Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Tealicious Tea Company
Tea Description:
Our version of Indian Spiced Chai Tea surpasses any other available. We blended our magical recipe of anise, cardamom, cloves, whole red peppercorn, ginger, vanilla and cinnamon together with our finest Ceylon OP to create this delightful Chai.
Learn more about this chai here.
Taster’s Review:
Autumn has officially begun! Well, at least for me it has. I know that the official first day of autumn was a month ago, but, for me, it isn’t really autumn until I need to start putting on sweaters when I go outside. When it’s cold and wet and grey … when drinking a hot, spiced chai blend is so comforting!
This Indian Spiced Chai from Tealicious Tea Company is indeed comforting … and oh-so-good!
The spices are really delightful. They are warm and soothing. I like that the cinnamon and ginger do not seem to be overwhelming the flavors – I can taste each of the spices. The cloves are strong, the cardamom gives a warm, exotic note to the cup, and I can even taste a hint of snappy licorice from the anise and I’m really loving that. For those of you who tend to not like licorice flavor, don’t worry, the licorice-y note isn’t strong, and the anise really melds together nicely with the other spices to create a more unified flavor. It doesn’t really taste “licorice-y” … or even “cinnamon-y” or “clove-y” for that matter. It just tastes warmly spiced.
The vanilla is my favorite element of this chai. It adds a very pleasing creamy touch to the cup; eliminating the need to add milk. It tastes so sweet and creamy, almost latte-ish without the milk!
Which is good because the black tea base is a Ceylon tea, and it’s a fine black tea base but I think that this chai could definitely benefit from the bold, malty flavor of a rich Assam. The Ceylon tea is smooth and tasty in this blend, but it just feels and tastes a little weak. The background doesn’t seem as “solid” as I like from a chai. As a result, adding milk to this chai may end up muting the flavors more than enhancing them.
But as I said, adding milk really isn’t necessary, because the vanilla really gives this tea a deliciously sweet, creamy taste without the milk. This is really delicious served without milk, with only about a half a teaspoon of turbinado sugar to enhance the spices a little bit.
A really delightful cup of chai to help kick off the start of my favorite season of the year!
Earl Grey Excelsior Tea from Tealicious Tea Company
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Tealicious Tea Company
Tea Description:
Our classic Earl Grey is blended with our finest Yunnan, Keemun, Ceylon and bergamot which creates an exceptional flavor and aroma. This tea is much superior from the ordinary Earl Grey.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
You know me, I am always looking for a good Earl Grey. And this is definitely one of the best! Certainly worthy of it’s given name: Earl Grey Excelsior.
And what is it about this Earl Grey that makes it one of the best?
Well, first of all, there is the blend of black teas that form the base of this tea. This is a masterful combination of Yunnan, Keemun and Ceylon teas, which creates a deliciously rich, smooth background flavor. There is very little astringency and no bitterness, and I even oversteeped this about a minute too long. But, there is no indication of this with the flavor: the tea tastes rich and malty, with some earthy notes and hints of a honey-esque sweetness that nicely compliments the bergamot.
And of course, no Earl Grey tea would be an Earl Grey without the bergamot, and the bergamot flavoring used here is of high quality, as demonstrated in the remarkable flavor of this cup. The bergamot has that tangy citrus note that is immediately recognizable as the classic Earl Grey flavor. Sometimes, though, with Earl Grey, the flavor is just off and the tea ends up tasting of Aunt Mable’s perfume … but rest assured: this Earl Grey Excelsior does NOT! There are no perfume-y notes, no soapy aftertaste. Just bright bergamot flavor!
This is a FANTASTIC Earl Grey! If you love Earl Grey teas like I do, you really MUST try this tea!
Morgantau Green Tea from Tealicious Tea Company
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Tealicious Tea Company
Tea Description:
A blend of high grade green Sencha tea, rose petals, beautiful blue cornflowers and brightly colored yellow sunflowers. This offers a refreshing and smooth flavor that awakens your taste buds.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
Spring is here! Signs of spring are all around me, from the beautiful pink plumage of the trees that line the streets in my neighborhood, to the promenade of the proud robins hopping around the lawns, to the bright yellow daffodils that pop up in random patches along the roadsides.
