Tea tasting: Tea Forté's Cherry Cosmo

Tea Forté's Cherry Cosmo is a darn peculiar tea.  In addition to the cherry fruit flavor, there's a weird, almost fizzy over-taste.  It's not quite lime.  It's not quite hibiscus.  Looking at the ingredients, I can't quite account for it:  organic rosehips, organic hibiscus, organic apple pieces, organic raspberries, natural cherry flavor, other natural flavoring (berry).

As a hot tea, the over-taste is borderline unpleasant.  As an iced tea, however, it more or less vanishes; what's left is a flavorful tart cherry taste.

As between Cherry Cosmo and Adagio's similar Dewy Cherry, I like Dewy Cherry better as a hot tea, but this one better as an iced tea, although neither is ideal.  Honestly, the best cherry tea I've tasted so far is good old reliable Celestial Seasonings' Black Cherry Berry.

Tea tasting: Tea Forté's Tupelo Honey Fig

I've been trying to finish off the tea I have before acquiring any new tea, hence the radio silence for a bit.  However, in the midst of today's awful weather, I did manage to find my white tea sampler and try something new: Tea Forté's Tupelo Honey Fig White Tea.

Tupelo honey is a type of honey made from specific trees (white tupelo trees) that bloom in the Southeastern U.S.   Apparently it's considered a gourmet honey.  As with everything, you can find it for sale on the internet (http://www.teavana.com/us/en/tea/tea-sweeteners/tupelo-honey-011046728.html).

This is a very very lightly sweet tea, with a strong minty and herbal finish.  The sweetness is definitely the sweetness of honey, not sugar (and certainly not the taste abomination that is high fructose corn syrup).  There's a smokey quality to the sweetness, if that makes any sense.   In addition to fig and the honey, the tisane contains licorice root, fennel, myrtle and peppermint, all of which combine to make a fascinatingly complex flavor.    To be honest, I really don't taste fig at all amid all of the other stuff going on.

This is not a delicate white tea.  Because it's got strong flavors, I tried icing some of it, which worked surprisingly well.   If I were to plan on serving it iced, I'd make sure to have fresh mint to add to the glasses.

Tea tasting: Trader Joe's Raspberry Black

Raspberry is one of my favorite flavors, so I'm always eager to try teas featuring raspberry. Anyone who finds a tea that combines vanilla, raspberry and almond will earn my undying love.

Unfortunately, Trader Joe's Raspberry Black tea is a huge disappointment.  It's a decent black.  But it has nothing in it that makes it raspberry.  There's just the faintest aftertaste of something sweet.

However, combining this tea with the Raspberry Sugar from the Spice and Tea Exchange that I reviewed previously works out incredibly well.  The sugar brings out whatever raspberry qualities should be in this tea as well as adding its own raspberry sweetness.

Tea tasting: Tea Forté's Kiwi Lime Ginger

My newly blossomed head cold demands a lot of tea, and that tea needs to have flavor and not have caffeine.   So, I opened my sample package of Kiwi Lime Ginger herbal tea by Tea Forté.

My initial reaction is not promising.  The brew smells sort of like cough medicine, and not in a good way.  The aroma fairly reeks of ginger, with a sharp slightly unpleasant citrus overtone.  Looking back over the ingredients, I see the "problem": organic honeybush, organic ginger root, organic rooibos, organic lemon peel, natural kiwi flavor and natural lime flavor.

Ugh.   I wasn't expecting a tea billed as "herbal" to be rooibos-based.  Ugh.   But I will soldier boldly on in order to give you a proper review.

If I hold my nose, the flavor of the tea is no more than adequate.  It's not particularly flavorful, unfortunately.  There's a very little citrus bite in the background.  The ginger is relegated to an aftertaste.  It certainly doesn't make up for the sheer unpleasantness (to me) of the aroma.

I've got some single-steep packages left.  If you don't object to the scent of rooibos, I'll happily give them away to someone who might enjoy them.

Tea tasting: Tea Forté's Rosemary Tangerine White Tea

Rosemary is not a flavor I immediately associate with tea (with pork loin, definitely).  

Tea Forté's Rosemary Tangerine White Tea works far better than it should.  I'm not sure I would buy a full box of it, but I will definitely finish the sample package.  This is NOT a fruity tea.  The aroma is all rosemary with a hint of tangerine.  The flavor starts out tangerine, but the rosemary quickly overwrites it.  I can still taste the tangerine underneath, somewhat.  It's . . . odd.   

This tea definitely needs pairing with food.   It paired surprisingly well with the gingerbread cookies I had as a snack this afternoon.  I think it would go well with any kind of strongly-flavored savory meal.   +Jody Livingston  suggested pairing with garlic, and that might work.  I'm immediately immediately thinking of herbed meats of various kinds, rather than something pasta-like.

This tea needs to be consumed hot.  Tea Forté's website says it's "refreshing iced" but they lie, lie lie.  It's appallingly bad when iced unless you like drinking liquid rosemary.

Likewise, this white tea needs to be brewed at the right temperature (185 F) or else it becomes a muddy awful herby mess.

I'd recommend this anyone with an adventurous palate who likes savory flavors, particularly if it is part of a sampler pack.

Bottle tea: Teas' Tea Unsweetened Black

I may finally have found that elusive unicorn of tea -- a bottled black ice tea that tastes like really good black tea, with no sweetener or weird aftertastes.   In the grocery store this morning, I found Teas' Tea bottled black tea, which advertised itself as "unsweetened" and "rich & subtle."

This is a serious tea drinker's tea.  It tastes like tea, with tea-like qualities and tea flavors.  And it's strong black tea.   As in, "I probably lost a layer of enamel on my teeth" strong and "I hope I don't drop this on my desk and dissolve a layer of varnish on the wood" strong.   Probably strong enough for +Rhiannon theCurious.   But it's oh so delicious for people who love the inherent taste of tea.  After little diluting with water (about 1/4 water to 3/4 tea), it has been a perfect morning wake-up tea.

I found this tea in King's, but I bet it will also be available in Wegman's or any similar upscale grocery store.  It's also available for ordering on-line.

Guest review: Trader Joe's Vanilla Rooibos

My loathing for rooibos is never going away, so I've asked +Christina Kirk to review this tea.  She's drinking it with a tablespoon of honey.

"It's a very nice blend.  The vanilla is not over-powering.  It's a typical rooibos flavor.  The aroma is light and the flavor is well-balanced.  The honey helps add to the quality of the tea by changing the rooibos flavor to something more gentle and mellow."

"If you want a rooibos, with some vanilla, this is your tea.  If you want a vanilla with some rooibos, I'd recommend other brands."