Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Honeybush
Where to Buy: Zoomdweebies
Tea Description:
This is a crowd pleaser. Order this today and offer your Thanksgiving dinner guests an awesome caffeine-free treat with organic flavors of gingerbread and a hint of cream cheese frosting. This is a real treat and likely to go fast. Do not miss out on this one.
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn about SBT’s subscriptions here.
Taster’s Review:
Gingerbread is not something I eat often. I like some gingerbread, but most that I find tends to be a little on the wimpy side with no real ginger flavor. An exception to that is the gingerbread that I’ve tasted from Nikki’s Cookies. Good stuff.
But a lot of the gingerbread that you can buy in the grocery stores (about a month ago, you couldn’t walk into a grocery store without seeing a “gingerbread house kit.” And most of that stuff tastes like it was made from cardboard. No real ginger flavor – it’s as if the ginger that they use in the recipe is ground ginger that had been sitting on the shelf since Christmas in 1990. Boring flavor with no ginger kick.
So I’m hoping this tea will give me the kind of gingerbread flavor I want!
I hot-brewed this tea. I brought a quart of water to 195°F and dropped the sachet into the kettle and let it steep for 9 minutes. Then I strained the liquid into my favorite half gallon iced tea pitcher and repeated the process: heated a quart of water – 195°F – and put the same sachet into the kettle. This time, I let it steep for 11 minutes. Then I let the pitcher come to room temperature before I stashed it in the refrigerator to cool overnight.
Today, I have a pitcher full of gingerbread tea! Well, I guess I should say, I did have a pitcher full of gingerbread tea. Now I have about 1 glassful of tea remaining at the bottom of the pitcher and that glassful will be consumed soon!
This has a nice ginger flavor. The ginger is subtle but present in every sip. It doesn’t have a strong, peppery zing from the ginger, but there’s enough ginger in there to know that you’re tasting ginger. And there’s a pleasant sweetness, almost molasses-y, and that’s something I want to taste with gingerbread too.
This is sweet and enjoyable without being cloying. The ginger cuts through enough of the sweetness to keep it from tasting too sweet. The honeybush is a good base for the gingerbread flavors because the nutty and honey-esque flavors of the honeybush really tie in well with the overall gingerbread concept.
If I’m to offer any “complaint” about this tea, it would be that I want a little more “buttery/pastry” like flavor. That – it would seem – has become a common complaint of mine about some of the baked good flavor teas that 52Teas/Southern Boy Teas/Zoomdweebies has been producing as of late. I’m just not getting the buttery/pastry-like flavor that I’ve come to love from some of 52Teas’ classic flavors like their Pancake Breakfast tea. I think that would make this taste more like a gingerbread cookie.
That said, I found this iced tisane to be enjoyable. I like the flavor of the ginger and the molasses notes are quite delightful. It’s not my favorite iced tea selection from Southern Boy Teas, but it’s tasty and refreshing. The fact that the half gallon pitcher is nearly empty after it being in the refrigerator for less than a day should be testament to the fact that I enjoyed the flavor and it is very easy to drink.
Please take a moment to check out Frank’s Kickstarter campaign! He’s looking to take Southern Boy Teas to new heights and the fundraising effort will help get him started in the right direction! Please help this small business!
Christmas Cookie Shou Mei from 52Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: White
Where to Buy: 52Teas
Tea Description:
If this tea doesn’t make you feel warm and fuzzy inside, you might just be the Grinch. With premium shou mei white tea, almonds, ginger, orange peel, cinnamon chips, a few cloves, marshmallow root and organic flavors, combine this tea with a nice crackling fire in the fireplace and someone to snuggle up to on the couch, and you’ll be in holiday heaven.
Learn more about this blend here.
Learn how to subscribe to 52Teas’ Tea of the Week program here.
Taster’s Review:
Yum! It’s no big surprise to me that this tea is already sold out! With a name like “Christmas Cookie” – who could resist, right? And it’s oh so tasty!
The aroma of the dry leaf was a little off for me. I could smell the spices and those were very pleasant to the nose, but I also picked up on a slight chemical-y note to the dry leaf fragrance. I hoped that this would disappear after brewing (usually, that flavor oil smell does dissipate in the brewing process).
To brew this, I used my Kati tumbler and added 1 heaping bamboo scoop to the basket and 12 ounces of hot water (heated to 170°F) and let the tea steep for 3 minutes.
The brewed tea smells warm and gently spiced. I’m not picking up on any of the aforementioned chemical-y notes – a good thing! It smells like gramma’s kitchen at Christmastime when she’s baking all those magical cookies that she used to bake. I smell spice cookies and almond cookies. I smell hints of orange. My mouth is watering and wishing it was eating cookies right about now!
And the flavor is delightful. I don’t know that I’m actually tasting cookies as much as I’m smelling them from this tea. I think that there should be more of the buttery, cake-y, pastry flavors that 52Teas does so well here. Maybe a tad more marshmallow root to emphasize the cookie aspect rather than the spiced aspect of this tea. As it is, it tastes like a mild chai made with a white tea base rather than a cookie.
I find that as it cools, the flavor improves a bit and the baked goods flavor seems to develop a little. However, it never becomes fully realized. I find myself wanting to taste something more “bake-y” – brown sugar? Buttery cookie? Pastry/cake flavors? Even a hint of icing might help bring the “Christmas Cookie” to life just a little more.
