Teavana

I’m starting to figure out how much milk I like in my tea so it’s getting better!

If it seems like I’m drinking this tea a lot it’s because whenever I make a “milk” tea I always make it bulk so I can keep it in a fridge. However, I only have one pitcher which means that I can only keep one type of tea at time.

So I’m trying to finish all my Thai Tea because my Masala Chai just came in the mail from Adagio!

This has been sitting on my shelf for a while so I thought I’d make a pitcher to keep in the fridge for finals. Still working on the perfect tea to milk ratio. I’m still new to adding milk to drinks.

Nope, still don’t like it.

But it isn’t making me gag like it was before, so I’m upping the rating, at least for now. I might increase it even more than I have if it were not for the persisting fact that the smell of it is really sort of too much for me. I can actually taste the peaches in this tea this time…it’s that faintly nutty stewed-fruit babyfood flavor I pulled out of the ginger-peach tea from Tea Guys. Some people would probably find it gross, but it doesn’t really bother me. Small side note, Teavana: there are no ‘fresh’ peach pieces in this tea. There may be dried, but I’m quite sure there were no gloppy, juicy cuts of fresh fruit in the bag.

Brews up sort of cloudy. Guess that’s the fruit.

I would probably really not be drinking this if I didn’t feel a monster headache coming on, and simultaneously want something sweet and low-caf as a result. This reminds me of pretty much all of Teavana’s offerings: the ingredients seem to be pretty high-quality and harmless, viewed separately, but the result of mixing them together is a little bit like being brained to death with candied fruit. If you’re into their other stuff, this probably wouldn’t offend.

Edit: Cup cooled down and…yeahno. Not drinking this. Sigh.

Bought this one during my recent splurge at Teavana, somewhat against my better judgement. I’m not really a huge fan of heavily flavored, heavily sweet teas unless they’re strictly intended to be served over ice, and even then I don’t like them too sweet…fruity and sweet are not mutually inclusive qualities. The guy who works at my ‘local’ Teavana is friendly and helpful, but I think our tastes differ. Most of the tins he opened for me made me feel as though I was being bludgeoned to death by a hammer made of fruit-sugar…and not necessarily natural fruit (or sugar) either. All of this while I was sick and congested! It may be that some of those don’t taste as strongly as they smell, certainly, but I was too wary to find out.

I caved on this one. He seemed to believe it wasn’t as intensely fruity as it smelled, and I wanted a white tea…pears, I thought, would surely not be that strongly represented after brewing. They, like blueberries, can usually be counted on to be subtle when used in foods and the like, right?

Ehhhh. I’ve been avoiding it because of the smell since I bought it — never a good sign — and finally decided to give it a try tonight while waiting for something in the oven to finish up. It tastes more or less like it smells — less strongly, though, which is a blessing — with a stronger sense of the white tea. If you go crazy for the smell of it, then you’ll probably go crazy for it in your cup. I can see adding this to some sort of pitcher concoction destined to be served over ice, but by itself it might be a little bit boring iced, and I can think of a bunch of other iced teas I’d rather be drinking.

For the cost per cup and how utterly ‘meh’ I am about it, I should probably be rating it lower than I am…but I think in this case much of the lack of appeal has to do with what I like in a cup of tea, and not necessarily how offensive the tea itself is. Now I have to figure out what to do with the amount I have left.

Happened to travel by a Teavana yesterday and decided, on a whim, to go inside and get a cuppa of my favorite. While I was paying, I was told that it is actually being discontinued…Sad Cinoi…so I bought a pound – I will save the rest for all of you…sigh

Backlogging Yesterday.

I usually save this tea as my dessert tea because I like it with half and half – I think that the half and half adds something; a creamy, smooth, almost savory taste blended well with this sweet nutty tea. However, I ignored my usual standards yesterday and had this first thing in the morning!

No real updates about it, nothing overwhelmingly new.

All Work and No Tea Makes Cinoi Very Annoyed.

Currently rectifying the above issue with this tea. It is towards the end of the tin. I have no idea how old this tea is at this point, but I know that I still love it, it is still fresh in the tin and I am glad I could turn to this in my time of need right now.

I’m not going to lie, I was really in the mood for coconuts for most of today. So I actually started my day with a pot of this, made it hot, with a tiny bit of half and half in each cup.

The tea is of course coconut with some nutty taste, the black and rooibos blend nicely together and then the half and half adds a smooth creaminess that it was otherwise missing.

Still one of my favorites :)

Ahh, sweet and full bodied, delicious and warm way to start my day. Taken hot, no additives.

