Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Roiboos
This tea is available from Amoda Tea.
Tea Description:
What makes this extra good? One, it’s organic. Two, the coconut is subtle, rather than being the main note. Three… is that banana I taste? How unusual, but very pleasant. Together with the green rooibos, this is a fantastic combo. Soft, sweet and creamy. You can try it hot or iced.
Learn more about subscribing to Amoda Tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Rooibos blends just aren’t my favorite. They just aren’t. But I do enjoy green rooibos more than I do red rooibos – I find that light, fruity note of the green rooibos to be appealing, especially when it’s part of a fruit flavored blend like this Perles de Antilles Rooibos Blend from Camellia Sinensis.
I think that the above description from Amoda Tea to be pretty spot on: the coconut notes are soft and unassuming, and the banana adds a pleasant flavor to this delightful tropical fruit flavored tisane. The overall flavor is indeed “soft, sweet and creamy.”
The creaminess is kind of a surprise for me, because I haven’t had a lot of green rooibos blends that have been what I’d categorize as “creamy.” Usually, they’re light and crisp and have almost a ‘bubbly’ type of character to them. I suspect the coconut and banana flavors brings a bit of creaminess to the party.
The pineapple adds a little bit of brightness to the cup. The apple is not particularly distinguishable, but I do note a little bit of apple-like sweetness that enhances the overall cup.
I really like this: it’s a soothing, gentle kind of flavor, the kind of tisane you want to curl up to late at night. And because it’s naturally caffeine-free, you can do just that. It’s sweet and it’s fruity without tasting like a cloying fruit punch concoction. It’s quite tasty, really.
Hot Cross Bun Rooibos and Black Tea Blend By Bluebird Tea Co.
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black Tea & Rooibos Blend
Where to Buy: Bluebird Tea Co.
Tea Description:
Yes you heard us right, our Limited Edition Easter tea tastes of Hot Cross Buns!
At Easter time there are few things better than the aroma of currants, cinnamon and freshly baked buns wafting across the kitchen. When creating our Spring Collection we knew we had to pay homage to our favourite Easter treat, so here you have it – Hot Cross Bun tea! Don’t say we don’t treat you every now and again!
Ingredients: Rooibos, Ceylon black tea, Cinnamon, Hibiscus, Apple, Rosehip, Orange peel, Lapsang Souchong, Vanilla, Cranberry, Flavour.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Easter time has long since passed but holiday teas are forever. At least that is what my Hot Cross Bun craving is telling me right now. It’s the same with most holidays, I end up hoarding seasonal teas for those yearnings throughout the year that can only be fixed by tea. You want Halloween in Summer, there’s a tea for that. You want Christmas in the Spring, there is a tea for that too! Well now I want Easter. Perhaps because I didn’t actually manage to eat any Hot Cross Buns this year due to my strict diet (boo!).
Looking at the ingredients for this is inspiring, Rooibos and Ceylon and Lapsang Souchong…woah! That is one heck of a base for this blend.
In scent the orange is waxy and rather strong with some dark fruit (like raisin but not quite) bitter tones and a hint of cinnamon. It is Hot Cross Bun like but not completely, only missing the sweetness, but a good start so far.
The loose leaf appearance reminds me of Autumn, it’s rather dark and dry with mostly brown colours and a hint of red.
Sampled without milk or sweetener.
Steeped scent is sour, waxy and very orange. Also some warm cinnamon tones. Similar to the raw scent but actually nicer and more Bun like.
Flavour matches the scent rather well, the orange is waxy and dominant at first before the cinnamon kicks in and the whole flavour becomes toasty and extremely Hot Cross Bun like. The cranberries that smelled particularly sour in the raw scent now resemble raisins almost perfectly. The Lapsang Souchong offers it’s smoky flavour to be toasty and warm. It also has some sweetness which I mentioned it lacked previously in scent. Despite the archive of ingredients this is a nice strength, not too bitter nor strong and with enough flavour whilst remaining fairly light in clarity.
