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I got this as a free sample with my last Persimmon Tree order, and was a bit skeptical. As much as I love loose leaf tea, I didn’t think there’d be any real difference between a bagged mint and loose mint. I mean, it’s just mint, right? Not like it expands or anything.

Well, I was wrong! Even though this has spearmint, and I really prefer peppermint, the blending is just perfect. It has that characteristic sweetness from the peppermint, but it’s balanced by a nice bit of tang/bite from the spearmint. It’s so smooth and refreshing, I think I’ve found a new everyday mint tea! Plus it’s grown domestically which is pretty cool.

I really need to try this tea on its own, but not today! The first time I mixed it hot with Tea Guys’ Maple Sugar and it was amazing, so I decided to experiment a little bit more. Ads for Teavana’s Pineapple Blueberry Pop mix keep popping up, and it seems like a good flavor combination but their teas are so expensive. So, I made my own—2 parts Persimmon Tree’s Tropical Pineapple, 1 part Wild Blueberry (since the flavor is a lot stronger). I cold brewed it overnight, and it’s just what I wanted—juicy and sweet from the blueberry, tropical with a slight hint of tang from the pineapple. They both have a green base so the flavors don’t clash but work together in harmony. Very nice!

One of the nice things about The Tea Table is that you get 3 free samples with any order, no matter the size, and you can pick from any of their teas. So I placed a teeny order, just for 4 teas in a 1-ounce size, but got a bunch of samples too! This was one of them, since I’ve discovered that I love berry teas.

This is an okay tea. I don’t think it’s anything special, a mildly smooth black base with a pretty generic “berry” taste. It doesn’t really say WHAT kind of berry it is, and I don’t think I could place it. It’s not tart like raspberry or cranberry, sweet like strawberry, rich like blackberry or currant, or with that signature juiciness from blueberries. It’s like… the lowest common denominator berry flavor. It’s definitely berry, but it’s a bit muddled—especially since I had to add cream as the base brewed up a tad bitter. I do have a few cups of it left (they’re pretty generously sized for free samples!) so I might try this iced, I have a feeling that I’d like it a whole lot better.

EDIT: Gave this tea another shot with a short 4-hour cold brew using my once-steeped leaves, and served it with a slice of lemon. Wow, what a difference! The weird “mixed berry” taste has faded significantly, leaving a more distinct flavor: raspberry! There’s also something else fruity, and it’s pretty clearly apricot to me. So it’s like an apricot raspberry blend now! The lemon also helps subdue the artificial taste, leaving a crisp and sparking iced tea. It’s almost hard to believe these are the same leaves I used before: for the rest of my sample I’ll definitely give them a good rinse to get out some of the flavoring and then cold brew it. I’d give the hot tea a 72 and the cold an 85, so I’ll bump the rating to meet somewhere in the middle.

I’ve been enamored with lychee (which apparently is sometimes spelled lichee) in tea since I tried DT’s Cheeky Lychee, which was the perfect balance of floral and fruity. However, there are a LOT of lychee teas out there so I wanted to try a few more before I made a big purchase. Cause honestly, I could drink an iced lychee blend every day!

And lo and behold, this one tastes JUST like Cheeky Lychee. I mean identical—in a blind taste test I know I couldn’t tell them apart. Sweet, fruity, light, floral, with a nice strong black base that works so well iced. It’s also cheaper than Cheeky Lychee, which is always a bonus. I do have a jasmine lychee blend from them to try, but so far this might be the lychee tea for me.

I’ve had this twice in the past 24 hours—hot last night and cold brewed this afternoon (stretching till now, I drink iced tea very slowly ^^;). I love cider, guayusa, and Butiki, so I knew I was going to love my little sample from Stacy. In fact, I’ve been saving it up for some reason, but I plan on placing an order soon so I need to get through my samples!

I think apple and guayusa are a perfect combo. The cider is apple-y and spiced without tasting like a chai, and the grassy plant-like (in a good way!) taste of guayusa is a perfect balance. It’s like a light, airy cider. A little tart, a little sweet, just perfect! I think cider teas are usually pretty heavy (like Adagio’s apple chai) so this is an interesting counterpoint. It’s not overwhelming, and I think I could sip it all day easily! Actually, I kind of did. Two hot steeps and a cold brew without losing flavor, which is nice since tisanes often only hold up to one or two infusions. I’m debating between this and the Apricot in my order, the cider is currently a bit ahead.