Ahh, my personal favorite for a cold and rainy day. I have drank this so much now, I have perfected the art of this tea. Place two heaping teaspoons of the tea into infuser basket, add just below boiling water, cover and allow to steep for three minutes. Add a pinch of sugar to help bring the macadamia/almond/coconut blends to the surface. Remove infuser, poor and enjoy!

Since I have been drinking a lot of this, I will up the rating which I now notice is low. This is currently one of my favorite teas. Previous rating: 82.

At first taste, I thought it was pretty decent (this was with nothing added and it was hot). I will try it again with sugar and report.

Update: I tried it again with a little rock sugar, it’s still pretty good. It’s not like the tea you get in a Thai restaurant, it is tea with common flavors from Thailand. The only complaint is that there is a fair amount of the tea that gets through the strainer/basket/ball, this is annoying in my opinion, but does not take away from the tea. Worth a taste.

Update II: So I have been drinking a lot of different teas to try and expand my horizons, but I keep coming back to this one. At the end of just about every day, I wind up having this one again, and I have to say, that I really have grown very fond of it. I’m not sure if the first batch I got was stale or if Teavana revamped the formula, but the sample I got last week is so fragrant and delicious that I find myself brewing it daily. I have changed my formula a little: hot water, few crystals of rock sugar, and brew for five minutes and fantastic! I am upping the rating.

Smells and looks like black tea. Brews to a light brown color. A medium black tea taste that I think I’s rather pleasant.

This has assam nilgiri,and ceylon black teas. You can see the black tea and I’t smells strong. I steeped this a short steeping time. And the taste I’s a good tasting black tea. I was afraid of the assam knocking my socks off. So It’s your choice to steep longer or not.

In my quest to find the best Thai Tea Blend Tea Blend, I tried blending this with Masala Chai. It was really good, but is missing one flavor that would make it the perfect tea. I honestly do not know what it is- the black tea was a little too much, and there was a spice or flavor that could have made the entire tea much richer. I’m determined to figure out what it is, or if I just need to use more parts of the Thai Tea.

I blended this with a Vanilla Red tea, and it became quite a nice full-bodied tea to wake me up, but with a fair subtlety. This blend is more suitable in the morning, though.

I smelled the leaves at Teavana and decided to give it a try. First, WARNING: DO NOT OVERSTEEP, 4 MINUTES MAX! This is a strong tea by itself, there is a black tea taste with the hint of chocolate and a spiced aftertaste. Second, the tea is good hot and decent cold, but I have to suggest sweetening it (sugar, artificial, whatever you want) because it can be bitter if oversteeped.

I did brew a pitcher of this iced and kept it in the fridge for the warmer mornings when I didn’t want hot tea before work, as long as it is mixed well (as in fully incorporate the tea on the bottom and the sugar) it is decent cold. However, I think since it gets stronger the longer it steeps, it is probably better to try the tea hot before you commit to it.

Overall worth a try.

Pushing the rating up a bit. I think this is what lets the Masala I blend it with really shine…like a good coat of light primer to layer darker shades of paint on top of. On a related note though, I’m convinced there must be a heavenly chai out there that I haven’t tried, so I’m definitely looking for recommendations now!

Steep time only reflects the water portion of making this, and not the heating of the milk with everything afterward.

So, I love chai. I should get more specific than that though, and say that I love chai lattes. Presumably one could wave some soy/milk/cream and sweetener in the general direction of a cup of chai and have done with it, but I am not that person. I like the malty-foamy-cozy-creamy parts of drinking chai, so that’s almost always how it’s prepared.

Not feeling well in the last month led to a spontaneous trip to the nearby Teavana, to which I had never been for no reason other than that I never made time to go. It also led to a flurry of spending done under the auspices of needing these various purchases to feel better, which in hindsight is weak justification even for me, but there you go. This was among the things I brought home…along with the Masala.

I should say right out that I’m just not qualified to rate this as far as being a mate, since I haven’t to my knowledge ever had any mate besides this stuff right here. As chai goes…

Today is the first day I haven’t combined it with the Masala, and I’m sort of surprised. I don’t know why I was daunted by the smell of it…it smells sharp and acrid, almost fruity (some part of me thought ‘potpourri’), a much ‘brighter’ smell than the smoky, cinnamon-heavy, shadowy smell of the Masala. I’ve been mixing them half and half and enjoying it a lot, but wanted to add a tasting note for some of these before I go through them, so decided to brew it up by itself. I wasn’t sure what to expect from making this one alone. I thought it might be overpowering or tangy, or…I don’t know. It’s not, though. It’s still a little bit fruity and floral (every time I use those words I feel like they’re not quite right, but they’re as close as I can get), but the steeping brings the cinnamon out a lot. It’s a much more balanced flavor than I anticipated. My first thought is that it would make for a fantastic option for iced chai when the weather warms up, though I wonder if putting it on ice would make the cinnamon more difficult to sense again. Something to look forward to finding out, for sure.

