Vykasa

This is another sample from my swap with moraiwe. I love jasmine and haven’t tried many black jasmine teas, so I was curious about this one. While steeping, the tea smells very floral – it’s not necessarily an aroma I’d normally associate with jasmine, though, but rather a generic and quite perfume-y kind of floral.
Flavor-wise, the orange notes are very strong. That’s the first thing I notice. The jasmine’s a close second and, again, it’s more that generic, perfume-y (teetering on the border of soapiness) floral as opposed to a true, natural jasmine. The flavoring overwhelms the tea base to the point where I can hardly taste it at all. This isn’t terrible, but it’s not particularly good either. There are plenty of better jasmine teas – bagged and loose – out there.

So, last night I found all these bagged tea in my cupboards.

It’s old. Not like. Expired old. But ‘Huh, where did you come from?’ old. Which means it’s probably creeping up there, because I don’t think I’ve seen it since Fiance and I moved in together two years ago. So, I knew this was gonna be a treat.

I cold steeped this, so if it was terrible, at least it wouldn’t be crazy bitter terrible.

The good news is that the Jasmine aspect of this doesn’t taste like soap, which I was worried about. It does however taste like some nondescript floral I can’t place and am not sure I like. I can just barely taste the orange over it, but what’s there isn’t terribly natural tasting. And the tea is mediocre (expected).

And somehow it’s still better than some looseleaf blends I’ve had.

I absolutely love this tea, I found it at Marshall’s or HomeGoods, not sure exactly where. The fragrance is heavenly, to me it smells and tastes like honeydew melon, I don’t really get any overwhelming ginger taste, and I really don’t get any kind of chai spice taste from it either. I really enjoy it because it perks me up, but doesn’t have so much caffeine that it keeps me awake all night long. I find it very good for when I’m studying. I read somewhere that you shouldn’t let the water boil for green or white tea because it will ‘burn’ it – I don’t know if that is true, but I try to grab the kettle off the fire just before it gets to the boiling point.

Having enjoyed black currant tea for a while, I was excited to find this tea. It is a pleasing green tea, with true red currant flavor. It is light, but not sour. It is a tea to have with nearly anything.

I wasn’t terribly thrilled with my last experience with Vykasa tea (see the Tropical Fruits tea) but I found this one on sale for $3 at my local Winners/HomeSense store, so I decided to give it a try.

It was…surprisingly nice. The ginger is present without being too hot and spicy and the melony flavour of the canteloupe isn’t overwhelmed by it. I’m not sure why it’s called a ‘chai’ unless that’s just to refer to the ginger because I can’t really pick up any other spices in the tea. None the less, I found it an interesting and enjoyable drink.

Smooth & tasty overall with hints of lemongrass & asparagus along with herbal scents. Definitely not your average green tea and oh yes it did calm me down. Worth a try for an early evening treat.

Just got the package from Jillian. I think I’m psychic (or have impossibly discerning hearing) because I heard the mail come in through the slot and thought, ‘PACKAGE!?’ And I had been about to head out the door to get tea at Murchie’s too.

I added all of the teas to my cupboard, even though most are just a single teabag (and I certainly don’t afford that luxury to the many of OTHER single teabags that I have) and thus will end up removing them after that single use (minus this one, because I’m using it up RIGHT NOW so I didn’t add it).

At any rate, I dubbed this the ‘Mystery Tea’. It wasn’t in a bag and it wasn’t labelled. I looked up the company on steepster under the assumption that it was one of the three that we have listed. I eliminated the rooibos easily enough, because even though I couldn’t smell anything really, it definitely had some green tea in there.

Steeped it as a green, and I could smell it STRONG for a few minutes (not very pleasant, but luckily that seems to have dissipated). If I stick my nose in the cup, it smells minty. Whaddya know, I think I know which one it is. Every so often I get a whiff of something REALLY weird (and not in a likable way) smelling, but then it’s gone.

