The Republic of Tea

Still making beverage choices for medicinal purposes; grabbed this one after noticing black pepper in the ingredient lineup.

My tastebuds are not calibrated properly due to the cruds I’m toting around in my head and throat, but it’s not coming through as very peppery. Just a decent, predictable chai; acceptable with a little honey and no milk.

Plain it was a bit bland (too much water?). But a bit of sugar later and it was lovely.

The perfect bagged black tea. Perfect with milk and sugar. A blend of Assam and Ceylon. Wish this one was available year round.

Good apple teas are hard to find. This is one, although the apple flavor leans a little more toward candy than toward a genuine Granny Smith. The caramel doesn’t overwhelm the fruit element, which is a huge plus for me.

Lovely on an afternoon when the heat is out in our 100+ year old building!

This is another of my coworker’s abandoned teas… I took pretty much all the hibiscus ones she had left in the breakroom, since nobody likes it but me. (I’m pretty much just a hibiscus rehoming sanctuary at this point…)

This came as quart-sized cold brew packets, so that is how I prepared it. It is very unseasonal, I admit, but I was starting to get tired of my mugicha coldbrew and welcomed a change-up. This is very tangy, which I of course enjoy. The hibiscus provides a nice full texture with a strong tart, fruity background, and the orange is quite zesty. The orange flavor is also very nice, rather than that weird artificial note it sometimes can have. I find it quite gulpable cold and plain, but I don’t know if I could recommend it to anyone else… if you a) like hibiscus b) like orange c) like things on the tangy/sour side, then you’ll probably enjoy this like me. But if you can’t check all three boxes, this isn’t going to be for you.

Just a sample that I wanted to try while the season is upon us. Glad it was just a sample. Granted, it was an office cuppa, so that means inattentively steeped, but the pumpkin came out bitter. Honey improved it a little, but I didn’t make it all the way through the cup.

Lots on my mind to distract me this evening, so when I grabbed the sample pouch that came from the natural health store, I had no inkling it was intended to be iced. I just popped the single-size bag into a cup and let it steep 5 minutes (that I did read off the bag).

Inattentiveness wins in this case! An odd-duck mix of everything from apple to aloe to sea buckthorn is sweet (but not too), pink (but not hibby-heavy), and … I’m getting buttery!

The actual for-sale tins evidently contain pitcher-sized pouches, and I can see that this would be really tasty iced, but thanks to my sloppy serendipity, I wouldn’t mind seeing it in single-serve bags.

I love this tea has an intense toffee flavor. I love the unique fall Republic of Tea flavors they have at World Market. I was looking for the Pumpkin Caramel Stroopwafal Tea from Republic of Tea but it was sold out. There were so many options glad a choose this one. Glad it’s herbal with a red rooibos base. I will have to try this as a tea latte too.

Love this one! It has some fruity hits and although not listed I feel like I get hints of vanilla. Great iced cold and it is Superfruit! I am not a big fan of green tea usually but this one is great!

Sipdown

This may have been Ashman’s favorite of the Earl Grey All Day line from RoT that we tried. The flavouring is pretty strong, which meant he could easily resteep and combine so that he had tea for breakfast plus enough for a travel mug to take to work.

The strawberry and rhubarb were pretty balanced so the rhubarb toned down “candy” tendencies in the strawberry. It was a brightly flavoured green and the base wasn’t sharp.

I barely picked up bergamot in these, and I don’t think I noticed it all in this one.

Sipdown

What a shocker to come on here today and see that my two sipdowns have never had a tasting note from me.

This was a really enjoyable blend. Orange Marmalade was super heavily flavored. This one a little less so.

It was genuinely a lemon biscuit/pastry flavor and not just tea with lemon. Ashman is not a fan of lemon in tea as a rule but he liked this. There was a nice, creamy vanilla note that sold the dessert profile.

The most upscale of our local health food grocers keeps a basket of sample goodies by the counter, and this was in it…probably wouldn’t have sprung for an entire canister of what, at least from the ingredient listing, looks like a garden-variety nightcappy blend.

But tonight, I’m tired inside and out and glad to have this on hand. Just enough rooibos and rose to tone and sweeten the lavender and chamomile. Nothing unusual or unique, but nicely balanced.

