Whittard of Chelsea

A smooth tea, though surprisingly malty for an earl grey, the bergomot is balanced very nicely with the tea to produce an overall fresh and delightful taste.
Firm character.
Well defined taste.
Lingering citrus finish

It´s for teas like this that I appreciate my water boiler with temperature control between 60 and 100ºC. To be brewed with water at 80ºC? No problem.
But, although it makes drinking white and green teas a lot simpler and straight-forward, I managed to forget about this tea for quite a while.

On the little card Whittard´s adds to the tea pack, it says the tea is “a supremely fresh and lightly fragranced tea with a hint of spring morning sweetness”. Indeed, in nose the loose tea is quite delicate with a sweet touch to it. In mouth it´s very easy going and light, nice enough without the grassy aspect of a lot of green teas, or the strength of most black teas. Honestly, I expected more from it.

This is another Whittard’s blend I picked to drink based on the name, without looking at the ingredients. I expected this to be a chai, and I wanted a bold, spicy tea for my breakfast tea this morning. I’d already tipped the leaf into the infuser when I read the ingredients and found that, apparently, the only spice in here is clove?! I say ‘apparently’ because the description here on Steepster lists other spices, and a few of the tasting notes describe a cinnamon-heavy tea (which I would have loved). I wonder if Whittard has changed the tea recently? More recent notes seem to be describing the same thing that’s in my tin – orange, vanilla and clove. It’s not bad, and I do taste all of those things, sort of in a dreamsicle way, but it’s not what I wanted right this moment. I’d probably enjoy it more if it was something I was in the mood for. I’ll have to pay more attention next time!

I finally finished my online training so I’m baaaack! I’ve missed you guys. Drinking this today because it’s instant and we have people coming to view the house later today so I didn’t want to make a mess with loose leaf. I still don’t get why this is called ‘dreamtime’ when it’s full of sugar and caffeine. Still, it’s pretty tasty once you get past the name.

Made myself a cup of this right before bedtime, expecting it to be caffeine-free, based on the name, and was surprised to realise that it’s actually a black tea base. I own the same ‘Dreamtime’ blend in regular, non-instant form and it’s definitely a herbal tisane, all apple pieces and rooibos. I wonder what possessed them to add black tea to the instant version? I drank it anyway, hoping it wouldn’t throw my sleep schedule off too badly – I’ve been trying to fix it for a couple of weeks, and avoiding caffeine after 5pm. I did get to sleep about an hour later than usual, but I won’t rush to blame this tea. Flavour-wise, it was quite nice. Very sweet at first, but the acidity grew as the cup cooled to match the sweetness nicely. Honey, vanilla and apricot notes were all present, and as I’ve found with most of Whittard’s instant teas the base was overpowered by the additional flavours. I’m not sure when I’ll drink this, though, because the flavour combination is definitely a ‘bedtime’ one for me, but there’s caffeine in this. Maybe I’ll try a pitcher of it iced, and hope for the best.

There’s another street party today so I made another pitcher of this tea iced to take out. I’m training for a new job so can’t take part in the party (I did go out for an hour to have a burger from the BBQ though), and I completely forgot about this and left it in the fridge when everyone went outside. Now the party is in full swing, I’ve came back inside to do more online courses, and I’m drinking the pitcher myself. Everyone out there has moved on to alcohol. Oh well!

VE Day 2020

I made a pitcher of this tea iced for our street party this afternoon, and as it turned out this was my last tea of the day because we ended up staying out til really late. We had a brilliant afternoon, and this went down a storm. Fantastic day all round!

ETA: I was a little bit merry when I wrote this last night, so I didn’t really add anything helpful about the tea. I had several comments that it tasted like juice, and even my iced tea hater mam enjoyed it. Heavy on the strawberry and blueberry, light on the tea. It doesn’t have that strong citric acid background that a lot of Whittard’s instant teas do, so that was a bonus. This is perfect for iced tea, I’m not sure I’ll even bother to try it hot.

THEME TEA DAY!!

Today is VE day, and it’s a big one this year – the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe. My neighbours have organised a street party to celebrate, only now because of the Coronavirus we’re all going to have to stay in our own gardens. But, there’ll be music, food and drink, homemade bunting, it’s a beautiful sunny day and we’re all getting dressed up in 1940s dress or in red, white and blue. I’m drinking teas which I can tenuously link to peace or patriotism and the like, and there’s a minute’s silence at 11am to honour everyone who lost their lives.