2 tbps. in 2c. water, simmered for a few minutes, and then 2c. milk added (1c. whole, 1c. 1%), brought to simmer again, removed from heat, stirred for a few minutes before straining to keep it from scalding. Turbinado sugar to taste. Not precisely sure on the steep time though.

A sweet, nutty oolong. I never really picked up on the fruitiness of the blend that Teavana claims is present, but then Teavana also claims this will help me diet ‘naturally’ and I haven’t seen any evidence of that, either. Crazy ol’ Teavana.

When I used to order this at Teavana’s drink bar, I’d always get it slightly sweetened because the barista had a tendency to scorch the leaves. Now, when I drink it at home, it never needs any additives. It also oversteeps well, for those of us with a tendency to abandon our tea leaves for extended periods of time. The flavor gets richer and deeper but never overwhelming.

Taken with sugar.
Good flavor. I feel like it needs sugar to make the jasmine pop and to smooth out the astringency in the black tea but it definitely doesn’t need milk which is nice. Not needing milk seems to be a sign of quality so good marks there.
The jasmine seems to over run the black tea on flavor though. It is not a balanced tea where you can taste both equally. Instead the jasmine is in the absolute spot light and the black tea doesn’t feel as developed as it could have been. Which is also a mark of quality so bad marks there.
The weirdest thing though is that lack of mouth feel from the black tea. I can feel the jasmine but the black under flavor seems washed out and without texture.
So this is a light tea with strong jasmine flavor.
Not over powering.
But in a sense not all there.

Taken Plain.
This is the only black tea I can take plain consistently. Rather good darjeelings are the only black teas I can take plain consistently.
It’s a good smooth tea with a sweet middle and woody start and finish. Not woody like smoked… but bite a two by four fresh woody kinda… it’s that flavor all darjeelings have. I can never quite pin that flavor on anything other than a darjeeling and that’s what it’s got.
Yea.

I haven’t been able to shake this cold. I don’t know where it goes when it leaves me, but after a brief vacation it always seems to slink back in just enough to reduce my ability to properly taste food, no more and no less, which is rather cunning…any more and I might be compelled to seek proper treatment to kick it for good.

Having been therefore naughty in my reckless consumption of things I can taste — i.e., some chai with milk that assuredly does not help my mucus situation — I am prescribing myself some tea to remedy what some of my other tea has done to me. This sounds irresponsible, but I count it as a twofer.

This was an interesting choice. I think I overdid the amount of tea that I steeped by just a hair, but it didn’t really suffer for all that. The first cup was not as good as the second…it seems like the sweetness from the vanilla accrues, and the squeaky-clean mouth sensation that it left behind seemed as though it wanted some (I can’t believe I’m saying this, because I rarely like it) very subtle mint, or some other sort of ‘cooling’ addition. That last could just be because I’m still a little bit under the weather, I don’t know. I’d like to try it iced, and can see combining it with all sorts of teas for that little extra bit of sweet. Not my first pick for an evening tea, but a nice option to have, and it seems to live up to its end of the ‘keep my pipes clear’ bargain.

I am not a big herbal buff, that said my sister convinced me to try this “tea” and I must say…not bad, not bad at all, but not tea either.

So packed most of this out to send to Ricky, but saved enough for one last pot for myself. I remembered not liking this, but when I smelled the raw jumble of leaves, I could not resist one last pot.

I say “jumble” because the leaves are quite a mix. There are jasmine pearls, berries, flower/petal pieces and small splinters that look like roobios. The fragrance of the leaves is fantastic, it is sweet and fruity. I remembered bitter though when I drank it, so I decided to understeep it. I brewed hot, 1.5 minutes with no additives. The tea is much better than I remember, still a dark pink/pale red color, the fruit is not nearly as tart and the tea is almost peaking through at the back.

For this, I will raise my rating. Previously: 57.

Overall, much better this time around. Though I still think this is best blended (1 to 1) with the Youthberry tea. It just adds a natural layer of sweetness you cannot get from sugar.