37 Tasting Notes
I have been looking forward to this ever since I read the reviews and the beautiful picture is just so intoxicating.The quality of the tea is impressive beautiful big leaves and visible pieces of apple – the smell is sweet and really does have a toffee apple scent.
I made up a nice pot of it and was enchanted by the smell when hot it really does smell like a hot toffee apple unfortunately the taste did not match the smell or the expectation. It tastes like an apple tea – the oolong component is very light, while you know you’re drinking an oolong it comes across more as an apple tea with a hint of oolong rather than an oolong tea with apple.
The taste also didn’t come across as toffee or creamy-like it tastes like a light tea.
As a huge fan of oolong teas and particularly of creamy and milky oolongs I was disappointed by the taste of this tea it seems very lacking in the oolong taste department and far closer to a herbal tea taste than an oolong taste.
If you like apples you’ll like this tea, and if you’re trying to edge into oolongs from herbals this would be a good tea to try. But if, like me, you love oolongs I wouldn’t recommend this.
Preparation
Yumo – there’s just no other word for it.
This tea is definitely a good chocolate tea, in fact it’s so good that it confuses the heck out of me. When I took my first sip I actually thought I was drinking a hot chocolate – it’s that chocolatey – and that was without milk. The only tea I take milk with is Chai so I didn’t put milk with this but I imagine it’d pair very well with milk for a ‘fuller’ experience. I didn’t add any sugar and found it to be the perfect amount of sweetness, it was sweet enough to not taste any bitterness of the black tea and not over sweet. If you like your tea sweet you could put sugar with it but I’d recommend less than usually do.
While that carob is probably heavier than the cocoa I didn’t see that as detracting from the taste. Without milk this is a light chocolate drink that tastes like a ‘standard’ hot chocolate so it’s in no way overdoing the act and leaves you feeling that you could easily eat a desert with this – in fact I had it with a home made double chocolate fudge cookie and it paired up very nicely.
I don’t think it works as a desert replacement tea as this made me want more chocolate not less, but it definitely does work as a chocolate tea, a very delicious chocolate tea that tastes natural. It does such a good job of approximating a hot chocolate that I would actually rather have this tea than a genuine hot chocolate, which I always feel quite icky after having because of all the milk.
You know you’re drinking tea, but you don’t have bitterness and the chocolate quality is very heavy – you could almost get away with giving it to a non tea drinker and probably more so if you added milk.
I would definitely recommend this to those on the hunt for a good chocolate tea and anyone wanting to have a hot chocolate without the sugar & milk.
Preparation
Mmm… yes it is good. I’d love for them to do one of those blind taste tests with this and hot chocolates and see if people can tell it’s tea or just think it’s a different kind of style. I almost got my non tea drinking friend to try it but he was all like ‘it better not be tea’ and I was like ‘darn! if only you hadn’t said that I could have sneaked it in.’
Haha… so close! This is certainly a good tea to start with since it’s so chocolatey. He has missed the chance to fall in love with tea!
Okay so I decided I should give this another go, having tasted good rooibos I wanted to go back to this to see if it was an initial shock that lead me to disliking it or if it was a genuine and lasting dislike.
I tried this blended with T2’s Sweet Spice and Just Cinnamon – and wow it was yummy, a very warm cup of Christmas. Sweet Spice was used last year as T2’s Christmas blend, it has no ‘tea’ in it and is a fruit tissane, as a result it’s very light and so suits well the hot Australian Christmas but every year around June I get a hankering for a warm Christmas flavoured tea and by itself T2’s Sweet Spice doesn’t hit the spot so I added Cinnamon and it’s close but still lacking with Red Green Vanilla it felt like a well rounded ‘full’ cup of tea.
The Red Green Vanilla didn’t taste bitter at all instead the rooibos strengthened the other ingrediants, the vanilla and cinamon blended well but didn’t overtake the Christmas vibe of Sweet Spice.
I was impressed with the way Red Green Vanilla carried the blend, so I would feel confident using it again. However, by itself it still fails to impress me and I would only recommend it for blending purposes.
I’m lifting the rating from last time (which was rather harsh) but still not taking it too high as it really needs more to become a satisfying cup.
Preparation
WOW… wow…. WOW….
Raspberry Rush where have you been my whole life? I am in love. Never before has a tea grabbed me, drawn me in and made my senses swoon. This is tea perfection – this is why coffee will never win – move over water raspberry rush is taking tea to first place.
The dried leaves smell like freshly picked raspberries a little berry, a little earthly and a whole of sweet and it’s one of those lingering smells than even once you’ve closed up the container it just seems to remain with you.
Infused is… is… bliss. The aroma is very sweet and all raspberry there’s no “tea” smell at all. Then there’s the taste, when I close my eyes I am sure I just gobbled down a whole packet of frozen raspberries. You know that taste you get from the frozen ones, that’s what this is like a syrupy-sweet overpowering burst of raspberry flavour backed by a very light black tea. The after taste echoes the initial taste only the black tea is even fainted.
