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I stayed away from Teavana tea purchases for a good while, not because they don’t have great tea products, but because I always found them to be a bit pricey. However, that didn’t stop me from browsing through their stores every time I was in a mall.

Yesterday, the very astute young lady sales associate knew exactly what buttons to push to get me to pull my wallet out once again. She touted this one as a robust, bold flavored, and, most important, reasonably priced, black tea. It also smelled great as she waved the wide tin lid under my nose. I long ago learned to fight the hypnotic powers that command you to spend your money when they do this. But yesterday I succumbed to the spell. I’m just glad she didn’t make me bark like a dog or strut like a chicken.

The long black leaves of this tea looked fresh and rich. The unbrewed aroma was interestingly unique for a black tea. I could smell citrus but it wasn’t bergamot or lemon. The closet entity that came to my mind was tangerine.

I steeped the leaves for four minutes at 205 degrees. Teavana recommended three minutes at that temperature but my personal rule of thumb is to never brew a black tea for less than four minutes if you really want to pull bold flavor from it.

Both the steeped color and odor were unique for a black tea. The hue was a bright gold which made me wonder if I should have steeped it for another two or three minutes. The aroma was slightly citrus and sweet, with an accent like a bowl of Frosted Wheat Chex with caramel lightly drizzled on it.

The flavor was quite smooth. It was not robust or bold but it didn’t register as empty on my palate either. The taste, again, was slight fruity, sweet, and grain-like. This time I couldn’t make up my mind if I was tasting wheat or corn. The flavors harmonized well and nothing seemed odd or out of place – just unique. There was no astringency and no annoying attributes remained in the after taste.

Another reason I purchased this tea is I was told it had a high caffeine level. That characteristic is required in all of my morning teas to jump start my metabolism. I didn’t notice any major jolt from the tea but I was sufficiently alert for early in the morning.

All in all, I would classify this as a very pleasant tea. The flavor is not strong, but adequate. The smoothness makes it easy to quickly down a full pot (which I did). If drinking a beverage with a nice, but hard to identify, flavor doesn’t irritate you, Teavana’s Indonesian Gold is definitely worth a trial run!