112 Tasting Notes

89

When I smell the bag of loose tea it smells grassy and also reminds me a bit of green (camellia sinensis) tea. Like the name suggests the dry rooibos is quite green but when it is steeped the tea brews up to be a rose/yellow color. Looking at the used leaves after steeping the tea they still look green.

I used only 1 tsp of the dry rooibos for 12 oz cup of tea and I steeped it for 11 minutes in near boiling water and it turned out to be a good (medium) strength cup of tea.

It tastes a lot like green camellia sinensis tea, in fact the taste is much closer to green camellia sinensis tea than to red rooibos tea.

This is the first green rooibos I have tasted and I really liked it so I plan to make this regularly.

Preparation
205 °F / 96 °C 8 min or more 1 tsp 12 OZ / 354 ML

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60

This was supposed to be an apple berry tea but I couldn’t taste much apple. I looked at the ingredient list and, surprise surprise, it didn’t include any apple. Maybe they tried to add the apple flavor with the “natural flavors” at the end of the ingredient list.

The only berry that was on the ingredient list was rosehips.

There was nothing objectionable about the flavor but it really didn’t taste good either. I don’t know if I will be inspired to drink this tea again.

Flavors: Cinnamon, Ginger, Lemongrass, Rosehips

Preparation
Boiling 8 min or more 12 OZ / 354 ML
Kristal

Ugh, I hate when companies say a particular fruit is in the mix of a tea and its not. I’ve had “mango” teas that have had no mangoes or even mango flavouring at all!

ctjuggler

I agree! I like fruit tea flavored with the real fruit (and the same fruit it is named after).

Another thing I don’t like is when they put “natural flavors” on the ingredient list. What does that mean? Almost anything could fit into that category. We really have very little clue what that means. Is the natural flavor cinnamon flavor from cinnamon bark, tea flavor from a camellia sinensis leaf, lemon like flavor from lemongrass, lemon flavor from a real lemon or is it sugar flavor (from cane sugar). I would rather if they specified what natural flavors they put in the tea then we know what we are dealing with.

Kristal

I also agree about the natural flavors! Sometimes I do see “natural lemon flavor” or something like that, but most of the time, like you said, you have no idea what it means. And sometimes “natural” may not really be all that “natural”

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81

This tea was delicious. It successfully captured a bold lemon flavor without any sour or tart flavor like you might expect with a lemon tea.

Flavors: Lemon, Lemongrass

Preparation
Boiling 8 min or more 12 OZ / 354 ML

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68

This tea was not bad but I found that it tasted a bit different/strange. I can immediately identify the Chamomile and Cinnamon in the tea. However after checking the ingredient list and the only other ingredients are Melaleuca Leaf and Natural Flavor.

I am pretty sure that the strange taste is from the melaleuca leaf. I am familiar with the smell of melaleuca oil (also known as tea tree oil but it is not related to camellia sinensis, the plant we get tea leaves from) and I think I can taste a slight background melaleuca flavor that makes this taste so different.

I am not sure why they wanted to add Melaleuca leaves to the tea. Maybe it was because the name of the company that sells the G’Day Herbal Teas is Melaleuca Inc. or maybe it is because melaleuca plants have antibacterial properties. I don’t know if dried melaleuca leaves in a tea would still have antibacterial properties or not but I don’t think you would want an antibacterial tea anyway because your digestive system relies on many types of good bacteria for digestion. I don’t think either of these reasons are good reasons to add an ingredient to a tea. The other possible reason I can think of for adding something to a tea is that it tastes good. But in this case I think it would have actually tasted better if it was a cinnamon spiced chamomile tea without the melaleuca leaves or the other natural flavors (but then they would have had to rename the tea).

In summary this tea tastes alright/good but it also tastes a bit strange.

Flavors: Cinnamon

Preparation
200 °F / 93 °C 8 min or more 11 OZ / 325 ML

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25

I bought this tea in a variety pack with 5 different flavors of herbal tea. Earlier this afternoon I tried the Ginseng tea from this variety pack and it was one of the best herbal teas I have ever tasted so I had high hopes for this one too. Unfortunately this tea was about the biggest let down I have ever had.

When I opened the package I wasn’t crazy about the smell but I was hopeful that it would taste better than the smell. Unfortunately the taste was even worse then the smell. It just tasted nasty. The aftertaste is horible and it sticks with you for quite a while. It has been half an hour since I drank the tea but the aftertaste is still bothering me. I won’t torture myself by drinking this again.