It is rather like a Hot Cross Bun, though there is one thing missing for me. Butter. I always have butter on my Bun whether it be toasted or plain. Though I must admit this is not a bad attempt at all, by any means.
So there we have it, Easter is available at the click of the kettle. It also helps to close your eyes and imagine those nostalgic holiday times.
Hot Cross Bun today, Candy Cane tomorrow. What a wonderful tea world we live in!
Rooibush Panna Cotta Rhubarb Cream from TeaGschwendner
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Rooibos
Where to Buy: TeaGschwendner
Tea Description:
Dessert in a teacup! The dazzling combination of Italian Panna Cotta, tart rhubarb and sweet cream combine for a flavor as delicious as the aroma.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Rooibush Panna Cotta Rhubarb Cream is probably the longest tea blend name ever…
Well, not really. It is pretty lengthy, though. And tacking on the “TeaGshwendner” certainly doesn’t help.
Ok; starting off with a confession: Not only have I never had Panna Cotta, but prior to trying this tea I didn’t know what it was either. I most certainly had to do an internet search, but now that I do know what it is I’m actually kind of embarrassed I didn’t. What originally caught my attention with this one was absolutely the rhubarb; I’ve been on a bit of a personal rhubarb kick lately: beer, pie, jam, yogurt and of course tea.
Dry, there isn’t a whole lot to this tea. It has a very, very mildly fruity scent but nothing super characteristic of rooibos and apart from one small little piece of cube shaped rhubarb my measured out leaf is all fine pieces of rooibos. As the tea was steeping, it started to smell a little bit stronger but still mostly maintained a predominantly rooibos only sort of scent.
The taste thankfully delivers some flavour although not nearly as much as I’m wanting. The whole front end of the sip is straight rooibos – albeit a pretty good one without any medicinal or woodchip kind of notes present. That said, people who dislike the taste of rooibos, good or bad, will want to steer clear of this one: trust me, you’re going to taste a lot of it. The other flavour kicks in the end of the sip and the aftertaste. And it’s pretty subtle; a bit of sweetness and a little bit of tang similar to the natural tartness of rhubarb. It’s also a little bit apple-y. I’m struggling a little bit to pick up the cream/custard of the ‘Panna Cotta’ but there is something about the tartness of the rhubarb that reminds me a little bit of Greek Yogurt, so perhaps that’s more derived from the panna cotta.
I don’t sweeten my teas, but I could possibly be inclined to add the tiniest pinch of sugar to this one because I just have that gut feeling that it’d make a world of difference. However, without the sugar the flavour of this one is definitely lacking. However, this could be a winner for someone who doesn’t mind rooibos and who is looking for something subtly flavoured.
Kenya Marula Black Tea from McQuarrie’s Tea & Coffee Merchants
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: McQuarrie’s Tea & Coffee Merchants
Tea Description:
Flavourful African black tea from Kaimosi, an exotic combination of sweet banana with the tart, fresh taste of the yellow-gold African Marula fruit.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
McQuarrie’s is a local loose leaf tea and coffee store; the kind I feel like most larger cities have at least one of – usually privately owned, and not part of a chain of any kind. They source their teas from other companies, such as the Metropolitan Tea Company and are an interesting middle ground between more commercial/branded loose leaf companies such as Teavana or DAVIDsTEA which can act as ‘gateway’ loose leaf shops and less commercial, higher quality stores for more seasoned tea drinkers. If that makes sense at all. This tea in particular is sourced from a larger manufacturer called Wollenhaupt tea, however it doesn’t appear to be currently listed on their website.
According to my Aunt, McQuarrie’s has ‘probably been around longer than she has’. It’s, of course, right in the heart of my cities’ more ‘hipster’ area with all of the other stores that specialize in more obscure hobbies/interests and fancier, offbeat cafes and such. My roommate, coincidentally, happens to work at one of those restaurants!
