Southern Boy Teas

So I ordered this last summer and never got around to it. It is hard for me to make such a large pitcher of iced tea just for myself. My husband doesn’t drink tea….:(. My in-laws were supposed to be coming for a visit so I made this. They didn’t end up coming though. So I only drank a quarter of the pitcher before I had to toss it. I can only handle so much caffeine.

Anyway on to the tea…. Sorry about that tangent. Moral of the story is that I think this tea had lost lots of its flavour due to age. I found the berry taste very muted and found that I had to sweeten quite a bit which is unusual because I don’t often sweeten my teas. I won’t rate this because it doesn’t seem fair to the tea

Needed to make iced tea tonight (because it’s ICED TEA WEATHER at long last, PEOPLE!) and I found one last bag of this among the three of so I have of rainbow sherbet.

So, I was making this while making dinner and added more sugar than I usually do – like, a tablespoon more, because I forgot this makes a half gallon and not a whole gallon. But you know what? Even though it still tasted like pink lemonade in sherbet form (still has an ice creamy texture thing going on, which I found off putting last time), it was pretty good. Good enough that the boyfriend said “what’s this?” and I told him honestly and he still took a sip! And then he proceeded to ask for a glass.

Which I gave him after I picked my jaw up off the floor. Figures he’d like a tea when I’m in the middle of a sipdown. Maybe I should take my chances with the rainbow sherbet and see what happens…

The smell of this tea once brewed is strongly reminiscent of the Rainbow Sherbet tea…a sharp, creamy tang. I was rather impatient and brewed this up to drink it straight away, so that was mostly the flavor I got as well.

A citrusy note was a bit more prominent in the aftertaste, but I have to admit I found that creaminess off putting – it’s just not what I associate with lemonade.

Maybe after a night in the fridge the flavors will settle a bit, but for now I will say it’s not my favorite of the 52teas I’ve tried. Honestly, that’s kind of a relief though – one less flavor I have to stock up on!

Is today ever a day for iced tea! I thought it was hot last week, but it’s nothing compared to this. I’m looking forward to going home just so that I can change my tshirt, which isn’t my usual motivation. Good thing I brewed this up last night and brought it in today, then! I’ve had a few cups of hot tea today (I need them to get me going in the morning), but as the day has worn on, it’s become far too hot for that.

The first thing that struck me about this one was how clearly the watermelon taste comes over. I’ve always found watermelon to be a particularly delicate and easily obscured flavour, so I was expecting it to have to fight hard with the black tea base. It doesn’t, though. Somehow, it remains a really clear and juicy flavour, and the black tea stays firmly in the background. Delightful! I was hoping it would be this way when I opened the sachet last night, because I could smell watermelon really clearly then, so I’m really glad not to have been let down. Not that Frank’s teas are a let down, but flavoured blacks in general can be.

I don’t think my thoughts are very coherent at the moment, because I’m sweaty and uncomfortable, so I’m going to shut up. This is a really tasty iced tea, though, and I think it might have actually helped to keep me sane today!

MMm this is a super yummy iced tea. I added a touch of sugar to bring out the watermelon flavor and it worked wonders. It’s sweet, juicy, and very melon like :]

I made a gallon of this early this morning. It is about half gone because hubby and I are both working outside in heat and sun and keep coming in to rehydrate. I even had to turn the hose on myself so I could keep going.

I am so glad I have more of this. In order, I love Earl Grey Iced, Razzleberry, and Pink Lemonade of the SBT’s I have tried.

The flavoring doesn’t cover up the delicious tea base, and the pink lemonade part is sweet and not tart. Perfection.

We finished our gallon of Razzleberry last night, so I refilled the dispenser with this right away. It is already almost completely gone. That’s right, in 24 hours with only two people drinking it.

When I saw the name I was afraid it would taste like the horrible iced tea with lemon that is so common. You know, the cheap, acid tea with ultra acidic fake lemon? But I knew Frank wouldn’t do that to us. No, he wouldn’t. And he didn’t.

