440 Tasting Notes
I am so glad that I only bought enough of this for one pot. It smelled too much like Bubbly for me to trust it, and damn was I right. This tea is like pineapple cheap champagne. It may be great for the wallet but your taste buds will regret every sip. I ended up dumping the pot after I tried it both hot and iced and couldn’t handle more than a couple sips either way.
I got this one as a free sample with my first order from Capital Teas. (If you haven’t tried them, their customer service was AMAZING!). My first try I tried while half asleep at six am on a Saturday . . . and forgot to shake the bag so I got all the light ingredients and no mate. Determined I gave it another shot tonight. This time I did a double strong and made sure I got some of the heavy!
The tea itself is good quality, and a really intriguing blend. I’m not a fan at all of roasted mate, and am picky about my chai blends, so I was a little afraid of what I was getting into. But free tea, right? I was pleasantly surprised on first sip. The mate is definitely there and makes a lovely base for the spice blend. The roast is mild and if anything adds a uniqueness to the otherwise unmemorable chai flavours. If you’re a fan of roasted mate and chai, this is a must try. Me, I definitely won’t mind finishing it up but I probably won’t be rebuying it, especially at seven bucks an ounce.
Preparation
This is a pretty stereotypical Teavana tea, but more on the drinkable scale. Straight its tart, as it should be with that many cranberries in it. I’m not one for tart drinks so I added a half teaspoon of sugar and that made it actually fairly enjoyable. I won’t be stocking up on it, but if a friend offered it to me I wouldn’t say no.
Preparation
Wait, there’s supposed to be strawberries in this? I didn’t get that at ALL. I ended up buying a bit of this on boxing day for a friend, who then told me the next day she’d bought 500g of it on her own. So I figured I might as well give it a try . . . meh. This tastes like a wannabe hot chocolate. Nothing to write home about, but nothing to complain about either. Kind of like the music charts right now, to be honest.
Preparation
Am pretty glad I only got a small amount of this one. David doesn’t do pu’erh to my taste so I went into this tea with trepidation . . . and I was right, but for different reasons. Normally all I get from their pu’erh is fish and count me shocked to discover that I didn’t this time, dry or brewed. I love how this tea smells in the bag, all fruity and delish. But brewed its just too dark of a pu’erh for me and the more I sip the more I’ve decided I really can’t finish the cup.
Ooh, I should try my sample of this one tonight. When I opened it up to swap some of it, I was re-intrigued with it, but then forgot, haha.
I definitely prefer the Berry Good that came out the same day. It is a blend though rather than a flavoured tea. Looking forward to seeing what you think. :D
I’ve tried the Berry Good, and liked it as well. Probably will prefer it to this one as well! Haha, can’t resist trying EVERYTHING though…. (is it bad that I was relieved when February’s TOTM was a tea I already had? :P)
Not bad at all, I was kind of the same way. I’ve done the entire wall, including the hard to find ones like gyokuro black. It was nice to have a month to sip down!
DavidsTea nearly scared me off pu’erh forever. Theirs is always rotten-fishy and gross. That they are now throwing fruit at it … eek. Thanks for the review/warning.
Thanks for the review. Been through the whole wall myself as well and on a break lately as none of the new ones have been interesting enough to get me in store. Going on two months now since I have been to store, however with the spring collection I will likely be back in to pick up small amounts. Heard that the fall tea Copabanana is making a come back as part of the spring collection.
I can’t help but feel that this tea is trying to be something amazing, but fails. Maybe it should take lessons from The Tea Haus’s Lime Fizz or even the similar version from Tealish. The ginger is here, but the rest of the flavours are subpar, and even the ginger doesn’t have the pop the other two flavours do. I can see why this one got discontinued.
Preparation
I love when a pu’erh is clearly a pu’erh and yet still flavoured. This one is a great example of that. The peach is very much an undertone, so much so that if the tea cools it fades almost entirely, but it works beautifully with the pu’erh’s richness. There’s no fishiness here, just a beautifully flavoured cup of tea that any pu’erh lover would cherish.
Glad I’m not the only one that really didn’t like this one!