Tazo

A surprise in my lunchbox! I found this hiding in a zippered pocket. I know I haven’t bought this tea for at least a year, so it may be past its prime, but I thought I would give it a try. What a pleasant surprise! I forgot how much I like this tea. It is such a nice blend of green tea and herbal flavors. I might need to pick up some more, or figure out how to blend something similar myself. How hard could it be?

I received a box of this in a swap. I like a hint of ginger, but I’m not a great fan of lots of ginger…like I love a snowflake floating by the window but I don’t like getting smacked in the face with a snowball. The ginger smell hit me like a snowball. It continued while steeping, so I cut the steeping time a little short in fear that it would just be too overwhelming. Luckily I was pleasantly surprised when I tasted it. I taste the lemongrass and the ginger, kind of a peppery taste, but not the green tea so much. And the pear seems to be afraid of the ginger, it’s hiding pretty well. Maybe a little pear in the aftertaste, a faint finish.

The box is interesting reading, all about good karma. They claim this tea is yin, yang and yow – the yin being the green tea, the yang the ginger, and the yow the pear. I would call this a basically yang tea. I will drink this again, but I doubt I will get more after this is finished. I do want to try it iced, I may change the rating then.

One of those elaborate flaboyantly aromasized teas that are just over the top with perfumation! However it’s really how bad do you want the caffeine. I was pretty out of it this morning, a cup of this woke me up and got me ready to conquor a day. To be honest, I don’t think I’ll be having this one again, after two sips I was ready to put it down. It has some enjoyable moments, but earl grey in general isnt my cup of tea. I enjoy heavily aroma teas, but as long as its an aroma that I enjoy. DIdn’t enjoy this one at all…. Smelled like an evil concoction of bergamot. Just saying. Time to enjoy the beautiful florida sunshine while Im here :D

it reminded me of FrootLoops… This kept me awake and happy on a 9hr drive back home

Tart and tasty! Brews up a delicious bright red color. I enjoy it with a spoonful of honey

Yes, pretty darn strong, but good if you like that sort of thing. :)

“But I’m just a soul whose intentions are good / Oh Lord, please don’t let me be misunderstood.”

Extremely tart citrus zing when it hits the tongue and roof of the mouth, with a lingering flavor of mellow licorice. The lemongrass is quite strong as well. I have found it best to wait for the infusion to cool a bit before drinking, and the addition of honey also serves to soften the blow. I suspect this brew would be great for soothing a sore throat (especially with the addition of honey), or otherwise warming away a cold in the wintertime. But no mistake – it is formidable!

One of my favorite relaxation teas. It kind of gets me in a creative mood, too, for some reason.

This and the black tea is what I order at Starbucks. I like both, but I think I prefer the green tea. As I wrote for the black tea, I prefer sweetener with this, too. I prefer teas that don’t need extra sugar. But for a tea on the go, this is decent.

The description made me purchase a cup of this from Starbucks. It smelled like apple and spice and I was expecting something delicious! The tea left an unpleasant tickling sensation on the back of my tongue. I’m not sure if it was the effect of the spice, but I did not like it. The tea lacked any sort of vanilla flavor and didn’t really taste too much like apple either. The spice was almost too peppery (reminiscent of Yogi Tea’s disgusting peppery character) to enjoy. Had to dump this one.

From a person who doesn’t really care much for green tea, this Zen is pretty alright. I prefer flavored green teas and drink em’ for the health benefit. But I probably drink 6 cups of black tea to each green one.

So, I was sitting at my boyfriend’s house last night, waiting for him to return from his summer bowling league…

It was about 7pm and I was bored channel surfing through one crappy television show after another… so I decided to dig into his tea stash. I found an assorted Tazo box and searched it for some decaf tea because it was late – I don’t normally have tea after 6pm because I seem to be sensitive to caffeine.

I plucked Lotus from the box and made a cup. Bad decision. It was bad, but drinkable. Both the aroma and taste were strictly lotus… it was like chewing on a flower. It was astringent, but I wouldn’t stay it was bitter. Not exactly sweet… just… floral… only floral.

I drank the whole cup, but I will never make this again.

This is a new herbal tea from Tazo. I found it in, of all places, my local grocery store, which only carries teabags. I’d love to find it in whole leaf, because this is a delighful herb tea.

The odor when the bag is opened is overpowering and sickly sweet – roses on steroids. The tea when brewed is much mellower – the rose is still present, but I get lots of citrus notes, and a mild sweetness. This tea is made with honeybush, so it seemed unlikely that it would need sweetening, and it does not. A very pleasant cup for evening, or for when your life needs a little more rosiness.