I find this tea very, very addictive and cannot recommend it enough! I really think this would suit people dipping their toe into the world of black tea who’ve sampled fruit tissanes and are ready to take the next step. This is the closest in taste to a fruit tissane that I’ve ever sampled from a black tea – it’s a very light brew that is quite hard to over-infuse (although it can be done so just watch out).
Because of the lightness of the black tea and the fact that the raspberry flavour tastes more natural than flavoured it lends itself to great all day, all night drinking – although it’s hardly likely to wake you up in the morning, but on the bright side it’s also just as unlikely to keep you up at night.
Yum, Yum, Yum!
Preparation
I never knew – I love raspberries I put them with everything and for some reason I just didn’t make the link between loving tea and loving raspberries, I feel so stupid.
I came on it quite by accident which I think makes it all the nicer – I was actually wanting to try T2’s oolong berry but they had run out they didn’t even have any left to smell! So the lovely sales assistant recommended trying this tea to get an idea of what the other would taste like.
Haha, yeah berries are always good, but I think the raspberry taste is soo good with tea. I always have raspberry tea at my dad’s house because he has nothing else.. and I don’t mind it. I’m also going to try the oolong berry if I can and I’ll let you know how it is!
Oh yes please do let me know how you go with it! I always associate a good oolong as being creamy not grassy and really just can’t imagine what a creamy berry would be like – maybe like a raspberry dipped in white chocolate mmm that’d be nice actually.
How lucky you are to have a Dad with such nice tea on hand! My Dad is very old school with tea – sticking to English Breakfast & Prince of Wales, I did get him to try a vanilla scented black tea on Father’s Day which he enjoyed but I can’t see him wanting to stock it.
This is a highly scented floral green tea that seems at home as an afternoon tea a little pick-me-up when the brain starts to get a little fuzzy.
For me the floral aromas seem to be competing with one another and it does come across as a very busy tea with a lot going on – if your like floral teas you’ll love this as floral aroma and taste is very pervasive – subtlety is not the name of the game here.
Although the rose is plentiful the jasmine seems to be the dominant scent and flavour reminding me far more of Green tea with jasmine than Green tea with rose. Being more of a rose lover I found myself wanting more in this area.
I’m not really a big fan of highly fragrant green teas and this tea hasn’t made a convert of me. Would recommend to floral green tea lovers but wouldn’t recommend as a starting point if you’re wanting to get into green tea as it’s very overpowering.
Preparation
Unfortunately, my crush on this tea has ended, it really has not stood up to the test of time. I find that it is far too easy to over brew it leaving to a very bitter tea with a sickly sweet aroma that doesn’t translate into the tea.
When made right it is still a deliciously sweet tea that really is quite divine but given that a couple of seconds make the difference between delightful and having to be thrown out I feel like it’s not worth the bother anymore.
That being said the addition of milk does seem to negate the over-bewing and create a nice milky desert tea. Given that I’m not a fan of milk in tea though it doesn’t really help me much.
Preparation
Mmm… that’s a nice brew. I’m really enjoying the rooibos from teas.com.au and this black tea blend is no exception.
Being a vanilla tea lover I was excited to see if this black and rooibos tea would really taste vanillary and to my delighted surprise it does I’d say it is probably closer to a vanilla rooibos than a traditional vanilla black tea. The tea itself seems on the light side of a medium strength and so would suit a lazy sunday brunch or as an after dinner tea. I don’t think it would quite satisfy as a weekday morning tea as it is very light.
When the leaves are dry they smell of a very faint vanilla aroma with solid black and rooibos coming through. When infused there’s an almost floral aroma to the tea that seems to fade as the tea cools down and turns into a heavy vanilla rooibos scent.
I found my initial sip of the tea was very bitter but as the tea cooled down the soft vanilla rooibos became the stand out taste. After each sip I was left with a very brief, very light sweet black tea after-taste which made me feel like it was a well rounded cup.
I would say that you get the most from this tea both in terms of aroma and taste when it’s cooled down a little because when had hot the black tea notes dominate heavily.
This tea is definitely closer to a rooibos than a black tea so if you’re looking to sedge-way into rooibos this would be a good starting point. Also if you’re like me and like vanilla anything than this is worth a try.
Preparation
I love this white tea with rose it makes for such a delicate tea that to me it is the perfect afternoon tea to accompany something sweet as the tea itself is so light with no lingering aftertaste allowing you to really savour what you are eating along with it.
I was disappointed when I opened the packet to see so much ‘dust’ and very chopped up leaves but in saying that it hasn’t distracted from the taste and it still delivers a very beautiful cup of tea.
The taste is of a very, very light tea – no bitterness, only a small amount of grassiness and an overshadowing of crisp rose. I enjoy the first infusion of this tea and prefer to start over again if I ever finish off a teapot but I find it lends itself to protracted drinking and I can make a teapot of this tea last a good hour, I also don’t find I’m put off if I let it get lukewarm which is handy as I have a tendency to really drag out my drinking of this.
