Twinings

Smells perfect, like a hot apple pie.
The taste is sweetish, with strong apple notes and a bit of cinnamon and raisins in the background..
A bit too watery, but generally not bad.

I feel like it says all that I feel about this tea when my thought today was “well, might as well finish this off today.”
Nothing special, and quite frankly I bought it for its Beauty and the Beast themed packaging (weirdly the only one that had Mrs. Pots on it. Surely someone was missing some brilliant marketing there, eh?)
Well, another sipdown! One closer to my goal.

I’ve had a couple of cups of this, more out of a desire for hydration than a desire for this tea. Its also nice to help combat the dreaded tickle in the throat.
Hmm. I shall be through this very soon, but I doubt I’ll have much more to say than that.

Ok, so this tea. This tea is almost entirely ignorable. I have drunk many, many cups of it, and after each one I say to myself “I really should log this” and then I just wander away, blissfully and utterly unconcerned.
Its that sort of brew.
If it was bad I would log it. If it was good I would log it. If I was conflicted I would log it. Never before have I just so entirely given only meh in its direction.
Poor tea. More hot water than impression….

So this weekend I was out on a little trip, meaning I was away from my teas. I brought some bagged things, and this was one of them. I thought it seemed holiday-ish.
Its a war between the orange and the cinnamon. Not unpleasant, but the two flavors are not layering quite as I expected them to do. I expected it to taste very Christmas-y, but it was more like orange juice with cinnamon in it.
Better than it sounds, but not brilliant, flavor wise.
Hmm. More cups are needed for futher analysis. Fortunatly, I have some of those.

I generally don’t like the flavor of jasmine, because it can be very sharp. This one had a better balance between the tea and jasmine taste.

I really liked this jasmine tea. I personally think that some jasmine teas can be to strong to the point that they taste like perfume but this tea has a nice balance and subtle but not underwhelming jasmine favor

Favorite bagged breakfast tea. Used to be my go to tea before I finally gave in to the world of loose leaf.

Just right for a night cap. Full-bodied tea.

I made up more spiced apple juice yesterday morning, for the walk in to work. It was a cold, snowy day and this was the perfect accompaniment. Not over this yet!

Tried this one brewed “normally” with just a splash of milk this evening. I say normally, because so far I’ve only tried this one steeped in apple juice, and my go-to for Chai is a latte, so…3 minutes in boiling water with milk isn’t exactly normal for me as far as Chai goes, but it’s normal in terms of how I brew black tea.

I wanted to try it this way mostly to see what the tea is actually like, because it’s hard to say with apple juice, and it tends to get at least a bit lost in milk. It’s not the spiciest chai I’ve tried, despite the name, but it is heavy on the ginger and cinnamon. They’re two of my favourite chai spices, so that’s okay with me. The black (assam?) base is smooth and malty, and provides the perfect base. I’m not sure I’d keep it around all the time, simply because there are chai blends I prefer and this one isn’t anything really out of the ordinary. If anything, I’d have liked it to be spicier, to live up to its name. It’s really actually quite tame.

I’l probably go back to drinking this one as a latte until the box is done, although the apple juice idea was nice…

013/365

I was obviously feeling very inspired this evening, because I did something with chai that I’ve never done before. When I think of chai, I think of milk. That’s my stock, word-association response. Today, I paired it with…apple juice! It was one of those things that I was convinced wouldn’t work, but it actually really does.

I used 250ml cloudy apple juice – the good stuff – although I don’t think that’s absolutely necessary. I added 100ml water to thin it a bit, and heated those up together in a pan until almost boiling. I turned off the heat, added 3 bags of this chai, and left it for 6 minutes with the lid on. What you get when you return is Christmas in a pan. It smells delicious.

It also tastes delicious. The apple juice becomes a solid background for the chai spices to play on, and it’s possible to pick out the cinnamon, ginger, and clove. I chose this blend particularly because it’s supposed to be on the stronger side, and I figured it would need to be to compete with the juice. I’m pleased with the balance I achieved, for a first attempt.

I will go back and try this one straight, and probably with milk, because obviously I can’t comment super-reliably on the tea just from drinking this. I love it, though, and I can totally see myself making a timolino of this for the walk to work on a cold morning.

It’s my new favourite thing.

011/365

I’m almost done with my box of this, and I feel at this point it’s appropriate to give this tea a nod. After all, it’s been my constant companion for the last 18-ish months.

As bagged blacks go, this is one of the better ones.

I would call this tea unobtrusive. It’s smooth, not harsh, not overly bland but there’s nothing distinct in it. To drink, not to savour.

I only had one teabag of this, so this is a latte sipdown! It is a bit older (2 years maybe?) and I don’t really drink bagged chais very often because I prefer most herbal ones. However, in the interest of cleaning out my stash, this makes a good cup with breakfast.

Twinings uses a malty but brisk base in their chais. The cinnamon, orange rind, and clove are apparent, but not well balanced with the nutmeg. Pumpkin pie tastes best with clove, allspice, and mace in it instead of just clove. I actually can’t tell the difference in flavour if I taste the spices by themselves, but I swear pumpkin pie tastes better using all three. My grandmother’s recipe uses orange juice, nutmeg, cinnamon, clove, allspice, ginger, and mace. I think maybe my expectation of pumpkin pie flavour is skewed by the family recipe.

Anyway, this made a really nice latte and I enjoyed it a lot.

Very strong, deep black tea. Tastes like the smell of burning wood- and that’s a positive. Very good with a strong creamer.

Too much hibiscus, even with a very short steep in cold water.

The concept was interesting but the taste was not as complimentary as one would hope. I had wondered why it was called buttermint but it tastes strange, as if there was butter in the tea. Hard pass.

And its sipped down! (I think. This is the sort of bagged tea that might suddenly spring an extra packet at you from the bottom of a purse or a backpack, but hey, its close enough)
Its a basic mint, which is no bad thing. I am immensely fond of basic mint, so its a nice cup to cling to on a cold morning.

Over lunch I acquired a gingerbread person, and it has improved the afternoon vastly.
I cling to my cup of warm tea, and my gingerbread, and think holiday thoughts to other people, and they day gets better.