Harry & David

Last cup. Hope this is available next fall…enjoying this so much explains why I’m not a huge lover of straight-up chai. It just tastes like hot, wet spice. The addition of a little fruit to the mix makes it homey and sweet and dessert-like. Wonder what cherry chai would be like…

Do your non-tea friends automatically assume you love chai? Me, too. However, this was a pleasant surprise—little bag passed on from a friend in a Republic of Tea-ish cylindrical tin, but with both RoT and Harry & David labeling. Can’t find a good description on either website, although it shows up as a “Pick Two Teas” option at H&D.

All that to say, it’s your standard average mishmash of chai spice ingredients, with the addition of apple. And the apple makes it exceptionally good. Pie with lots of cinnamon. Homemade red cinnamon apples. Mmmmmm!

Made a cup of this yesterday, but I only got to finish about 1/3 of it, because my LO was being ornery. She just doesn’t understand “Mommy’s having a tea moment” yet. xD It’ll be a while before that happens. Usually it’s not so much of an issue. Like this morning, when she’s sleeping late because she decided to stay up two hours past her usual bedtime last night.

Anyway, enough about my spawn. My previous notes about this tea stand—it’s a lot more vanilla than pear. However, there is something in the astringency of the aftertaste that is somewhat reminiscent of the way pear peel tastes by itself: a little sour, a little bitter.

Having this tea this morning with some wheat toast and blood orange marmalade. :) The vanilla flavor comes out more than the pear, I’m afraid… but I could probably guess that pear is a difficult flavor to detect anyway. I love eating the fruit, though, so I was really excited when I saw this tea in a sampler pack from Harry & David. Omg, that store makes me poor. D:

Anyway, it definitely is a wonderfully light black tea (despite the fact that I steeped it a bit longer than I meant to), with some delicious fruity notes that I suppose could be the pear. It just doesn’t scream “I AM A PEAR TEA” at me. Still tasty, though. :3

This I’s in a teabag. It mostly smells of the chocolate and raspberry. I steeped it up. I brewed up to a black tea. Its a nice black tea with a medium chocolate and raspberry taste.