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I put this in my gravity steeper and totally lost track of time. Thankfully, mate tea doesn’t seem to do the mad-crazy-bitter thing that black tea does when oversteeped. This just became stronger.
This tea gets a special place in my heart for being one of the first ones I liked. My friend was ordering from David’s Tea and I threw in an order for a few things, just to try them. I had no idea what I was ordering. This one’s ingredients sounded good, and I’d heard vague things about mate tea helping with weight loss. Boom. Money gone. Tea arrival.
Thankfully, my lack of knowledge didn’t hurt me.
This is a great tea. Deep and slick and with a few chocolate and mate notes, as well as a hint of robust coffee.
Oddly, my FAVORITE part of this tea is its aftertaste. (How often can one say that about ANYTHING?) It coats the tongue in something really silky and good that I can’t quite pinpoint. Yum.

I tend to drink tea to stave off sugar cravings, so you’ll notice I just gab joyfully about sweet teas like this. It’s got the richness without a weird aftertaste or that horrid trill-y high note. Every note is in the mid and deep range.
It kind of reminds me of listening to a well-tuned string quartet. No flutes or cymbals or other frou-frou. Just a nice experience.
I’m getting pretty close to a sipdown on this one, and will be re-ordering it.

This is a creamy, nutty “black” tea. I use the quotation marks because I don’t think there’s too much black tea in it. The black tea is a really subtle presence. People who dislike black tea could easily like this, I suspect.
It’s sweet, and nutty, and smooth. It’s hearty, but not overbearing.
If I were going to liken this to a person, I’d say it’s a Robin Williams character. (I miss him terribly).
I’d classify this tea as a good dessert substitute if you were trying to go easy on the sweets. It’s the experience without the calories.
Depressingly, this appears to be gone from David’s Teas site. I am a puddle of woe.

When my best friend was in the hospital a while ago, she couldn’t drink caffeine, so I picked this up for her. I gave her half and kept the other half. She was very excited about it.
Our verdict?
This is a perfect late-evening decaf tea.
It’s really sweet, but in a deep and earthy way. I’d consider it an alto singer as opposed to a soprano. A gutsy, deep-throated jazz singer — but not the kind that smokes.
The perfect thing to recover to.
PS – my best friend is fine now.

My friend disliked this tea so strongly that she basically threw it at my face and yelled “NO TAKEBACKS.”
I tried it as a hot tea and didn’t care for it. It’s aggressively, gleefully, in-your-face Jolly-Rancher sweet — which is, to be fair, precisely what it bills itself as. Like Guy Fieri, it’s resolutely ITSELF.
However, I occasionally throw it into the gravity steeper with other (better) teas as an iced tea sweetener. It works very nicely for this purpose. Everything has its place.
That said, I can’t wait til this is a Sipdown.
If anybody ever wants to trade with me, I will absolutely throw in a few “free” teaspoons of this into your sampler. It’s really… an experience.

Confession: I bought this in-store because it smelled pretty good, even though I had no idea what pu-erh was. When I got home and found out it was fermented and aged tea, I was kind of grossed out. I put off drinking it for a while.
What a mistake!
This is yummy. It’s got the caramel, plus an earthy, almost chocolate undertone. (I might be imagining it, though, because chocolate is my favorite thing on earth.)
It’s a tiny bit sweet, but mostly rich and dark.
This is both literal and figurative: the tea does come out wonderfully deep in tone.
It’s like the loamy soil upon which barefoot witches are performing a ritual. You can almost taste the history. You know, that history I didn’t know about when I bought the tea.

So, I’m not sure where Crazy Science Experiments go here, but I just made a truly magical iced tea for my upcoming trip to the library. It’s a mix of:
- Cream of Earl Grey (David’s Tea)
- Main Squeeze Mate (David’s Tea) &
- Raspberry Cream Pie Rooibos (David’s Tea)
I don’t totally love Cream of Earl Grey hot (slightly too sickly sweet), but iced and mixed in with a few other flavors, it’s awesome.
Instructions for making something similar:
Pick 3 flavors, one black (the base) and two other, brighter flavors.
Put one perfect-measure spoonful (or one teaspoon) of each into a gravity steeper. Let sit for about 3 minutes.
Release filtered contents into a water bottle full of ice. You’re ready to rock and roll.

The first time I tried this tea, I was so grossed out, I almost chucked it. After a few tries, I’ve gradually come around to — if not a love, at least a mild like.
I mostly drink it when I’m preoccupied with something else. I want the warmth and comfort of tea but am not on the verge of giving it an in-depth tasting.
This tea tastes like diluted black tea with apple juice in it, and a Granny Smith aspartame aftertaste.
It has occurred to me (just now) that this tea might be better iced?
I feel a science experiment coming on.