Teas
Tea Description:
If you like Pina Coladas and gettin’ caught in the rain this tea is for you! It’s a favorite herb and fruit tea that bursts ingredients of pineapple, apple, rosehip, coconut pieces and hibiscus petals. If you are allergic to coconut stay clear. Small Batch Blended and from Sing Buri, Thailand. It has a low antioxidant level and its a caffeine free herb and fruit tea. Steep: 5-10 minutes at a temperature: 100C, 212F. This can be re-steeped for additional cups! Also, makes great popsicles and pink tea for tea parties!
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
With a description like the one above, my expectations for this tea were pretty high. I mean who doesn’t love a sweet tea that carries you away!
The tea mix itself is beautiful. I adore the colors and love how pretty it looks as the tea steeps. The dry mixture smells fabulous. Sweet and tropical. My excitement level was rising to taste this sweet tropical treat!
I brewed this up per their recommendations and was enjoying how the water was turning into a beautiful pink color.
I took my first sip and sadly- this tea didn’t hit the target for me. I wanted to love this tea so much. At first taste, you can pick up an almost strawberry flavor that reminds me of a strawberry Popsicle. The flavor isn’t very strong and is more on the weaker side. The coconut is subtle and gentle. I think with a tea that is being considered a pina colada, I wanted the coconut flavor to be strong. I didn’t pick up any pineapple or even any of the hibiscus tartness. This tea was more of a lightly flavored strawberry flavor. I can see this being a great tea for a little girl’s tea party but not for me. I would like my flavors a bit stronger.
My last thoughts on this tea is that maybe this tea is one that needs to be cold brewed or even steeped longer than the 10 minutes to really bring out the flavor. I did share the remainder of this tea with a tea drinking co-worker and her thoughts were in line with what I was thinking. Regardless, I’ve enjoyed the teas that I’ve tried from Treehouse Teas for the most part. Just a few I haven’t cared for. This tea blend would have been one that would have totally caught my eye so I am glad that I was able to try it, just not sure this would be one I would need to try again.
Sipdown #37!
Gielle 1st Flush Darjeeling Black Tea from Harney & Sons
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Harney & Sons
Tea Description:
This beautiful estate is set off to the side, away from most other Darjeeling estates, and this discreet locale aptly suits the owners of Gielle. They do what they think is best – in particular, to use the old “Chinese” tea bushes and to make an older style First Flush Darjeeling. Our tea mentor, Bernd Wulf, helped to develop this older style back in the 1960s. It was less oxidized than the Darjeelings of that time, thus lighter and greener, yet still with enough body to handle milk and sugar. Bernd was the father of our tea supplier Marcus Wulf – a cornerstone of our Tradition of Tea that ensures you excellent tea, produced and sourced with great care over generations.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
I should probably say upfront that first flush Darjeeling is one of my favourite varieties of black tea, so this one is preaching to the converted with me. The dry leaf itself is a thing of beauty – light and medium green leaves, and some downy silver-white buds. They’re a little twisted, and of about 1-2cm in length. The scent is mildly grapey with hints of stone fruit. I used 1 tsp of leaf for my cup, and gave it 2.5 minutes in boiling water. The resulting liquor is a medium golden-orange.
To taste, it’s pretty much perfection. The main flavour I can discern is dried apricot – quite rich and fruity. It lingers beautifully right until the end of the sip. There’s a very light hint of muscatel grape, which develops primarily at the end of the sip and in the aftertaste, and something that’s reminding me just a little of frangipane – a sort of nutty, almondy sweetness. It pairs beautifully with the apricot. There’s the slightest touch of what I can only describe as briskness – not bitterness or astringency, but a slight sharpness that takes this tea to a whole new level. It seems to enhance the grape notes a little, cutting through the initial rich sweetness. Certainly no bad thing!
This is a fine example of a first flush Darjeeling – clean-tasting, and beautifully light and delicate. Each one I’ve tried seems to have a slightly different character, and drinking this cup has been another pleasant experience. I’d not hesitate to recommend it to Darjeeling fans.
Peaceful Pineapple from Treehouse Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Treehouse Teas
Tea Description:
Peaceful Pineapple Organic Green Loose Leaf Tea
Relax, unwind and find your inner peace. Organic Blue Mallow Flowers, Organic Chinese Green Tea, Natural Mango Flavor, Organic Marigold Petals, Natural Papaya Flavor, and Natural Pineapple Flavor.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Peaceful Pineapple. That name kind of struck me as a bit odd only because when I think of pineapple, I think of parities and fruit trays. Not relaxing and unwinding. But hey, I’m nothing but one to take in all experiences. So if this tea will help me unwind, I’m good with it!
This green flavored tea was quite lovely to look at. I enjoyed the pop of purple amongst the green tea leaves. I steeped this up with the green tea setting on my Breville and was excited to try a pineapple flavored tea. In the past these have been hit or miss with me. A lot more times than not, the pineapple flavor either doesn’t come across as being true pineapple-more of a tropical papaya flavor.
First sip and I’m a bit confused by the tea. All I am really getting is a green tea flavor and a confusing one at that. I’m not really getting the mango, papaya, or pineapple flavors. More of just this more or less bland green tea. No real flavor is singing to me or even one flavor I can discern from another. I’m wondering if there is too much going on or if I need to try cold brewing this pineapple tea to make the flavors pop. As it sits, the flavors just aren’t there for me so I’m going to dump this cuppa out and try experimenting with this tea a bit more down the road. I was hoping I would have a nice tropical flavor to drink this afternoon. Looks like I need to keep looking or need to keep experimenting!