Wild Strawberry

I made this again and added some honey and wow it was good. It would make for a refreshing iced tea. Perfect for a hot summers day. I bumped up the score.

I opened the bag and it took me a minute to place that delicious, almost overpowering strawberry smell. Fruit snacks!!! Totally smells like fruit snacks and I’m digging it. Another pink liquor. I’m assuming it’s from the hibiscus. Are they just putting it in everything? Seems like all I looked at today had hibiscus in it. Anyway, it tastes like hot strawberry Kool-aid. With kind of a plastic-y taste? I dunno. I’ve been pretty disappointed with everything I’ve tried tonight. Maybe being sick has thrown everything off… Will try again later.

I needed a really big, sweet kick in the pants this morning. So I mixed up a pretty strong batch of Weight to Go!, Wild Strawberry, and then I threw in some straight pu-erh from a friend in China. Lots of sugar. It was exactly what I needed. Sweet, tangy, with a great undercurrent of strong pu-erh, and I’m ready to go!

I will start this out by saying that I absolutely hate hot hibiscus-based tea. Just, ew.

But iced? That’s another story. This tea has become a summertime staple for my household; it’s tart and sweet and fruity and all around perfect for quickly-approaching summertime afternoons. And it doesn’t need added sugar, so it’s pretty guilt-free as far as refreshing cold drinks go. We just reordered another pound of it (it’s very affordable too, huge plus).

I picked up a sample of ‘Oscar Wilde Strawberry’ today at Atticus Tea in Park City. I know they get a few of their teas from Adagio and this one looks to be an Adagio tea so I’ll review it here. This tea is pretty good. It has a nice strawberry flavor, not too much though. It’s tart. I added a fair amount of agave nectar to it. It has no medicinal flavor like many fruit teas can get.

I definitely like it, and yet, could not add more of it to my shopping cart when I was in the adagio site a few minutes ago. I like it, but cannot imagine wanting more than a sample size of it. It’ll be nice for a few cups.

And, I have to give props to Atticus Tea for giving this to me for free. I was buying something else and asked if I could have a 1/2 oz of this to try. They wouldn’t charge me for it.

Sipdown! I’m just writing this tasting note to say that. I’m not actually drinking the tea, I’m giving it to my coworker. He was surprisingly difficult to boil down to what type of tea he wanted. Or maybe I just have too many choices. It’s probably excessive when asking for a fruity herbal for me to come back with 10 choices. Strawberry? With or without cinnamon?

I remember liking this more when I tried it last than I do now. Maybe I didn’t use enough in my teapot, because it’s a lot weaker than I remember. Before it was very bright and flavorful, with a taste of strawberry jam. Now it’s just weak with a hint of strawberry. Hm.

Had the most excellent smell when I first opened it up!

Think I may have added a bit too much of the tea into it, because wow was it strong at first taste. I did two “heaping” teaspoons to account for the two cups I was making, but maybe I heaped a little much. I also let it steep near the max time suggested – 9 minutes. The color is a very deep red. The taste is slightly bitter, and I feel like I can taste more of the apple than the strawberry. But when I added a spoonful of sugar it offset the bitter taste perfectly! Entirely enjoyable that way.

Hello again autumn, hello again hot tea drinking, and hello again steepster.

It’s cold enough that I actually want to drink something hot. But at night, I do not want any caffeine. So I’ve been drinking this tea, and it’s quite nice. The taste is fruity and a bit floral. Even without any sugar, it’s somehow a bit sweet. There’s nothing spectacularly “wow” about it, but it’s very drinkable, and I’ve had several mugs of it over the past couple of weeks.

Also, the brewed tea is very red.

Tried this at the suggested 1 heaping teaspoon to 8 ounces of water and added on teaspoon of sugar. It was a very weak tasting tea. Like hot, watered down fruit juice with a hint of strawberry. My plans for this tea in the future are:

1. Try again with 2 teaspoons instead of 1
2. Try it iced. (as a fruit based tea, surely it will be better this way)
3. Try mixing with some rooibos and maybe a little ginger to give it some oomph.

As of now this tea isn’t impressing me, but maybe it will be better in the future :P