Pukka

Sipdown (2650)!

Since I was sick all weekend with a very stuffy nose, sore throat and dull palate I figured I’d sip down some of the more “medicinal” leaning Pukka blends I have that I’m not sure I’d typically enjoy – especially since so many of theme contain licorice root which is great for your throat.

This was definitely a very licorice tasting blend – but more the black licorice like taste of the combined anise and fennel versus the more cloyingly sweet licorice root flavour. So, the kind of licorice note I do actually enjoy personally. Licorice root isn’t my thing, but black licorice? Sign me up. Did I feel quote unquote “new” after drinking it? Nah, I was still pretty sick and miserable. But at least it wasn’t an unpleasant to me kind of cup of tea, though I immediately feel like it would be very polarizing for most.

Sipdown (2607)!

I was fully braced for an unpleasantly earthy and spicy soup-like cuppa, but honestly this was a lot more approachable than I’d have expected given the ingredient list. Very soothing still, but more medium bodied/intensity with quite clean tasting turmeric, ginger, and burdock – no muddy earthiness. I thought the heat were noticeable, but gentle enough to work for something less fond of these ingredients like myself. Not too savory or brothy at all.

Usuallly I’m also quite sensitive to the taste of licorice root, but I found it very balanced here and that lingering sweetness in the aftertaste really softened the spices and roots. Would I reach for this again? Nope, but I’m had many much worse turmeric and ginger bagged teas.

I sipped down the remaining few teas from the tea exchange awhile ago. I started the day with a mug of the Pukka Licorice and Cinnamon. I was hopeful that this was going to be a good cup of tea, but slightly disappointed that it was a little bitter. There wasn’t a great deal of cinnamon and the licorice fell short, too.

Sipdown (2611)!

Drank this last night before heading to bed. As far as chamomile forward blends go I do think this was on the more palatable side, since that’s a flavour I’m not a fan of and also a bit more sensitive to because of that. The vanilla and honey notes helped a lot. I definitely tasted more honey than vanilla and the aftertaste was a little cloying to me, but overall not half bad. Definitely a complimentary note!

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Something about this was surprisingly herbaceous and savory and I don’t think it was just from the echinacea, which is a pretty unpleasant tasting herb generally speaking. All in all though I thought this was pretty palatable for a clearly very functionally targeted blend. I mean, the combo of elderberry and echinacea is definitely a bit of a powerhouse duo for immunity and it’s a tough thing to get those two really bold flavours to want to cooperate with each other.

I did think the berry notes were really dense and jammy, and almost more cassis/black currant like to me than the somewhat floral leaning and tart taste of elderberry. However I just read the ingredients list and see there’s actually black currant flavouring in the tea, so I do feel a little vindicated in my observations here.

Don’t think I’d seek this out again – especially when I’ve recently discovered a lot of other much more pleasant Pukka teas. However, if you were looking for an immunity focused tea blend I do think this isn’t a bad option. Certainly better than many other grocery store teabags targeting that function that taste sickly sweet because they over corrected when trying to mask the taste of the herbs or of feet because they haven’t tried to mask anything at all…

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Based on the copy printed on the overwrap of this tea bag I was expecting more of a spiced citrus flavour that could potentially be a little more “mulled” in vibes, but to my surprise the citrus was relatively subtle as were the spices. Mostly I just tasted a smooth and sweet anise flavour tinged with the other aforementioned ingredients. I actually enjoyed it a lot, but mostly just because I like star anise. I feel like it could have been better with either the depth/heat from more spices (like clove) or a brighter orange, though…

So a little weird because it was an enjoyable mug of tea, but not the mug I thought I was going to have so I was still partially let down in some ways!?

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Not something I’d probably seek out since I have many similar things in my stash already, but I found this to be a pretty in offensive blend of peppermint and other herbs. In particular I like the sweetness and kind of licorice-y depth that the fennel inclusion adds to the cup, and the nettle was very inoffensive. Not spinachy like it could have been. Made for a smooth and soothing cup with a light medicinal sort of feel to it. Medicinal, in this case, in a good way where it felt like it was doing something positive for me.

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Honestly not bad at all for a bagged lemon/ginger. I thought it had the exact right balance of bright, lively and sweet lemon notes with earthy and warming spices like ginger and turmeric. Very soothing, and healthful feeling and just nice on the throat. The manuka honey addition makes all the sense in the world from both a complimentary flavour perspective and as something you might want built into the tea if you were drinking this while feeling under the weather.

Can’t complaint at all.

Sipdown (2580)!

Hmmm… I’m not totally sure how I feel about this blend.

I guess to start with the “pro” side of things it was much, much less perfume-y and floral than I’d imagined it might be based on the ingredients list. I really latched onto the rose notes and I found those very soothing which, along with the lavender, made for a pretty anti-stress kind of tea. I also didn’t really taste the chamomile too much, and what I did taste was less musty and unpleasant than I find most chamomile to be to my own palate.