He created a wonderful blend that is actually fairly subtle. Hubby surprised me by absolutely loving it and drinking glass after glass today. It is super hot and muggy here and every Sunday he and Sam go romp in the woods and fields, so he really wanted to tank up on this when they got home.

There is a very pretty reddish glow in the color. The tea base is really nice, as always, and lemon, cotton candy, and raspberry come next. The word “candy” comes foremost in my mind when I think of describing this, but not super sweet, cloying, tooth rotting candy. Just nice candy flavor. I am so glad I bought a bunch of these. I think I am going to have to order more.

Made this iced, per package directions, + 3 tbsp. sugar.

I got this for my boyfriend, as I don’t really like raspberry. I keep trying to entice him with flavored teas but he is just not biting. I shouldn’t be too surprised, though – he likes plain anything (ice cream, cheesecake, etc) over fun flavors.

I gave this a shot but it wasn’t to my tastes. He gave it a shot and it wasn’t to his either. But really, we are outliers and our opinions shouldn’t have any weight on the rating of this tea, so I’m not going to give it a number. It was quite raspberry so if that’s your thing, you should go for it!

I will say that the base was great, the perfect strength and balance of flavoring. And steeping instructions were perfect…. definitely follow them for the best iced tea, just sweeten to taste and you’re golden. Luckily I still have the rainbow sherbet iced tea to try – I have a feeling that I will be pretty happy with that one. :)

USPS said my order wasn’t coming till Monday so I was psyched to check my mail last night and find these already arrived!

First off I like that they come in bigger bags now, although I’m guessing the need to make the labels bigger played in that too. Over the seasons I was not drinking iced tea I lost my ability to carefully open the smaller packets these came in last year.

I did the usual steeping of the bag in 2 cups of water then transferring it to a pitcher filled with ice and cold water. I then put the bag in a quart of water to cold steep it for a second steep since getting 2 uses out of these bags is great.

I always think these taste better after chilling in the fridge overnight so I didn’t even try it last night, but it was definitely the first thing I did this morning. Straight out of the fridge there wasn’t much flavor, but as it warmed at room temperature, out came the pink lemonade flavor. You can definitely smell the cotton candy in here over any other flavors, but you don’t taste it. It does its job at just adding sweetness, which is great because sometimes the grapefruit seems a bit heavy, especially as it gets too warm.

When it’s right it tastes just like a mix of pink lemonade and iced tea, minus the it being super sweet. I’m sure if you do sweeten it, it’ll be even better, but I quite like it how it is.

Honestly this might become my favorite SBT already.

I made this up the other day. It was good, but the Cotton Candy flavor every one raved about this one didn’t really come out that much. I mean it tasted sweet, but I wasn’t getting a cotton candy flavor. Maybe next time I will try to sweeten this with sugar instead of Light agave nectar. Anyone else have any suggestions?

Perfect for summer sweetness!

I made a pitcher of iced tea with this one, added some sugar and Oh my goodness does it hit the mark for cotton candy. Smells and tastes like a pink fluffy cloud of cotton candy to me. The black tea base is good too, not too strong which is nice because cotton candy is a very delicate flavor to me.
Had I never found Steepster I would have never imagined cotton candy tea was out in this world. Woot! I have cotton candy matcha too!

I used to thinking of iced tea as being fruit flavoured so cotton candy struck me as a bit of an odd choice for this style of tea. None the less it seems to work pretty well. The spun sugar cotton candy flavour was a bit on the subtle side but adding a tablespoon or so of agave nectar to the jug helped bring it out.

Yay I’m getting allergy tested in a couple weeks. UGH a couple weeks, I finally realized ragweed is at it already and that’s why I’ve felt terrible for a week. I’ve never been allergy tested so it will be nice to know what exactly does bother me. Allergy season here sucks. I’ve tried honey, I hate taking antihistimines, so we’ll see.

The first of my flavor oils for lip balm have arrived…they smell soooo good and I was reminded of the fact I still have several of these teabags to use while the weather’s still lovely for iced tea. (Just kidding, I’ll drink it all year.)

Opening the bag smelled just like opening up a package of jello. It tastes a lot like it too. I really like the Lime Jello Salad green tea, and I think I still like it more, just because it has a creaminess to it.