I have tried quite a few chamomile based teas and I have liked all of them until this one. -——————————————-
Update: The nasty aftertaste stuck around bothering me for one to two hours after drinking this tea. I am rating this tea 1/100
-——————————————
I actually have two boxes of this variety pack, one at home and one at work. So I decided to make another cup of tea with a teabag from the other box (just in case) because I couldn’t imagine someone intentionally designing a tea to taste that bad. I brewed the second cup of the the same way but this time it didn’t taste nearly as bad. It still had a hint of the objectionable taste but it was more background. This time the pleasant chamomile taste is the dominant flavor. This second cup of tea deserves a rating of 49/100 so I am averaging the rating of my two experiences to give it 25/100

Preparation
Boiling 8 min or more 12 OZ / 354 ML

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92

The dry tea bag and the steeped tea both smells alright. When I taste the tea it tastes good. But the real highlight comes in the aftertaste about 2 seconds after you swallow the tea. The aftertaste is so good that it tickles your taste buds.

The aftertaste makes me want to take another sip but when I take another sip the excellent aftertaste is covered up with the good (but not excellent) taste of the tea. Then I have to quickly swallow and wait a couple seconds for the aftertaste to come back.
I think it is the slight bit of peppermint that is giving a slight cooling effect and that cooling effect along with the licorice root and other ingredients produces a playfully delicious aftertaste. As the aftertaste develops it tastes so colorful, it tastes like flowers are blooming in the spring!

Ok back to earth now, I know I can’t stop talking about the aftertaste but that was the real highlight here and that’s probably what I will be dreaming about tonight. I would have given it 100 if the smell and the initial taste was as good as the aftertaste.

Flavors: Lemongrass, Licorice, Peppermint, Smooth

Preparation
Boiling 8 min or more 12 OZ / 354 ML

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95
drank Chinese Tieguanyin by Unknown
112 tasting notes

The tea comes in a metal tin with several single serving vacuum sealed packages of whole leaf oolong tea. Each leaf is rolled into a ball so it doesn’t break when they vacuum seal it.

Before I go any further I will try to better identify the tea I am reviewing. Most of the writing is in Chinese… this is all the English (or roman letters) I have to go on. The tin says “Chinese Tea Processed from the tinest and tenderraw tea leaves rich” (no tinest and tenderraw are not typos that’s actually what the tin says). Then at the bottom it says “JING XUAN’GHA LI”. On the vacuum sealed bags it says: “ZHONG HUA QING” then below it says “Tieguanyin Tea” which translates to Oolong tea. The only other clue I have is that this was given to me by a friend after they went on a trip to Hong Kong.

The tea tastes excellent and very fresh (even though it has been in my cupboard for about 3 years before I noticed it again and started using it). The individual vacuum sealed bags work great to preserve freshness. very few of the leaves are broken.

Even though the tea is packaged in a single serving vacuum sealed package I only used about 1/3rd of it for my cup of tea and although it is a bit mild, it tastes perfect for me.

Preparation
185 °F / 85 °C 4 min, 0 sec 1 tsp 12 OZ / 354 ML

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70
drank Strawberry by Tetley
112 tasting notes

I woke up this morning and drank this tea. It was a pleasant orange pekoe tea but I could barely notice the strawberry. I would have enjoyed it even more if there was a bit more strawberry.

Preparation
Boiling 3 min, 0 sec 11 OZ / 325 ML

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82

The Mandarin taste and smell was more prominent than the green tea. It actually reminded me of some fruity herbal teas. I really liked it so I will probably buy a box of this tea.

Flavors: Orange

Preparation
185 °F / 85 °C 3 min, 0 sec 10 OZ / 295 ML

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90

This is called China Green tips (full leaf) and comes in a large tea bag / sachet. Unfortunately it didn’t have any full leafs they were medium sized pieces of broken leaves. That being said it was bigger pieces than any other tea bag I have seen.

It tastes very good and fresh. The best bagged green tea I have ever tasted.

Preparation
185 °F / 85 °C 3 min, 30 sec 10 OZ / 295 ML

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Profile

Bio

I just recently got into tea (fall of 2015).

I love trying many types of tea. So far I have tried many Black, Oolong, Green and White teas as well as Yerba Mate, Rooibos, Honey Bush, Chamomile, Mint and fruit teas. I have liked good teas in almost every category. I don’t go for overly bitter/astringent, tart, or sweet teas and I never add milk/cream, sugar or other sweeteners to my tea.

Even though I have many excellent teas I always want to try a new one just to see what it tastes like and if I like it even better than my current favorites. Eventually I will focus more on drinking my favorites rather than always trying a different type of tea.

Ratings:

85+ Excellent and I will definitely repurchase soon so I don’t run out.

75-84 Really good and I will probably buy it again.

65-74 Good and I might buy it again but on the other hand maybe I won’t repurchase.

50-64 OK and I might finish the box.

1-49 Really did not like it at all. I probably dumped out the rest of the cup for the teas on the lower end of this range.

I am only doing one review per tea. If I drink it multiple times and my opinion changes then I will go back and update my rating and tasting notes.

Location

Canada

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