Turkish Apple

I’ve got a quiet night to myself. Husband is out for a couple hours, kids are sleeping, and I’ve already passed my caffeine limit for the evening. The nice tang of this lets me have something sweet and light that’s also warming on this cool night. I really can’t feel ever guilty about Turkish Apple.

The other half has been having this iced quite a bit and is loving it. Very easy to do – just add the ‘tea’ to the bottom of a glass/mug. Pour in about 1/3 of a cup of boiling water to dissolve, then add ice. Stir and wait for it to melt a bit and enjoy! Its quite tasty iced, a bit less tart than the hot option. Will be enjoyable drinking this over summer.

Although doubtful about its claim to the title of “tea” due to the fact that it is brewed by dissolving the sugary concoction into some boiling water, I have to admit that drinking Turkish Apple is quite an enjoyable experience. I would not, however, have purchased my own supply of it, had it not been for a discounted T2 Fruit Stack in which it was contained, along with Citrus Punch and Strawberries and Cream. Overall, pleasant either hot or chilled, Turkish Apple is a light, simple and sweet drink.

Turkish Apple is a refreshing tang drink, sweet whilst still giving off a crisp tartness, it makes a truly delicious iced tea in the heat of summer as the tang satisfies even the most hard earned thirst. Warm it is sweetly tart and very nice.

It is really best used as an accompanier to other teas or tissanes – T2’s Just Rose rose buds heighten the tartness and make the flavours really stand out from the sweetness – very very nice iced. When added to strawberries and cream it balances out the sweetness to give a refreshingly crisp after-taste.

Truly an ‘essential’ tissane to any collection.

Powdered Sugar… and some artificial flavour. That’s it. That’s the tea. I worked at T2 for 5 years and it was recommended we never openly explained to customers what this was. It was also a coincidence that so many of the iced tea “combos” that we had on tasting were a combo with Turkish Apple or Cherry. Any fruit tisane tastes good with an entire pack of Turkish Apple (250g sugar) dumped in it.

Very tasty, but then, it’s basically apple flavoured sugar dissolved in hot water. Delicious hot, but also amazing to sweeten iced tea.

…also a fantastic rimming sugar for making cocktails!

I don’t ever drink these turkish tisanes by themselves, because it’s basically like drinking sugar. Which is a bit weird. However, I love having them to sweeten iced brews, rather than using boring old regular sugar.

I don’t use them a LOT, but I’ve been icing a bit more lately and that reminded me to leave a tasting note. I’ll try to remember to update tasting notes each time they get thrown into a jug with another blend.

It’s sweet and it tastes like apples. That’s about the extent of the similarity between this and actual Turkish apple tea. This is a very expensive bag of artificially-apple-flavoured sugar. It is literally sugar, you dissolve it in hot water like any other instant fruit drink. Sickly sweet and revolting by itself (in my opinion), this is an essential ingredient in making iced fruit tea that tastes like the iced teas on the counter at T2 – they use it by the cupful in each jug. Great for kids and non-diabetics.

Made iced tea with this one. It came as part of a bundle.
The first glass out of the jug tasted like something from my childhood – maybe the little plastic straws full of sugary sherbet that one would find in a showbag? Complete with faint plastic undertones reminiscent of chewing on said plastic straw to make sure one got every last granule of sherbet out of the sweet treat’s packaging. Something close to that anyway. I wasn’t sure I liked it so I had another glass. Same story. The jug sat in the fridge for 2 weeks being ignored and last night I had another glass. Well, it had changed quite a bit and was milder and less sherbety than it had been. Rather delightful actually! Perhaps I brewed it too hot in my T2 iced tea jug initially? Not sure, I probably won’t purchase it again to find out though, 2 weeks is a bit longer than I like to brew my tea.

Sipdown (116)!

Well, I was rather confused when I pulled this one out of VariaTEA’s package. At first I thought it was some sort of weird rock sugar type thing – why would she send me rock sugar? I don’t usually sweeten my tea at all…

But then I looked it up to add it to my cupboard. Instant tea? Well, that’s weird and unusual and I’m intrigued. I made it at once! Though, I’m not sure if I exactly made it correctly? But oh well – what’s done is done.

But to be honest; I’m not really feeling this one. Yes, it’s apple – and it is a “crisper” apple taste like the description suggests but there’s also a tartness/dryness here that is unenjoyable as well as a flavour that I instictually want to describe as “musty”. It’s still drinkable, but I’m definitely happy I’m only sampling this one and don’t have any more cups worth to get through.

Sorry VariaTEA but this one and I are not a very compatible match.