I got my tiny order from The Tea Table today, and decided to dip into this one first. I had to be brave because in the bag it smelled… revolting. Almost barf-like. Seriously, it was horrifying! I am wondering if it was just the packaging, though the other teas I got don’t have a funky smell… nor do the dry leaves for this once they were in my little french press. Maybe it was just the smells from the flavoring trapped in there or something? Cause it only smelled like that when I first opened it. In any case, I’m glad I powered through because this is quite tasty!

Steeping, it smells like my beloved Tamarind Pop. Of course it doesn’t have any of the same flavors (or nearly as much complexity), so maybe it’s the rum part? It is a bit earthy and has that brown sugar-y taste going on, which I suppose was the association my brain made. The flavors seem odd (coconut, strawberry, rum, cream?!) but they work together well into a smooth and enjoyable cup. I got quite a bit of strawberry and a lot of cream, not so much coconut. The rum adds more of a buttery/malty background presence, it doesn’t really taste like actual rum. Not that I mind!

This is definitely tasty, especially after a nice light summer dinner of grilled chicken and rotini with pesto. It’s kind of rich and the flavoring is heavy: there’s a definite and distinct “black tea taste” but I’d be hard-pressed to pick up any of the individual tea notes. Sometimes, though, I’m really in the mood for a fruity, creamy, no-frills dessert-y tea!

I tried this both hot and cold brewed—hot I think the mint kind of overwhelmed everything else, it just tasted like a regular peppermint to me. Cold, though, the other flavors come out beautifully. The rose, mint and white tea all meld together and work so well in combination. I love mint/rose together, and this definitely doesn’t disappoint! They don’t overwhelm each other OR the base, which I was surprised by. White teas are so light and delicate, I didn’t know how a strong flavor like peppermint would work. But the blending is very nice, just the right amount of everything.

There’s also a hint of something else… maybe fruit of some sort? Like a soft whiff of strawberry. It’s very nice! Being a lover of both rose and peppermint I am totally loving this blend.

This is quite different from what I was expecting. In my head, ‘Tropical Pineapple’ sounds like a pina colada type drink, heavy on the flavoring. However, this is a pretty light blend! The green base shines through, grassy and crisp. The flavors are very subdued: the pineapple tastes like some fresh squeezed juice was mixed with a nice green tea, it’s very soft and subtle. However, it’s without any tang, which I kind of expect from pineapple.

There’s another fruit taste here too—apricot maybe? Well, it tastes like apricot! Kind of rich and lightly sweet, it goes really well with the pineapple to balance it out. It’s a tropical glass without being overly tropical (not that I mind super tropical flavors, but I prefer them with a black base). Of course I had this cold brewed, for some reason I find hot teas with tropical tastes kind of… strange? Anyway, an excellent iced tea, maybe the best green I’ve tried from Persimmon—I think the flavors are balanced a lot better than Green Pomegranate. The Caramel does give this a run for its money though! Maybe I should do a side by side taste-test.

I caved and bought a larger quantity of this in my recent ETS order, it’s just so delicious! A wonderful twist on Earl Grey, not as rich as an EGC but with just the right amount of sweetness and light floral undertones.

My last sample from The Tea Merchant! I sure went through those fast. For some reason I decided to cold brew this one, I’ve never had an iced flavored pu-erh and thought it would be interesting. It smells so rich and earthy, but I do love iced coconut drinks.

Even after an overly-long 16 hour steep, the color and taste are quite light! Not weak, but rather airy. The earthy, rich, hay-y flavor from the pu-erh is still there, but cold it’s almost sparkling. The coconut comes through loud and clear, deliciously tropical. The cocoa keeps it from being too beach-drink-like, and complements the deep flavors of the pu-erh. There are also nutty flavors going on, in fact I’d almost swear there was hazelnut flavoring! It’s kind of like a tropical twist on Florence.

It reminds me a lot of Persimmon Tree’s Coconut Cacao, only I haven’t tried that iced or this one hot yet so I can’t really compare them. This seems to be a lighter take on pu-erh/coconut/cocoa though, with less of a coffee latte vibe.