This though, seriously it’s like the jello water from when you were sick as a kid, except far less cloying in flavor.

The addition of a couple drops of agave made it taste even more like jello, minus the weird texture! I will have no problem finishing this pitcher and then making another.

I did a little dance when I opened this one up. It smells SO sweet and sugary and a bit caramelized and just so much like cotton candy! And the scent filled up my kitchen. So I knew this was going to be good. I’m the only one in my house who drinks iced tea on a regular basis, so I didn’t want to make a full pitcher. That, and I wanted to be able to make this goodness last as long as possible! So I cheated and tore open the tea bag, poured the leaf into another container, and will be making this by the cup instead.

I also cheated by trying this hot for the first time, instead of iced! After smelling the dry leaf I knew I wouldn’t be able to wait for it to chill or cold brew. So I added a bit of milk, a touch of cream, and some sugar to my cup. Mmmm, it still smells so strongly of cotton candy after steeping! And it tastes divine. Strong black tea base followed by a smooth hit of cotton candy. It’s definitely pink cotton candy rather than blue (blue’s my favourite!) but I can overlook that due to this tea’s impossible yumminess. In comparison to the 52teas version, I find the flavouring to be a bit stronger in this one, and definitely pink cotton candy, whereas I found the other to have more of a generic cotton candy taste. I would happily drink either of them, and while they are definitely different, it would be hard to choose a favourite! Can’t wait to try it iced, as it’s supposed to be.

My brother actually decided he wanted a glass of this! It’s kind of hilarious though because he said it tasted bitter at first, and I know it is not bitter at all. And he wanted a lot of agave in it…jeez.

I gave some to my grandma too and she said it tasted like cherry.

This probably isn’t my favorite, I prefer the regular 52teas Cotton Candy. But it’s still good, I just like the stronger cotton candy flavor. This one has more of a caramelized sugar aftertaste to it than cotton candy to me, and agave doesn’t make it pop like it does to the bubblegum SBT.

That’s not to say I won’t drink this up anyway, it’s still an awesome flavor, especially since I had no idea my brother would ever touch iced tea hahaha.

Last night, hubby and I finished off the gallon of Razzleberry sweet tea in the refrigerator. I was making popcorn and he was headed for the outside fridge and asked if I wanted a drink. (We keep the sodas outside as we buy them in bulk for weekends when the whole herd of teenagers descends upon us.)

I told him thank you, but no, as I was trying to drink tea to limit my soda intake. He hit the brakes and turned to the fridge and fixed a glass for each of us.

Now, help me out if I am wrong, but it seems to me this is a much healthier choice even when sweetened. I am adding one cup of sugar per gallon of iced tea. That makes eight 16 ounce servings, so each serving would have 1/8 cup sugar, which should be approximately 4 teaspoons. Is that correct?

As I did my research, I saw that some of the bottled iced teas in stores have as much sugar as soda! Oh my cow! I have to give Harney Tea some accolades here for having delicious, refreshing iced tea in bottles and keeping it very low in sugar.

So I realize that no sugar would probably be best – and personally there are a lot of teas I could drink unsweetened and iced but the family won’t go for that – but this is a lot better than the ten tsps. of sugar in twelve ounces of cola and I get to avoid burping the bubbles and leaching the calcium from my bones. WIN!

I made this iced tea according to package instructions and I resteeped immediately to get a full gallon. There is no lack of flavor. I LOVE THIS TEA!

I put it all in the small Pottery Barn dispenser, which I then put on the top shelf in my fridge. This was the sweet tea served tonight for Writers’ Group. I mention the dispenser to say that I have found it to be very handy when you have a lot of tea. You don’t have to lift a heavy pitcher, just turn the handle on the spigot and fill your glass. The glass helps the tea get extra cold, too, and since the spigot is metal instead of plastic, you are less likely to have a major catastrophe with a failed spigot.

I added one cup of sugar to one gallon of tea because most of this crowd likes their tea SWEET! Some even add extra simple syrup! This was very well liked tonight.

I have a bunch of new SBT to try, and I can hardly wait!