I picked this one up in person; it’s always kind of nice shopping in person because you don’t have to blindly purchase something just based on the description or other people’s reviews. I got to see and smell this before hand! The smell was definitely very banana and that certainly made me excited because it’s been a while since I’ve had a good banana tea with a black base – right now 52Tea’s Butterscotch Banana is sticking out in memory but it’s been an awfully long time since having it. The marula was very interesting too; other than knowing it’s an exotic fruit I have no experience or familiarity with it so that absolutely caught my attention.
It seemed, overall, like a very interesting find from my local store!
I cold brewed my sample – someone recently called me the ‘Queen of Cold Brew’ and that may be pretty accurate. I will cold brew just about anything, especially at this time of the year.
This had a very interesting flavour! The banana was the dominant note; it was almost sickly sweet and tread a thin line between realistic, overripe banana and banana candy. It struck up fairly vivid recollections of two things. The first was the banana liquer that I currently have in my fridge, which is very sugary and sweet. The second thing was Khao Tom Mad which is a Thai dessert made of banana, sticky rice and coconut milk served in either a banana or coconut leaf. I’ve only had it once, but it was pretty amazing – maybe even life changing. I definitely think some of the sweetness of the banana comes from the blackberry leaves; my experience with them has been that they tend to made fruit flavours really, really pop.
I don’t have a familiarity with marula, but I’m told by my roommate that it’s supposed to taste a little bit like guava. I don’t know if I necessarily got that with this blend – though I did get a little bit of tartness which the roomie says is probably from the marula. It was quite mild though and didn’t play much into the overall dynamic of the tea. I am a little bit sad the marula didn’t have more of an impact on the taste – I love when I get the chance to experience new flavours in tea.
The rest of the tea was supporting notes for the banana; both mild cinnamon and a bit of drier wood notes were present. The finish was the biggest let down for the tea though; there was a light sudsy/soapy flavour than was unpleasant and slightly lingering. I first thought that the wood was a little weird to have been coming from the rooibos in the blend, which was my initial assumption – but then I remembered that one of the listed ingredients is lapacho. Aha! I’ve had bad experiences with lapacho, including soapy notes and very dry hardly palatable wood notes. I definitely do NOT see the appeal of lapacho. Fortunately, it was quite mild here. It would certainly explain both the soapy notes and the off wood notes, though.
Overall this tea was pretty interesting, and a bit of a rollercoaster. It had an incredible beginning with some of the tastiest banana notes I’ve had in a very, very long time and the middle was pretty solid too but the weird lack of anything Marula, of which the tea is named after, and unfortunate presence of Lapacho made for a bit of a disappointing finish.
Still a worthwhile try though given how unique it is, and something I’ll continue to personally fiddle around with. I’m determined to taste some marula!
Green Rooibos from M&K’s Tea Co
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Herbal.
Where to Buy: M&K’s Tea Co
Tea Description:
The non-oxidized, green counterpart to the redbush rooibos you may have heard everyone talking about! Less red, more green, less autumn, more spring! Green rooibos tastes much more vegetal and refreshing and less robust than regular rooibos.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
The weather is getting warmer and the spring bug is starting to set in. I’ve noticed that my iced tea intake has gone way up. My kids have the bug too. Everyday they ask me if they HAVE to go to school. My five year old who goes to a pre-K program has already declared himself as being done with learning and school. I had to inform him that he has many years ahead of him and that next year he will be going all day next year versus the half day he currently goes now.
This tea reminds me of springtime. The dry leaves smell very vegetal and have a hay/grass like smell to them. Brewed up (212F-3tbsp-5 minutes in my Breville-then poured into a tumbler of ice) this is honey goodness.
Beautifully done. Smooth and honey like. A well done yet simple tea. I’m not picking up any kind of vegetal flavor like the description had said. That is fine with me. This hit the spot. Just wish I would have brought more along with me. I could drink this all day. Yum!