I haven’t historically been a huge fan of Republic of Tea, but after enjoying their s’mores tea, I thought I would give this a shot. Plus, I can never resist fig-flavored anything…

Thankfully, it’s quite good! The bergamot is the strongest note but doesn’t overtake the other flavors and doesn’t taste too floral for me. I definitely taste the fig (yay!), and it reminds me of fig jam. I’m not sure about whiskey, there’s maybe a slight smoky woodiness going on in the background. The vanilla and caramel swirl together into a sort of crème caramel flavor with a custardy, slightly buttery character.

Overall, I’m happy with it. I thought it might be too many flavors going on, and admittedly I would just as soon omit the vanilla and caramel altogether and add more fig, but it doesn’t taste too muddled and I can still pick out the fig notes.

Picked this one up on a whim. It’s a new release, and normally I wouldn’t be interested in such a chocolate-heavy tea, but I was intrigued by the herbal base of carob, roasted dandelion root, and cacao.

I’m glad I grabbed it, because it’s quite good! There’s definitely a distinct graham cracker flavor to it, which I love. A little bit of marshmallow too. Surprisingly, it doesn’t beat you over the head with the chocolatey notes. Not super rich, just a nice, lightly toasty herbal to cozy up with.

I do think I’ll use more bags next time, for this first cup I used two for 12 ounces of water. It could be a little stronger.

In the past I have resisted Earl Grey teas with added flavors. I dunno—it seemed like cheating, somehow. After all, Earl Grey itself is such a classic, such a wonderful taste in and of itself, that adding another flavor to it seemed almost…sacrilegious! Well, I have changed my mind.
I shall have to review this again, and soon, because I have added sugar to this from the get-go, which is not a truly fair and objective review of the tea on its own merits. But with the vanilla in its makeup, it’s a dessert tea, and called out for sugar!
I liked it enough when hot that it occurred to me to make a double batch and chill it—and it’s a terrific iced tea for this hot July weather. I do recommend it both hot, and chilled.
We’ll see how I like it when I don’t automatically add the sugar! But for now—enjoy it, friends!

This was the middle layer of a trio tin gifted to me and is recommended either hot or cold. It leads with cinnamon, but not milky cinnamon…the green tea gives it a little crispness and reminds me of the cinnamon disk candies wrapped in bright red cellophane I used to sneak at Grandpa’s house. It’s lovely chilled.

I bought this at the same time I bought the Caramel tea from their regular line and they are similar enough that I should not have. This does taste better than the caramel tea…it’s a more mild flavor. Not a strong “tea” flavor" and pairs well with milk. Overpriced since you only get 30 bags compared to the almost double amount you get in the regular line. I love Mrs. Patmore and the description got me. Ehh. It’s ok. The picture they used could have been better so I don’t feel compelled to keep the tin. Nice to try….but I won’t be sad that they stop selling it since I think it’s limited anyway.

Ehhh. I was very excited for this one but it’s not for me. It kinda reminds me of the the leftover milk from a fruity cereal- like fruity pebbles or captain crunch. Something like that. I was able to get through the big tin I bought by either adding a splash of pomegranate juice or mango soda. Just a splash. It covered the artificial flavor so well! It has nice big ol leaves though that I have been adding to my raised garden beds…I think it’s been doing them good!

Hope your Saturday was pleasant! Between welcome rain showers, we took a quick break from the usual round of piled-up household needs and strolled the grounds of our little burg’s 150th birthday party next to the baseball diamond. Burgers on the grill, handful of craft tents, a decent local band, and a petting zoo with a pot-belly piglet that was a third the size of our biggest cat. Took about 10 minutes to see all there was to see ;)

Local do’s signify the beginning of fall, and with the weather cooperating, I was in a chai mood this evening. This little gift tin sat neglected all summer, but I think it’s going to be fun to work my way through it. The cacao chai is pleasant and the spices don’t overwhelm the cacao vibe. I’ve had one cup with milk and one without; neither with sweetener. Both tasty, but I think I like it unadorned best.

I am going to have to learn to drink chai year round, not just in the winter…I got a triple gift tin as a thank-you gift at work to add to the other gift chai varieties that are beginning to gather dust in my office.

In this case, it wasn’t difficult to drink. This is mild, the spices are nicely balanced, the chocolate is detectible and the reiki mushrooms give it a nice, grounded pu-erh sort of feel. Low-caffeine, too.

Exactly what I expected from “Earl Grey and Orange Marmalade”… it’s OK, nothing to rave about. Just a unique combination I have never had before.