Imperial Acai Blueberry White Tea

Added some stevia to sweeten.

Cold Brew!

I want to like this one so much because the dry leaf smells great, but this is my second time drinking this one and it’s just so awful…

The brew actually starts off pleasant enough! It’s sweet blueberries notes that for a split second remind me of blueberry pie filling! It’s lovely, and great – and then it all goes downhill so very fast. The rest of the sip is just horribly bitter; and not in a “bad white tea” kind of way but in a very harsh, chemical/artificial flavouring kind of way coupled with an acai/currant flavour that just tastes straight up like cough syrup. Like, I don’t know that I can even begin to convey just how bad it is…

The finish is equally bad, and very weird because while retaining all that bitter grossness it also manages to somehow tastes chalky and soapy on top of that. I powered through a quarter of my cold brew and now I’m just gagging on how terrible it is. Ugh…

So yeah; dumped the rest of this brew! I haven’t tried this tea hot yet, so I’m super crossing my fingers that at the very least it’s drinkable as a hot tea so that this tea leaf isn’t a complete write off. I’m skeptical though.

Does anyone out there like this tea!? And if so, how do you prepare it in a way where it doesn’t taste like garbage!?

A friend kindly sent me a sample of this. I really like the idea of pairing blueberry and currants — but neither is coming through strongly here. I get a hint of the currant, but I don’t think I would have guessed blueberry if it wasn’t in the name. I guess the acai is responsible for that hint of bitterness. Though I’m not that crazy about white tea, I think it’s a good choice here, as anything stronger would overwhelm the fruit flavors. Overall, not a must-have, but still a pleasant lightly-fruity tea.

Smells delicious!

Terrible. Tasted like soap, both hot and iced. Never buying again.

I love anything blueberry so I wanted to try this. It’s very expensive, almost $15 per oz. I got about 2 oz. and a little goes a long way. It steeps very densely and fast so I keep my steep time to under 2 mins. It’s very bitter for my liking, but has a slight blueberry note and I like that it’s white tea. Other than that, my search for a strong blueberry tea continues!

Made this one iced. It’s been a long time since I’ve tried to brew a white tea. This confirms that I do need to wait until I purchase something that helps me control the temperature as this came out bitter. Until then, I plan to try this one cold brewed. What I can get out of this attempt is that this may be a light, pleasant tea with a blueberry taste. I feel like it has promise, just needs to be brewed right.

This is another tea from Teavana that doesn’t taste quite as good as it smells. It is decent though, not incredible by any means but reasonably good. Not good enough to buy again but I won’t just throw it out. The leaves look like tea, not like a little bit of tea with a lot of fruit bits like a lot of Teavana teas.

I brewed this once in an 18oz teapot with 3 tsp leaf and 175 degree water for 2 min.

Well, it’s back to work after the holiday. Everything is still and quiet here so it seemed the perfect time to make a cup of this tea. This cup is much better than the last – it’s still a little bitter, but it seems more flavorful. The white teas I’ve tried seem to be so temperamental that just a few seconds or degrees off one way or the other has resulted in a bitter steep. I guess I just haven’t found that perfect spot yet for this tea. I still think this would be best chilled so I do plan to try that later on.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas! I’m still in full holiday mode. Not quite ready to give up the lights and paper for the cold, dreariness of January. But at least we’ll still have tea to keep us warm. :)

As other posters have stated, if you understeep this tea, it has no flavor; if you oversteep it, it becomes bitter. I am having the last cup of a 2 oz resealable envelope and it is bitter. I think it should have more of a pure blueberry flavor to it.

Another thing that may be bothering me and making the tea taste bad to me is that it includes maltodextrin. Granted, I’m sure it’s very little as it’s a part of the acai fruit powder, last ingredient on the list. But still, I’m sensitive to gluten and it’s probably enough to make it taste nasty and to stuff up my head like I have a head cold. If Teavana is actually concerned with health, they need to put a warning on their teas that include maltodextrin for those with food sensitivities/allergies. I never thought tea would have maltodextrin in it, but now I know better. I will not buy this tea again. And here’s a thought: what if fruit-flavored tea included only tea and fruit! They need to dump the additives; it’s eliminating teas that I will buy from them and for family members!