It is one of T2’s more expensive teas but they often have it for sample in store in the summer months – I think because it’s such a light tea – so I’d recommend keeping an eye out for it.
White rose tea is the tea that got me drinking tea and this is a good white rose tea so I really recommend giving this to a friend who has yet to turn to the tea-side. :)
To me a good oolong is one that you never want to stop drinking and that gets better with each new cup. For me a bad oolong is one that satisfies with one cup because really good oolongs taste so much better on the second and third infusion so if you aren’t reaching for your third, fourth and sixth cup then you’re not getting the most out of your tea.
This is a good oolong – this is aptly named and makes for a very satisfying post dinner tea. When I opened the packet for the first time I was very impressed to see distinct oolong leaves, beautiful large read-pink rosebuds and dottings of peppermint. No dust fragments or chopped up leaves. AND THE SMELL – mmm…. very nice rosey hues with little hints of peppermint enticed me to get out my good teapot. I infused the first lot for about 2 and a half minutes and the second time for another minute longer. The leaves when they’re infused expand out massively – they are the largest oolong leaves I have seen so far and are just beautiful to look at.
I love rosebuds – I’ll put them in everything so the domination of the rose is a major plus in my book. The tea smells more of a mixture of rose and peppermint than ‘traditional’ oolong and the initial taste is of a smooth sweet rose with little hint of the peppermint to follow. The after-taste is when the crispness of the rose kicks in along with the peppermint which at first seems quite light but with each subsequent drop dominates a little more each time while keeping the dominate tone squarely on the rose.
The second infusion amps up the more buttery oolong balancing out both the rose and the peppermint and turning into a well rounded sweetly refreshing tea.
There was no grassiness to the tea at all and I agree with the previous reviewer, Luthien, that the first infusion yields a more herbal than oolong taste. I also think this tea is someone how ‘better’ after tea – when had after tea it seems to cap off the eating and provide a nice relaxing way to start the evening. I had my further infusions much latter at night and I kept feeling like I should have eaten first but maybe that’s all in my head!
I would recommend this tea to people who like rose and ‘buttery’ oolongs.
Preparation
Okay a big shout out thank you to teas.com.au for making this exquisite vanilla rooibos tea. I finally understand the obsession with Rooibos. Everywhere it seems people are raving about this tea-type but when I’ve tried it has been bitter and with a putrid smell. This, however, is the complete opposite of what I’ve tasted elsewhere.
When you first open the packet you are greeted by an earthy sweet vanilla scent and the sight of some beautiful red leaves. I infused this for about two and a half minutes and then waited for it to cool down slightly. There’s an earthly smell with just a hint of almost chocolatey-vanilla to the tea that I wasn’t sure if I liked or not. Then I had a sip and I was even more confused but then I had another and another and as I kept drinking I liked this tea more and more.
It is probably the closest thing to black tea that I’ve tasted (out of green, white, oolong, etc), while having none of the bitterness either in taste or scent. The initial taste is something like a generic black tea mixed with soft vanilla sweetness. It is really the after-taste that makes this tea so additively appealing – you are immediately left with a very warm and quite intense honey-vanilla taste in your mouth and throat. If you have the next sip straight away you’ll find it enhances the taste providing you with the honey-vanilla taste immediately and an even stronger after-taste. This is why the more you drink the better the tea tastes and more the you want. I had two mug-fulls one after the other, I literally couldn’t help myself.
It is a very special taste and quite satisfying so although the subtlety of the taste and smell could lend itself to be drank with food I enjoyed having it on its own and savouring the tea.
The vanilla-honey taste and scent is grounded in the earthiness that surrounds this tea so in no way is it overpowering or sickly sweet. The vanilla taste comes from the combination of carob and vanilla pods and so both smells and tastes natural, they also seem to be in a good balance with the tea itself and so don’t come across as an afterthought or flavour enhancement.
I highly recommend this tea as after only my first tasting I went back for more.
I recommend this tea to people who enjoy vanilla, honey and chocolate flavours in the tea and particularly to people who have yet to come over to the side of rooibos. After having this I am definitely going to add rooibos to my rotation of teas as it really is something special.
Shame you didn’t enjoy the Toffee Apple Winter. You’re dead on when you say that it’s good for those “transitioning” into oolongs. Amara likes to drink it with a dash of agave syrup to bring out the toffee flavour. Someone with a more developed palate such as yourself might enjoy our single origin Milk Oolong (which is a traditional Milk Oolong, not a flavoured one) or even the Tropical Paradise which we use a base of GABA oolong for.
It really would be good for a try-out tea, often people start with a strong oolong and are put off the type altogether, which is a shame because oolongs are awesome.
Thanks for the recommendations – your Milky Oolong looks very tempting I love the idea of sampling a single origin – estate type that can be pretty hard to find in Australian tea sellers. I’ve added it to my list of tees to try. :)
It’s true. Oolongs are my favourite too. Such an awesome variety of complex and subtle flavours.
Aww, this seemed so promising from the product description…