This tea seems a perfect choice to sip when contemplating the magic of spring. It is a gorgeous tea, not only to the eye with its colorful petals and lush, green tea leaves; but it is also lovely to the nose and the palate as well. The aroma is so incredibly beautiful, with hints of fresh grass and the air that sweeps over rose blossoms in the spring. That divine fragrance filled the kitchen as this tea brewed, and the brewed tea – while its bouquet is quite a bit softer than the dry leaf – it still holds on to hints of that flowery, fresh scent.
The tea tastes very much the way the aroma led me to believe: it tastes fresh and lively, with delightful floral touches. It isn’t an overwhelmingly flowery tasting tea, though. The rose is the strongest of the floral tones, and it is more like a whisper of rose flavor rather than a powerful rose taste that you might experience from a rose scented tea (a rose congou, for example). Here, the floral notes are much more delicate, but I like the way they enhance the overall cup.
The green tea is a very bright, refreshing tea with floral notes of its own, which are highlighted by the presence of the flower petals in this blend. There are vegetal notes and a buttery undertone. There is some astringency to this, but not much. It’s more like a slightly dry feel to the tongue in the aftertaste, followed by a lingering floral note.
A lovely tea to enjoy these early days of spring … or any time of year for that matter!
French Canadian Maple Tea from Tealicious Tea Company
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Tealicious Tea Company
Tea Description:
Our French Canadian Maple Black Tea is a classic blend of Ceylon and maple flavor resulting in a premium taste.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
This tea had me with the very first sip. It is SO incredibly yummy.
The maple flavoring is perfect – it is sweet and a strong flavor but, I can also taste the black tea. It is a Ceylon black tea, so it is fairly mellow. With the addition of the maple flavoring what might otherwise be considered a medium-bodied tea becomes a rich, full-bodied tea.
That being said, this isn’t what I’d call an energizing type of tea. Instead, it is a cozy, comforting cup… a very pleasant tasting tea, it isn’t overly invigorating so it isn’t exactly the kind of tea you’d want to drink on the mornings when you need to get up and go.
Instead, I’d recommend this tea for the days you want to linger and curl up with a deliciously cozy cup of tea. Perfect for weekend mornings when you can take your time and savor this delicious maple flavor: It has that classic maple flavor that reminds me of maple sugar candy! There are complex nutty tones (chestnuts!) and a gentle warm spice note in the distance. YUM!
This is sweet without additions, but if you want something sweeter – a little bit of turbinado sugar will turn this into a delicious dessert-y treat in no time. This tea would also make a fantastic latte – just brew it a little stronger by adding a little extra leaf, and then add steamed, frothed milk to the brewed cup: it’s a creamy and indulgent way to satisfy your sweet tooth. Of course, if you want to amplify the maple flavor, you can also sweeten it with a drizzle of maple syrup.
As for me, I love this straight up – nothing added. It has an enjoyable sweetness to it that makes my sweet tooth happy without me needing to add calories to the cup. While this would be tasty as an iced tea, I prefer it hot, because the flavors have a very autumnal taste to them, and hot tea really plays to that cozy autumn-ness of the tea.
This is my first tea that I’ve sampled from this company, and I’m thrilled with it. I can definitely see a Tealicious Tea Company order in my future!
Grand Keemun from Tea Licious
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Tea Licious
Product Description:
Full body black tea with a light flavor.
Taster’s Review:
The aroma of this tea is somewhat earthy with a low note of pine. There is also the faintest hint of smoke in the fragrance. It is very masculine and intriguing.
After my first sip of this tea, my first impression is that the description provided on the website is a little misleading – this is certainly a full-bodied black tea, but, I don’t consider the flavor to be light at all. This is a very bold, robust tea with a very pleasing complexity that I would expect from a high quality Keemun tea such as this.
The wine-like qualities of a Keemun are there: fruit notes of plum and currant, sweet but not cloying, with an aftertaste that is somewhat reminiscent of fermented fruit. The finish is dry but not overly astringent. There is very little bitterness to this cup, although I do detect a hint of savory bitterness toward mid-sip.
There are some other noteworthy flavors to this cup as well. The earthiness that is part of the fragrance becomes less apparent although I can detect vague earthy notes in the sip, as ell as a lovely smoky note that weaves its way throughout the sip.
Perhaps most enjoyable (for me, at least) is the biscuit-y quality that this tea possesses. It has a deep, bake-y kind of taste to it, that is accented with a lovely burnt-sugar caramel undertone.
This is a really lovely Keemun, one I’d highly recommend.