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drank Blackcurrant & Blackberry (Fruit Infusions) by Basilur
257 tasting notes

Herbal and Decaf Traveling Tea Box, Summer 2025.
Blackcurrant & Blackberry. Basilur.
Who knows what’s in Basilur’s tisanes? I couldn’t find an ingredient list for this concoction anywhere. This was a string-tag paper teabag in a sealed, plasticized, foil wrapper. Steeped as directed: 5 min. in 8 oz. boiling spring water. Blackberry is one of my favorite berries, and I do love blackcurrants too, so I was eager to try this Basilur tisane. Hibiscus seemed to be the prominent flavor I tasted, with only notes of black-currant and -berry. Of course, raw blackcurrants and blackberries are also sour, so they may have aggravated the hibiscus sourness. And there was a chemical note throughout. The berry flavors came out of hiding once I added a tsp. of sugar, but I’m beginning to wonder if Basilur can do anything without hibiscus. It’s like the main organic base of everything is just hibiscus, then sprayed with whatever flavoring cocktail they decide to throw together. This tisane did have a nice finish and the overall flavor improved as the infusion cooled, so maybe another winner-when-iced? I have to admit to liking this infusion despite the above critiques, and I would recommend it to those who like sour berries, and rate it as a 77. Great to have been able to sample it, and thank you to Martin who contributed it to the TTB!

Flavors: Berries, Black Currant, Blackberry, Hibiscus, Sour

Preparation
Boiling 5 min, 0 sec 1 tsp 8 OZ / 236 ML
3 comments
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gmathis
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Most Basilur fruity blends strike me as “pleasant fruit mishmash.” Tasty, but you can’t pick out much individually.

TeaEarleGreyHot
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@gmathis, I do try to stop short of making it a “catch-22”, where it’s damned for being a mishmash or damned for being one-dimensional. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a review of a pu-erh saying it was too complex, so there may be a bit of a double standard!

gmathis
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My palate is so unsophisticated, I consider it a good day’s work if I can ferret out two distinct flavor profiles in one cup!

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gmathis
Delete

Most Basilur fruity blends strike me as “pleasant fruit mishmash.” Tasty, but you can’t pick out much individually.

TeaEarleGreyHot
Delete

@gmathis, I do try to stop short of making it a “catch-22”, where it’s damned for being a mishmash or damned for being one-dimensional. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a review of a pu-erh saying it was too complex, so there may be a bit of a double standard!

gmathis
Delete

My palate is so unsophisticated, I consider it a good day’s work if I can ferret out two distinct flavor profiles in one cup!

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

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Life is too short to drink bad tea!
Pan-American: Left-coast reared (on Bigelow’s Constant Comment and Twinings’ Earl Grey) and right-coast educated, I’ve used this moniker & Email since the glory days of AOL in the 90’s, reflecting two of my lifelong loves— tea and ‘Trek.

Now a midwestern molecular biologist (right down to the stereotypical Hawaiian shirts), I’m finally broadening the scope of my sippage and getting into all sorts of Assamicas, from mainstream Assam CTCs to Taiwan blacks & TRES varietals, to varied Pu’erhs. With some other stuff tossed in for fun. I enjoy reading other folks’ tasting notes (thank you). I’ve lurked here from time to time and am now adding a few notes of my own to better appreciate the experience. Note that my sense of taste varies from the typical. For example, I find stevia to be unsweet and bitter. My dislike of red rooibos may be rooted in the same genetic palatum divergence, which impacts perceptions of many flavors, from asparagus to stevia to cilantro.

I don’t work for any tea vendor, and I’m not a tea sommelier. I don’t taste every nuance, hint of flavor or note of aroma, nor am I trained to describe those that I do detect. But I taste enough to have opinions, and do my best to be descriptive. Sensory preferences can shift from day to day and person to person, so numerical ratings are kinda bogus, especially between and among various people. But there are individual trends, and I try to reflect that. As reference points for my ratings, I give Lipton Black Tea bags “orange pekoe and pekoe, cut black” a score of 65 because it is widely available and profoundly consistent. I view it as just okay. I would give plain, hot, quality spring water a rating of 25, and I buy Crystal Geyser brand for brewing because my local well water is stinky and discolored, and my filtration & softening system leaves it salty and unpleasant. Tea should make the commercial Spring Water better, not worse, so a rating below 25 speaks for itself.

I am conversationally friendly but absolutely not here looking for dates or money, nor to sell anything. If I’ve started to follow you, I don’t mean to be creepy, it only means you recently posted something I liked reading, or it was about an interesting tea or event. And I recognize that the Steepster system only notifies me of new posts written by people whom I follow. If you follow me, I won’t assume anything. If I do not follow you, it isn’t a snub—you’re still a good human being!
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