Going to sip this. I’m afraid. Mint! But black AND green tea, and I usually like blackgreen tea blends. I can do this.

Don’t taste really any green. I got a slight black tea flavour and then a stronger mint that trailed into the aftertaste. There’s a fruityness in there too, but I don’t know of what. This almost just tastes like a herbal tea. A slightly fruity mintness. I’m basically just assuming it’s Bora Bora now. Too obviously mint. I don’t have much experience with any of the other ingredients listed, so I can’t pick them out, but maybe those are that weird smell I keep getting but can’t seem to taste.

It’s not bad. It’s actually kind of nice and refreshing. The mint isn’t overpowering (it usually is for me, but that’s probably just my bias against mint), but I still don’t get really any other flavours. Actually, there’s an earthy turmeric aftertaste to the mint. Huh.

Prior to steep the smell reminds me of a raspberry pop tart. After steep I can certainly smell Acai and maybe Papaya…or is it pineapple…or both!? WEIRD…that’s the 2nd time that has had me puzzled today…lol…

The taste is more like a fruit cider type and I can really taste the acai or acai-like-ingredient. I can’t say as I am fond of it…but I might try it iced…so this rating is based on the hot variety…INSERT PUCKER HERE…eeeeek

Thanks, Jillian, for sending it to me – as I love trying to new teas and new brands regardless

I was hoping for something a little fruitier. I’m just not liking this tea this morning. It’s mostly smoky from the gun powder tea and I can taste a little bit of fruit but it doesn’t blend together very well.

That’s it for this tea – I have two more bags left but they’ll be going with some of my tea trades. I wanted to finish this off – mostly so I could use the tin this tea came in – it’s a nice double-lidded metal canister.

Both of the Vykasa teas I’ve tried have been tea-fail to one degree or another, but of the two I prefer this one. It’s not a bad tea I suppose, if you like mint with a black-green tea blend – I just wish I could actually taste the other (purported) flavours.

It’s been awhile since I’ve had this tea so I figured I should revisit it. In and of itself it isn’t a bad tea I suppose, but what I want to know is where the hell does it get off maskerading as tropical tea?! This basically tastes like a rather robust Morrocan Mint tea – there was maybe a little bit of fruitiness on the second steep, but other than that, all I’m tasting in mint and green tea.

Five minutes is too much steeping for the green tea in this blend I think. It brought out the flavour of the actually tea present (instead of the mint) however it had a rather bitter tang to it that I didn’t like. As for the other (supposed) ingredients in this tea? Yeah, I still got nothin’.

Steeped for 2.5 minutes. Not bad at all.

Brewed for 3 minutes in less-than-boiling water. Still a bit too minty.

The second steeping (for 4.5 minutes and at a slightly lower water temperature) was significantly less minty although the fruitiness was rather deminished aswell. Still the flavours of the actual black and green teas came through more nicely than before.

There wasn’t any instructions on how long to brew this tea so I put the bag in for 3.5 minutes. I might play around with that some more. The mint flavour is a bit overwhelming although there’s a distinct (and quite nice) fruity-floral aftertaste.

I’m officially giving up on this tea. It tastes sort of like weak, heated fruit punch, but it still has a bit of that mouth-drying quality that I don’t care for. I might chuck this into the Travelling Teabox – maybe someone else down the line will like this better than I do!

I decided to split the difference from the last two steeps and leave the bag in for 4 minutes. The result is fruity enough (though it doesn’t immediately bring to mind anything tropical) I suppose, but I’m still getting some of that bitter astringency.

Steeped 5 minutes. When I first add the water the tea turns a vivid pink and as it steeps it turns into a very red-looking cup of tea, it’s enough to make me wonder if the colouring is even natural.

I’ve also noticed that it leaves a bit of a dry taste in my mouth.

Fruity but kinda bland, I think it needs to be steeped longer than the reccomended 3 minutes.

I was a bit confused because despite this being called a ‘red tea’ it isn’t rooibos-based but Ceylon tea-based.