Tazo has its generic brewing instructions on back – 5 minutes in water at boiling temp. It might be worth experimenting with a lower temperature, especially as this is bagged tea and should extract fairly easily.

Feeling a little groggy this morning so I tried this out in hopes that it would give me a bit of a wake-up. The smell of the tea make me think of some sort of scented cleaner – something about the smell of the lemongrass and the ginger together I think.

I was bracing myself for something toxic-tasting, but thankfully this tea didn’t deliver that. The ginger is probably the most prominent taste wrapped up with a bit of indistinct lemoniness. It isn’t too overpowering although that might be because of the low steeping temp to used. The green tea is pretty well hidden although I get it at the end of each sip. Overall this tea does has a nice refreshing quality though it’s also a bit drying on the mouth. It’s a decent enough drink, though not something I’d buy a box of I don’t think.

I had a 15 hour day yesterday and I am egg-zausted! I wanted to treat myself to something special this morning, and ever since chrine posted about her Earl Grey Latte I have wanted to try one!!! I just ran out to pick one of these up at Starbucks.

The first sip was a bit strange, but once my brain registered that I wasn’t drinking a coffee based latte from the white cup with the mermaid, I started to really get into it! The lavender is pronounced (yes!) and the foamy warm milky goodness and syrup make up for any deficiencies in the Tazo Earl Grey. It’s a bit perfumey but in a good way. I got the Tall size, and I can’t imagine getting anything bigger because it’s very rich. I love it! I am surprised/thrilled that Starbucks offers such an unusual drink!

So if I wanted to make this at home I would brew, say, 8 oz of Earl Grey tea and add about 4 oz warm milk? I don’t have vanilla syrup – would some simple syrup and a little of my home made vanilla extract work you think?

EDIT: I found a recipe for home made vanilla syrup that I’m going to try, and I thought I’d post it here for posterity:

http://breweddaily.com/2008/11/simple-vanilla-syrup-for-coffee/

I’m participating in a sleep deprivation study (oy! It is now 6 in the morning, and I’ve been awake for two hours against my will =D), and as we’re not allowed to have any caffeine my lovely friend bought us some herbal tea to get us through the morning. I have to say, so far I am not a fan of Passion. I’m a little surprised since the ingredients are so lovely, and it is such a beautiful tea, but it’s a bit like drinking straight lemon juice—unbelievably sour and puckery. However, reading these notes makes me start to think that this is more my fault than the tea’s. As others have said, it’s strong, strong stuff—it turns the water purple in just a moment or two and packs a real flavor wallop. I get into the habit of leaving the bag in while I drink herbals because usually herbal for me means mint—and you just can’t overbrew mint. This, clearly, you can overbrew. In addition, honey would mellow this out a great deal. As I don’t have access to honey, I’m going to go brew another cup with some sugar and a shorter steeping time, and we’ll see if this gets a revised review =)

in a pinch for some decent quality green tea? i’ll say that this does the trick when I don’t have my usual whole leaf tea. I can usually get two infusions out of a venti size since they put in two tea bags. I sweeten to taste with white sugar or honey if available at the location.

I can’t get away… this has became my office staple of tea!

Update on my wonderful vanilla rooibos…ahhh how I love thee! I must admit I used to get the vanilla rooibos lattes from Starbucks at $3 something a pop and then I had an epiphany, why not try to make my own latte?! 1 cream and 1 sugar later and this is an exact replicate of the Starbucks version and so now I am even more in love with this treasure!

This is a rooibos that I will actually drink alone (usually I’ll blend rooibos with another tea). Very smooth tasting to me; I actually need to go get a tin for my desk!

I used to be a big fan of this tea. I first had it at the Seattle Needle 10 years ago, bottled. The bottled tea blends the tea with apple juice and orange juice and it was addicting. I don’t know if they changed the blend when I first started drinking it, but it tastes off for some reason. I prefer the bottled tea, the blend taste different!

TTB Tea #15:

The problem I have w/ blends containing more than one type of tea isn’t the flavor… it’s the steeping parameters! I decided to steep this more like I would a green oolong since I figure the black tea probably only makes up 1/3 of the tea.

1 bag (2.23g)/6oz

After 3 min the liquor is VERY red. The aroma is heavy like a black tea, yet green… I can’t explain it.

The flavor is heavy like a black tea, yet smooth and sweet. I definitely wouldn’t steep this like a black tea. It’s ok, but I think a person that likes black teas would enjoy it a lot more.