Twinings

Tastes like cherry candy with a hint of almond extract. It’s okay. Definitely not my favorite of the Indulgence blends, though—that honor still goes to the salted caramel green.

This one just tastes generically sweet and creamy to me, not like fudge or chocolate. Which may be for the best; green tea and chocolate don’t strike me as a wonderful flavor combination. In fact, this blend has got a lot in common with Twinings’ Salted Caramel. And it really is quite sweet, bordering on excessively so. It’s okay, but definitely not something I’ll go out of my way to drink again.

Sipdown (103)

Mango? No. Strawberry? Not really. Licorice? Yes. Hibiscus? Double yes. What does that mean? This is one big cup of blech, simultaneously too tart and overly sweet. Smells good though.

A tasty and basic chamomile, nothing stands out about it, but it did taste fresh and flavourful.

Why are Twinings’ UK teas and tisanes so much better than their US counterparts? From the infinitely stronger and more flavorful breakfast blends to the exciting herbals they don’t carry back in the States, it’s almost as if they were two separate entities. Anyway, on to the tisane, another of the teabags I picked up at the Twinings shop a few days ago. It’s mostly blackcurrant, with some hibiscus undertones. The blackcurrant flavor is very pleasant; I only wish the rhubarb came through. I suppose the hint of sourness from the hibiscus hints at it, but that’s all. This blend seems very similar to Twinings Blackcurrant and Blueberry, and I think I like them both about equally. I’ll definitely purchase one or the other again.

On Thursday I made my way to London’s Twinings shop, where you can buy individual teabags of a bunch of their blends. Though they don’t have quite as much variety as I might’ve liked, it’s nonetheless a great opportunity to try new varieties—especially those you might be on the fence about, like I was about this one.

This tea sounded so weird, but I know it and some of the other Indulgence blends have gotten rave reviews so I thought I might as well sample them all. And it is weird, a little, but it’s good. The caramel flavor is pretty true to life, and it gives the tea a rich, buttery mouthfeel. It makes for an unusual flavor combination with the green base, but not a bad one. It’s a very enjoyable blend, on the whole. I’m not sure it’s a restock for me, but I certainly wouldn’t object to drinking it again.

070/365

I read back over my previous tasting note for this one, and it looks like I actually enjoyed it. That surprises me, because this time I found it ridiculously over-sweet and very cloying, and I didn’t manage to finish the cup. It was caramel, but quite an artificial flavour on the whole. Mostly, I found it to be like drinking a cup of melted butter, minus the oily texture.

I’ve revised my rating down significantly, because today’s cup was, honestly, fairly awful. Perhaps they’ve changed the recipe?

This is the last of the Twinings Indulgence blends I picked up pretty much on a whim. I’d pretty much ruled out Twinings green blends a long time back, but the idea behind these, and favourable things friends had said about them, made me reconsider. I’m glad I did, because these are pretty amazing. I gave this bag 2 minutes in water cooled to around 175 degrees.

Straight off, Salted Caramel reminds me a lot of the Fudge Melts blend I tried last week (I think…), only with less vanilla. I wasn’t all that keen on Fudge Melts – it sounded great, but it was kind of cloying and over-sweet in a sickly sort of way. Salted Caramel, fortunately, isn’t like that. The initial taste is sweet, rich, soft caramel, but there’s a distinctive saltiness that keeps the sweetness at a manageable level. My head tells me I’d prefer this as a black tea, but I can’t actually taste the green tea at all so I think that’s just my own bias towards black tea rather than a substantial observation.

On the whole, I’ve been pretty impressed with how flavour accurate these blends are, and there are a few that I’d happily drink again (and maybe actively seek out once my cupboard is under control again). Salted Caramel is no exception, so if you’re looking for an accessible, strongly-flavoured caramel dessert tea this would be a good place to start. Yum!

I’d pretty much ruled out Twinings once I started drinking loose leaf tea, but I’d heard people say good things about this one (and the Indulgence range in general) so I finally caved in and bought a few to try. I wasn’t expecting a lot, so it was a complete surprise to find that these are actually…really good.