The white tea has a smooth and silky texture. It’s not bitter or overly astringent. It’s sweet and has a delicate flavor that is lightly vegetal (more like hay than grass or steamed veggies). I appreciate that I distinctly taste TEA here and those flavors have not been overpowered by the presence of the strong spice and other flavors.
Since this is a white tea, I decided to resteep it and see how it turns out. YES! There it is! That cookie flavor! This tea MUST be resteeped to get to that yummy cookie flavor. I even taste a hint of frosting!
As I said before, it’s clear to me why this flavor has sold out – not only is the name of the tea tempting but the taste is delightful!
Maple Marshmallow Flavored Iced Black Tea from Southern Boy Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Zoomdweebies
Tea Description:
Why hasn’t anyone combined these two flavors yet? I don’t know, but I’m not scurred. Here’s our premium organic Indian black teas blended with organic maple and marshmallow flavors.
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn about SBT’s subscriptions here.
Taster’s Review:
YUM! This is seriously good.
My mouth watered when I saw the label on the package. I want those cupcakes.
And while this tea doesn’t have “cupcake-y” flavors to it, it definitely has the maple and the marshmallow! These flavors are strong and very well-defined. And even though they are really strong, I still taste plenty of black tea flavor too.
It’s sweet and refreshing. It’s something that tastes so good that you’d swear you’re cheating on your diet when you drink it, but you aren’t! It’s iced tea! It only TASTES indulgent.
This is one of the best flavors I’ve tasted from SBT thus far. This might even be better than my lime favorites (Lime Cola and Lime Jello).
If you’re one who doesn’t like sweet flavors – this tea probably won’t be to your liking. But for the rest of us, seriously, you’ve got to try this. It’s so good.
AND Southern Boy Teas has a new Kickstarter Campaign going. Please take a moment and check out the campaign and if you can, please consider contributing to this small business!
Peaches & Cream Iced Green Tea from Southern Boy Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Zoomdweebies
Tea Description:
Premium Organic green tea with organic flavors.
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn more about how to subscribe to Southern Boy Teas here.
Taster’s Review:
I had high hopes for this particular flavor of iced tea from Southern Boy Teas. The idea of a Peaches & Cream iced green tea sounded oh so yummy!
Unfortunately, I don’t get a strong peach or cream flavor from this one. Not while it’s cold, anyway. I found that after the tea came to room temperature, rather than cold, right out of the fridge, the flavors developed a little bit.
Which was kind of a disappointment, because hey, let’s face it, we drink iced tea because we’re looking for a chilled beverage, right?
The green tea is a light tasting green tea with soft buttery notes. These buttery notes do accentuate the cream flavor, but only slightly. Slight vegetal tones to the green tea. It’s a light and fresh tasting green tea – enjoyable.
As I mentioned earlier, I found the peach to be very difficult to discern when the tea is served cold. I keep the glass of iced tea sitting out on the counter for about fifteen or twenty minutes for the temperature to get out of the “chilly” and a little closer to “room temperature” before I drink it now, because it’s at this temperature that it tastes best. The cream notes are a little easier to discern than the peach, it’s a soft, vanilla-y note and it’s nice.
It’s a pleasant enough iced tea but I enjoyed several other green iced teas from Southern Boy Teas much more than I enjoyed this one. Good … but not great.
To brew: I used the “hot brew” method, heating 1 quart of freshly filtered water to 170°F and steeping for 1 1/2 minutes. Then I poured the brewed tea into my tea pitcher and resteeped the pouch again, 1 quart of water, 170°F and 2 minutes. Then I combined the two quarts of brewed tea together and chilled them in refrigerator until cold.
Lemon Ginger Cookie Oolong Tea Blend from 52Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Oolong
Where to Buy: 52Teas
Tea Description:
This was one of the suggestions I got for the new blend in the 12 Teas of Christmas set. I liked the idea so much I decided to make it NOW rather than save it for the gift set. Fujian oolong, ginger and lemon myrtle combined with organic flavors make this a treat you won’t want to miss out on. It will warm your bones and please your palate.
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn how to subscribe to 52Teas’ Tea of the Week program here.
Taster’s Review:
Mmm! This tea evokes happy memories for me. Every once in a while when my daughters were younger, we used to have tea parties. We’d go all out for them, making little finger sandwiches and scones and buying special sweets for the occasion. Our favorite cookies were ginger cookies with a lemon cream filling. The zesty flavor of the ginger along with the bright flavor of the lemon – a perfectly delightful combination.
And this tea is also perfectly delightful!
I like that I’m tasting lemon and ginger here, but that they aren’t overpowering the Oolong base. Oolong is one of those teas that I often think is better off left alone and not flavored because it can easily go wrong, and most Oolong teas are simply amazing without anything added to them.
Oh, I’ve enjoyed many flavored Oolong teas and I even flavored an Oolong in my blending days (a melon flavored Oolong which was exceptionally good – if I do say so myself). However, because it is easy to do wrong by the Oolong when flavoring it, I think that for the most part, it’s just better to leave the Oolong alone rather than just go woefully, painfully wrong with it.
BUT … Frank did good by the Oolong this time! This is lovely!
The light, creamy base of the Oolong melds beautifully well with the sharp notes of the ginger and the vibrant lemon notes, and these two flavors are not overwhelming the Oolong. It’s sweet, a little creamy, and smooth.
It tastes like a tea party in a teacup! It resteeps well too. The second infusion was almost as lovely as the first.
As I write this review, I see that there is one pouch left in stock of this tea. So, if it’s one you’d like to try, you can always request that it get reblended here. And while you’re at it, you can also submit your idea for a great tea blend!