I picked this tea to start my morning because it was the first one I thought of when I decided to drink themed teas today. What’s more English than an English rose? As a happy coincidence it’s also the last of my first tin of this tea, which means I’m half way done with it! I love a simple rose tea, and while this does the job it’s a bit light on the rose for my liking. I prefer Adagio’s Summer Rose, which has a much more prominent rose note and a harsher base than this tea, but I prefer to drink my rose teas with a splash of milk in the morning, and this tea is too thin to hold up to the milk. I’ll happily go through my other tin of this, but while a basic black rose tea is a staple in my cupboard, when it comes time to buy more it won’t be this one. Today, though, it sets the mood nicely.

ETA: This is a nice tea for when I’m making a pot for an afternoon tea, because the base doesn’t get too astringent even if you leave the leaves in the pot for an hour or two.

Aaaaand the final ‘I drank this ages ago’ note to get my cupboard up-to-date. A good deal of my teas have sadly gone awol so unless they magically turn up my cupboard is going to undergo a brutal cull very soon. I’m not holding my breath because they disappeared from my cupboard in the kitchen along with two of my strainers, and my mam (who likes to throw things away and then forget about it) has done a clear-out of basically the whole house since we went into lockdown. So, it looks like it’s goodbye to all my DavidsTeas that I can’t get over here in the UK! ): I may have shed a silent tear.

As far as I remember, this was okay. Acidic like a lot of the instant teas, and muddled fruity flavour.

Sipdown 173/397.

Another barely-a-note note. I enjoyed this one, but not as much as some of the others. Elderflower is a favourite of mine, but blackcurrant isn’t usually a flavour I choose. It reminded me a little of Ribena, and was as a result a little strange to drink hot.

Sipdown 172/397.

Another basic note just to say ‘I drank this’. It was too long ago to remember any of the specifics, but this is one I have purchased multiple times and thoroughly enjoyed. Very fruity, good hot and cold, a nice thirst-quencher in the summer. If I were ever to buy another instant tea again (which I probably wouldn’t) it would most likely be this one.

Sipdown 171/397.

This is more a placeholder than a tasting note, just to say that I finished this one a couple of months back while I was away from Steepster and never wrote anything about it. It was nice for what it was, but what it was wasn’t my favourite.

Sipdown 170/397.

This tea is dismal.

The base was very hay… old hay with some notes which were really off too. Jasmine? Some floral notes were there, but I am not that sure about jasmine. Moreover it tasted bit artficial and caused little headache too.

Tea base wasn’t one of the best too. Not only the notes above, but it was bitter and cheap taste too. That is surprising for me considering it is Whittard!

As expected, I am still not a fan of hibiscus. It is very soothing but just not for me.

Apparently ages since last reviews here and I think it could be that old. It seems they do not make it anymore as well.

Apparently another CTC black tea, but what to expected from tea bag. Smells quite fruity but then some earthiness is there. Or maybe barn floor? It doesn’t stink, but – it is somehow quite strong. Mango? Where is my mango? No mango aroma.

Ingredients says it contains black tea (98%) and mango flavour oil (2%), but it doesn’t leave any oil marks.

The taste is far from mango sweet notes as well. It tastes rather like sweetened black tea, no mango taste there.

Finally finished the Whittard advent; at least it’s only February!

This was day 23. I don’t drink a lot of marrakech mint and I’m not sure why. I actually quite like it, although I suppose green tea in general just isn’t my go-to. That would be black, because I need caffeine as much as I need oxygen. Possibly more.

Anyway, this one’s pretty good. Not too dank, sweetly minty. I’d definitely drink it again, although it’s not amazing, you know? The cornflower petals are pretty, though. I’ll give it that.

Maybe today I’ll finally finish up the Whittard advent? I did pretty well to keep up in December, given that I only have two left, but I’ve definitely been snoozing on them. Time to change that!

This one’s day 20; a straight-up White Peony. Nothing particularly remarkable – it’s sweet and lightly creamy with those sugar water vibes that white tea has generally. Eminently drinkable, but not distinctive.

Well, this is new. I reviewed this a day or two ago and wondered where to put it. Mine is a round sachet, not a teabag as pictured in the image here. Another reviewer said it tasted like artificial strawberry banana candy but mine isn’t tasting like that. So maybe it wasn’t the same thing? This came in a big set. But the pattern on the box is the same as the teabag one.

I still like it a lot, it is still very rose flavored but not too heavily so, with a somewhat brisk black tea base. Martin Bednar mentioned that the loose has rose petals in it, so I decided to tear open the sachet!

I found more confusion. This is really fine textured tea – as in bigger than dust but not by much. There are lots of tiny round white pellets in it as well. It looks like that potting soil with perlite or whatever in it, but in miniature. If you do dollhouses and want some realistic looking potting soil, here you go!

