I was asked once, “what does cactus taste like?” and I floundered wildly to come up with an answer. I still don’t know how to describe. I could recognise it instantly; it’s even one of those flavours that it’s easy to imagine when you don’t have it, but I don’t really know how to describe it.
It’s sort of sweet and sort of fruity but not like your ordinary sweet and fruity. It has that cool sensation that you also find in mint and it has a certain freshness to it so it doesn’t get cloying. And a touch of fennel(*) too.
My leaves of this are fairly old and have been standing forgotten in the cupboard for a long time, so I can’t really remember how much flavour it had to begin with but I think it must have faded some. There isn’t all that much of the added flavour left in it, except in the aroma, but the green tea it’s based on is coming out loud and clear. It doesn’t say what the base is, but I’m guessing it’s probably Sencha, since the vast majority of the green flavoured teas in that particular shop are based on Sencha. Or at least they were at the time I bought it.
It’s been ages and ages since I’ve had a pure Sencha (that I knew for sure was Sencha) so I can’t really judge it on flavour. Only an educated guess. Due to the nature of the cup, i can’t tell you about the colouring of the liquid and looking at it as it’s poured doesn’t really give a very accurate picture. It did look a tiny bit neon-green though. Just the slightest hint.
The taste is definitely different from my chinese and taiwanese greens too. It doesn’t taste as green, kind of. As in, it doesn’t taste like it’s not a green tea, it just doesn’t invoke the same images of things that are green while drinking it. Or something. Gosh, that sounds ridiculous, but I can’t figure out how else to explain it. It reminds me very strongly of Genmaicha, to the point where I have to remind myself that it isn’t actually Genmaicha. Does any of this sound Sencha-ish to those of you who have more experience with Sencha?
.(*) Fennel, btw, might be an interesting flavour in a green or white tea, come to think of it…
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My first thought when I saw cactus tea was “owww”, then I remembered you don’t actually have to eat the cactus whole. Sound awesome actually, I’m a huge cactus fan, provided the needles are off.
i would love to taste cactus! it sounds like such a fun flavor!
That’s a very interesting taste you describe for the cactus. I’ve eaten cactus and I don’t remember it tasting that way. Of course, brewing it into tea might make it taste different. I’m curious to try the tea now and compare with my favorite nopalitos omelette.
The cactus I’ve eaten tasted like green beans. I know that sounds strange, but that’s what I remember: sweet green beans. Different from prickly pear fruits, obviously, which is sort of..like…jam. Kind of. Or maybe that’s just because I had prickly pear jam.
Curious about this tea, now.
It’s really weird. I don’t know what they’ve actually used to flavour it with. At first I assumed it was prickly pears, but then I saw they had them in my supermarket one day and I bought one and absolutely didn’t like it. I was imagining it to taste sort of like this and instead I got something kind of more…. banana-like only not yummy like bananas. Then I started poking around on the internet and discovered that there are several different kinds of cactuses or cactii or whatever that produce edible fruit, so now I’m as confused as ever. ‘Cactus’ is all they’re giving me. Heck, for all I know it’s just a fancy name for the flavour and doesn’t actually have anything to do with the plants at all.
My first thought when I saw cactus tea was “owww”, then I remembered you don’t actually have to eat the cactus whole. Sound awesome actually, I’m a huge cactus fan, provided the needles are off.
i would love to taste cactus! it sounds like such a fun flavor!
That’s a very interesting taste you describe for the cactus. I’ve eaten cactus and I don’t remember it tasting that way. Of course, brewing it into tea might make it taste different. I’m curious to try the tea now and compare with my favorite nopalitos omelette.
The cactus I’ve eaten tasted like green beans. I know that sounds strange, but that’s what I remember: sweet green beans. Different from prickly pear fruits, obviously, which is sort of..like…jam. Kind of. Or maybe that’s just because I had prickly pear jam.
Curious about this tea, now.
It’s really weird. I don’t know what they’ve actually used to flavour it with. At first I assumed it was prickly pears, but then I saw they had them in my supermarket one day and I bought one and absolutely didn’t like it. I was imagining it to taste sort of like this and instead I got something kind of more…. banana-like only not yummy like bananas. Then I started poking around on the internet and discovered that there are several different kinds of cactuses or cactii or whatever that produce edible fruit, so now I’m as confused as ever. ‘Cactus’ is all they’re giving me. Heck, for all I know it’s just a fancy name for the flavour and doesn’t actually have anything to do with the plants at all.