Caramelised Apple is the fourth I’ve tried from the range, and it’s probably my favourite so far. The initial flavour is very much caramel, but it tastes to me like the hard, transparent caramel you’d find on a fairground candy apple, rather than the softer opaque stuff. That probably only makes sense to me, but I know what I mean. The apple comes out mostly towards the end of the sip, and quite well in the aftertaste. It’s a slightly sharp, green apple flavour, and pretty true to life. The clean sharpness cuts through some of the caramel flavour, and it’s a brilliant combination just as it is in reality. It’s not artificial at all, to my tastes, and neither is it overdone or overpowering in terms of sweetness. I like this one a lot, and I don’t often say that about bagged tea.

Having this tea at my parents place, since I have to stay over a couple nights to babysit my brother while they party in Vegas (not really, just get drunk and eat a lot of Bubba Gump shrimp. And while we’re on the topic, why don’t they have that in Canada, namely in Vancouver? If they had a location here, I’m 100% sure it would be insanely popular. Plus then it would mean I wouldn’t have to go on vacation to eat Bubba Gump ;_; )

I noticed this in the cupboard and decided I wanted to try it first, since we have the decaf version at home. Since my boyfriend and I found the decaf to be surprisingly heavy on the lemon/citrus, I wanted to compare with the regular version. Immediately after opening the packet I knew it was not the same. I mean, the lemon is still in there, but way more in the background, while the bergamot and the base black tea mix in more strongly. Quite nice tea, reminds me of a less citrusy Lady Grey. It’s smooth with bright flavours, and easy to drink.

I suppose the decaf versions might be really lemon flavoured because perhaps the decaffeination process causes the tea to lose a lot of flavour, and they add in more lemon it make up for it? Not sure why they wouldn’t opt for more bergamot too, considering it’s supposed to be an earl grey tea. I don’t know, but it’s quite interesting to note the large taste difference between the two versions of the same tea.

Actually, as I drink this one, it reminds me more and more of Lady Grey, albeit stronger In flavour but very similar. My lady grey obsession had recently died down somewhat, so I’m not going crazy over the similarities, but it still it an enjoyable, light and citrusy earl grey.

In other news, I got another Tea Sparrow box today! I’ve been on hold while I finish some of my stash so that it doesn’t get too out of hand, but yesterday I got it in the mail! I don’t know what it is about receiving mail, especially tea in the mail, but there is something profoundly exciting about it. I was delighted to see that I once again received Strawberry Mint from Herbal Republic, one I’ve been wanting to order but couldn’t justify the shipping price for one tea. I brought them all with to my parents’ place so that I can try them while I am here.

I taste lots of cinnamon and spice, a sweet dried fruit flavour, and orange zest. I steeped it in almost boiling water until the liquid was a medium brown. The cinnamon or orange zest makes it a tiny bit bitter, which is odd, but I like the spice combination. It tastes a lot like a cough drop.

I remember this being delicious the first few times I tried it. Since I was new to the realm of black tea, I steeped it lightly. Over the years, I’ve moved on to loose leaf teas, so I don’t think I’d go back to this one.

This was my first time trying any kind of Irish Breakfast. The liqueur was a very rich, deep red… about 5 seconds into the steep. I pulled out the teabag well in advance of its recommended steeping time. It has an earthy, malty flavor that I suppose must be characteristic of Irish Breakfast. I guess that I just don’t like that.

Not my favorite. Can’t tell if that’s because I don’t like Ceylon or if it’s because I don’t like this tea: it’s sharp, muddy, bitter, and easy to oversteep.

I credit this tea as the one that got me into Darjeeling. Now that I’ve sampled a few loose leaf Darjeelings, I know the Twinings one isn’t that great. Still, I like the woody flavor and the astringency when I’m in the mood for it. It’s a bit like drinking a table leg.

Sipdown (134)!

Well, I’m 2/2 for the Twinings teas from Scheherazade!

I was surprised how much I liked this one given my typical aversion to both ginger and green tea, but this was light on the actual ginger flavour and instead had really nice, rich molasses, brown sugar and cookie notes with a ginger flavour lightly peppered in, just like I find actual gingerbread to taste like. Even the green tea was pretty light overall. So basically, this was just good, solid authentic gingerbread tea. Now, it is summer so it’s not the right season but it was still really damn delicious.

…And I thought I wasn’t a fan of Twinings. Do I need to reevaluate a little bit?