I assumed it was bits of sugar but surely they would have to label that? The ingredient list says only black tea and flavoring. I should have tasted one of those tiny spheres before steeping and may do so later.

I steeped it and looked for the spheres. Gone. So I tore open an extra sachet that was also in the pot and had been steeped. There were only two of the little spheres, super tiny, and I managed to separate one. I bit it, thinking it would be a crunchy sugar bit. It was soft.

Clearly there were more of these and they dissolved. This one tasted like nothing, not sugar and no explosion of rose to indicate it had somehow carried the flavoring. I bit one of the little pellets of tea (if we can call that tiny thing a pellet) and it was the same texture as the white sphere. So I still don’t know what it is. It must be the rose flavor delivery system. LOL

Weird as all that is, I stand by the fact that I like this tea. I think I will stick with buying Harney and Sons Rose Scented, though, which is a better quality base and is more accessible.

One person drinking it with me loved it, the other who mostly just likes plain black tea said she didn’t like its aftertaste, and I guess she meant the rose.

It was paired with homemade shortbread and made a decent companion for it.

I really struggled trying to decide where to review this. This came in the Tea Discovery Collection which was a Christmas gift, and was found at Home Goods for half the online price. Bargain!

The description on one of the Steepster pages for this tea appears to be for a different tea, because it mentions tropical fruit and rose, and this tea is pure black tea with rose. Period.
These are sachets and not loose tea so I didn’t want to review under the loose leaf version.

I like floral tea as long as it doesn’t taste artificial. This one has a lovely, just strong enough but not too strong rose flavor. I find rose oily, in a good way, like puerh can be oily. The base is mildly drying but not unpleasant and to me the dryness is mitigated by the oiliness of rose. The rose is definitely more delicate than Harney’s Rose Scented (which I LOVE) but still strong enough to be unmistakeable. This was paired with a plate of homemade shortbread and white chocolate chip cookies. It held up well to competing flavors and the rose still came through.

I am very happy with this particular offering in the collection of black teas and look forward enjoying many more cups.

It was perfect with no milk or sugar for me. It could probably handle a tiny touch of both if that’s what you like.

Could you believe it’s acutally over and I am sitting here, drinking Christmas tea? Simple, I knew I got it from Izzy (thank you, but what happened to her I have no idea – not even news on her website);

And then I forgot. So I took it today, as it is quite cold day; quite sad day that free days and exams starts tomorrow. Exactly tomorrow I have one – quite major one.

Anyway to the tea, it looks like decent black one, bold, quite spicy on aroma.

And in taste? Well, it is nice black tea, very strong (but I steeped it on upper limit), nice spice notes there and although cinnamon is not there, I feel it. But more prominent are cloves and vanilla is rounding the taste and adds sweet note. Not bad , but nothing to return.

Day 24 of the Whittard advent (and yes, I am very late with this one!)

It’s partly because I’ve been putting it off, since it’s a black/green/oolong blend, with rose to boot. Rose tea isn’t generally my favourite, and honestly, brewing something well that’s got all those things to contend with was beyond me before Christmas. Now, of course, I’m absolutely up to the challenge! Maybe, anyway.

I was totally scientific and let the water cool a bit while I wandered around and did some other things. Turns out, it’s actually pretty nice when all’s said and done. Quite sweet, but with an underlying earthy woodiness and just a hint of floral. Nothing overpowering, thankfully. I’d compare it to walking through a forest on a slightly damp but sunny day, I suppose. Fresh, like.

It’s probably not one I’d actively seek out just because I think it’s a weird combination of things in general and it strikes me as fussy. I like my life as straightforward as I can get it, and that usually includes tea. I’m glad to have tried it, though. It’s drinkability surprised me!

Day 21 of the Whittard advent. This one’s a black with juniper berries (yes, please!), strawberry and blackcurrant. No hibi, thankfully!

It’s fruity; really fruity. There’s lots of strawberry and a touch of underlying sharpness which is very much reminiscent of blackberry. It has a great summer pudding vibe going on, and I’d absolutely buy this.

Mango green tea with a hint of bergamot.

Day 19 of the Whittard advent, and I’m actually almost up to date. Just day 15 to return to, at some point. Probably next week now, but you never know!

This is a breakfast style black. Strong, with really nice bready undertones. Not too tannic. It’s pretty malty, but still somehow savoury. It’s doesn’t head into the realms of the super-sweet in the way that some malty teas do. It’s also really smooth, which is nice. No real bite to speak of. I find some breakfast blends too heavy on an empty stomach in the morning, but this one’s actually really nice.

It’s very reminiscent of Twinings 1706 and B&B’s Great British Cuppa, if you’re familiar with either of those.