I had this as a tea slushy in my Zoku tonight as my dessert. YEAH! BABY! Razzleberry, I love you. You are the best flavored iced tea I have ever had.

Wow, I can’t believe I didn’t have this listed in my cupboard! I bought all I could last summer because we loved it, and I am happy to see it is in stock right now. Hooray!

This is good the first day, and knee quivering delicious the second. I make two steeps so I get a gallon out of each pack. Delicious and totally worth it. It is cheaper than soda and better for me, so I don’t mind that it costs a little more. Hubby and a guest today really enjoyed it.

I am saving the last of my lightly sweetened pitcher for a friend who might come over tomorrow, so with supper tonight I am having the very sweet one. Though I call it very sweet, it has half the sugar my mother used to put in her iced tea. Hubby agreed to take a sip, and he doesn’t drink much iced tea anymore because he loves sugar, but this one got him. He didn’t give it back to me at first, sipped a bit more, then said, “Wow, this is soooo smooth.”

And even though I have largely given up sugar in my tea, this is so good it is making me weak in the knees. I don’t know why, but the teas reach a state of absolute perfection in the fridge a couple of days after you hot brew them. Definitely ordering more, and trying more of the flavors.

Edited to add: Just offered hubby some more of the tea. He points out the most gigantic drinking glass we own, now empty, but apparently moments ago filled with this tea. I guess I better order some more quickly!

I made two steeps of this, and I sweetened one quite a bit for other folks, and for myself I added only a tiny bit of raw sugar.

The sweet one was put to the test last night when a guest who doesn’t like any tea except grocery store super sweet black iced tea had supper here. I offered a sip of this, she said it was fantastic, and drank a whole glass with her meal.

I opted to drink the barely sweetened one, and it was delicious.

I am making these according to package directions, not cold steeping them. I have found – and maybe it is some weird psychological thing – that they taste best after the tea has been in the fridge for at least one day. Somehow the flavors seem the most natural and refreshing for me that way.

Good stuff, and I hope to be sharing it with another friend later so I can get her reaction on it as well.

I just received my order from 52teas today, and I was so excited to try this one! I made it according to the package instructions. To the first 2 quart pitcher I added three tablespoons of sugar. To the resteep pitcher, which I made right away, I added (gulp) one cup of sugar cuz that’s how hubby rolls! LOL! So that pitcher is for him and for the kids!

The tea is beautifully clear, a nice amber/orange/red color. It looks so refreshing in the glass pitcher. It smells fruity and good, and the tea is not covered up by the flavoring.

When I started leaving sugar out of my hot tea, I never dreamed I could leave it out or cut way back on it in my iced tea. Growing up on super sweet tea (Mom added THREE cups of sugar per gallon of iced tea!), how can you get used to less sugar?

This tea is so good with so little sugar, I don’t even miss the extra sugar. It would probably be fine and dandy with no sugar at all. It is hard to express how grateful I am to have something that tastes this good, is good for me, and has little sugar and almost no calories, yet is natural.

I think there is more SBT in my future. Don’t run out yet, Frank!

Okay when I got to the page for this…Razzle Dazzle from Chicago got stuck in my head.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YW3MIixEps4

Raspberries and blackberries are my favorite berries so I love this tea. It tastes like ripe, crushed berries were poured through my tea before I drank it…if only I had the berries. Nothing artificial about the flavors, just the taste of summer berries.

I got some awesome blackberries a couple weeks ago but I was donating them to some bears so I only got to eat one. I love saying that because it sounds absolutely ridiculous and actually I have no idea what animals got to eat them..but I hope it was the bears. If I had some of them to go with this tea, I would be in fruit heaven right now.

I added a bit of agave to the first cup just to see if it made any difference, but I liked it more just the way it was. It tastes more like candy if it’s sweetened though, which may be a positive depending on your tastes.

I love love love the black tea base in these bags so much. Even though this is only the third one I’ve tried so far (I have all the rest of the flavored ones so far, I just ordered radioactiviTEA though), it really is perfect. It goes with every flavor beautifully in a delicious balance.