Jillian Send Message

Dear David’s Tea,
Please stop putting all your samples in itty bitty tins that I can’t get my scoop in without tea spilling everywhere.
Love Jillian.

Oh. My. God. This tastes like those Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Lattes only better! The flavours taste more authentic and the spices are fresher and well…spicier. The addition of some milk makes it creamy and smooth-tasting, and for once I’m actually able to taste the pumpkin. The spices in this blend work really well with the pumpkin – I can taste primarily cloves and cardamom which I like better than the cinnamon that’s often used in autumn-themed teas.

I bet this would be fantastic steeped as a traditional-style chai with steamed milk and honey.

The flavour profile is a bit more balanced this time – I think the extra minute I steeped it helped. The rootbeer flavour is stronger and there’s some slight minty notes as well. Chamomile is still the dominant flavour however, which is fine I suppose – I have nothing against chamomile.

I got this tea as a free-bee with one of my SpecialTeas orders, I seem to recall. I’m generally not big on berry-flavoured teas as they tend to have hibiscus in them, and I have to say I haven’t been too impressed with other greens that I’ve tried from this company. But I try to keep an open mind whenever I try a new tea.

It smells berry-ish or maybe a bit like fruit punch – I didn’t notice the tell-tale red colour and a check of the ingredients list on the website confirmed that there in fact isn’t any hibiscus in this blend (whoot!)

The tea is a little bit bland, although I can taste the flavours a bit better after its had time to cool off slightly. The mix of berry flavours is apparent and has a touch of sweetness and you know what? it manages perfectly fine without a bunch of hibiscus in it. So there all you hibiscus-obsessed tea companies! ;)

The rhubarb flavour isn’t so aparent, but then it’s something that has the potential to rival hibiscus in terms of sourness; so I’d rather they went with too little rather than too much!

I drank this cuppa this morning, but I’ve only now had time to actually sit down and log on to my laptop. There was only enough tea leaf for one more cup so I had it with some skim milk. The milk smoothes the tea out nicely and while it doesn’t turn it into anything mind-blowing I could see this being a solid, go-to breakfast tea for people like me who need a kick in the ass in the morning.

I added in a splash of milk just for curiosity’s sake and it turned the tea a colour that was almost identical to the color of hot chocolate – the kind made from that Cadbury mix.

Anyways it didn’t make the tea taste like a rootbeer float (damn!), although it did bring out the sweet, creamy notes that usually get overpowered by the honeybush and rootbeer flavours when drunk plain. I might just make a habit of drinking it like this. :D

This is another tea that came into my posession via the Travelling Teabox. I was a bit dubious when I saw that this was a CTC tea with broken leaves mixed in. I’m glad that the recommended steeping time was so short because this tea definitely has a kick to it and a harshness that could end up being quite nasty if steeped for longer. I didn’t care for it at first, but as I drank it grew on me. It reminds me a bit of an English Breakfast – slightly toasty with a clean, tannic flavour. I think it could be improved with some milk.

I experimented with steeping this tea in a more traditional fashion using more leaf, slightly cooler water, not mixing the leaves while they steeped, etc. The results were so grassy and bitter that I couldn’t even finish the cup and had to dump it out, something i almost never do with tea – steeping it subsequently for 30 seconds was better, but still slightly bitter. Bleh, this tea is going to lose points for that – I liked the Murchie’s version so much better.

I managed not to accidently add milk to the cup this time around. The impressions that I got from the previous steeping remain the same – raw cocoa powder with a bit of smokiness. It’s a little harsh and bitter for my tastes, so next time I might try reducing the steeping temperature by a minute and seeing if that helps at all. Still nothing that I’d liken to orchid, although I am getting like glimpses of sweetness, but this is mostly overshadowed by the bitterness.

I dug out a small sample packet of this tisane today – I think it got it from Doulton awhile back and it got lost in the unfathomable depths of my tea cabinet. :D

I went with the lower end of her recommended steeping time and the result was predominantly of chamomile with herbal-minty undertones. There’s also an intriguing hint of rootbeer flavour at the end of each sip. I’m not sure which of the ingredients is creating that effect – or maybe it’s a combination of several different things?

Man this tea smells awesome; it’s all banana-y and coconut-y. I think I need to steep the teabag longer because the flavour is a little weak, but I love the tropical, fruity flavours in this cuppa. The rooibos flavour is barely there, providing a good, solid background to the other flavour notes.

Thank you for sharing the bounty with me, Jaime!