On the “con” side, there’s nothing super unique or stand out about the blend. I do feel like I could get something just as good from a ton of other companies. Also, the licorice root was this weird push/pull sensation. I don’t personally like licorice root so I would have preferred the blend without it, but I think the natural sweetness of it was also doing A LOT of heavy lifting in terms of brightening up the floral flavours and without it I think this probably would taste pretty flat/stale. So not sure which would be the better option both for my personal preferences and in a general sense for anyone sensitive to licorice root overall…

Kind of a mid blend overall.

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I wonder why Pukka decided to rename this tea? They have a lot of “three” blends like their ginger, and I find the naming scheme actually pretty iconic. Also just more clear to the consumer, I would think?

Regardless, I really enjoyed this cup of tea. It’s definitely not something for the tea drinker who dislikes or is on the fence about tulsi though because dang does it taste strong and basil heavy. It’s also surprisingly nuanced though, and if you can taste past the really herbaceous flavour I think there’s a lot of other notes to appreciate like cooling and camphorous mint and tingly spices like clove.

This is probably one of the few Pukka blends that I’d happily buy a full box of. I am on record as being a HUGE tulsi lover though, for whatever that’s worth.

I’ve been working through a bad chest cold all week (I’m suspecting a bad case of bronchitis, but I haven’t had the time or money to get that confirmed) so I’ve been drinking TONS of tea. I went through my entire 100g tin of T2’s “Mulled Wine Magic” over the week and have instant regrets, because they are gone now and I’m too tired and out of it to go looking for a hibiscus chai spice blend replacement that ships from the US. So then I decided to turn to this tea, only to discover I only had a single teabag left. Siiiiiiiigh. Where did all the tea go?!

I always expect elderberry teas to be more like hibiscus teas for some reason… dark and syrupy berry. They never are and then I have to reassess my expectations. I do like this though. The echinacea is the main flavor and it’s such a hard one for me to describe… It’s a little floral, but leans more on the herbaceous side than the flowery side. There is a bit of a minty flavor to the tea but it is not strongly menthol and doesn’t overpower the other flavors. I don’t actually taste anything I’d attribute to “berry” or get any fruity notes from it. It is very licorice root sweet, which I know would be a turn-off for many, but I like licorice root and it is greatly appreciated now while by body is trying to cough my lungs straight out of my ribcage. Sweet, minty, floral, could do a lot worse for a sick tea, but the flavor is probably not for everyone.

January 2024 Steepster Sipdown Challenge — A grocery store tea

Sipdown! (22 for January | 22 for 2024)

I grabbed two teabags of this from the recent round of TeaTiff TTB and steeped with 13-14 oz of boiling water in my Nordic Mug at work. Sat steeping on my work desk for about an hour.

Was hoping for a very fruit forward tea – instead I am tasting licorice? I don’t know, maybe the echinacea? It does have this weird taste similar to DT Pomegranate Echinacea tea which again was a tea I was hoping was fruity but just tasted weird. Echinacea is not an ingredient I have experience with so I suppose I need to taste on its own to isolate if that what I don’t like?

Anyway, it’s not a bad tea I suppose for being a bagged grocery store tea. Wasn’t what I was expecting.

Matcha does not belong in a tea bag. This is most likely a culinary matcha. I wonder if there’s much in there as I don’t really see it. There’s some dust on the bottom but after touching it I don’t believe it is matcha as the texture is too tough. Either that or this is a very poorly ground matcha. And the coloring is fiercely terrible. The liquor color is more akin to black tea. When it first hits your palate it’s not too bad. Grassy notes and wet leaves and some slight vegetal notes. But it changes so quickly. The astringency kicks in like a bucking bronco and before you know it your face first in the wall with a leftover palate of bitterness. The wet leaf has stems and leaves and some of them are so very tiny…

TTB tea! For an herbal chai, this really isn’t bad! It’s a bit too mildly spiced for me to think of it as a chai, but the flavors were pretty tasty with some soy milk.

I have a lot of GI issues related to my chronic migraine condition, so having a ginger tea around is a must. Grabbed this blend from my local grocery and actually preferred it to the brand I’d been buying, Twinings of London’s Lemon Ginger. The lemon flavor doesn’t taste as artificial/cleaner-esque in this tea compared to the Twinings, and while I know most people abhor licorice root, I’m not one of them, and I like the inclusion here because it takes a little bit of edge off ginger spiciness while still allowing a nice amount of healing ginger. Sadly it has been perpetually sold out on every subsequent trip I’ve made to the store, so I had to restock the Twinings that I don’t like as much. This was definitely my first choice, though.

I’m not sure why this is called matcha when it’s really a combination of other green teas. It does taste pretty decent and almost fruity.

I saved this one for after the kids were in bed, when I was supposed to be grading papers but really was online playing games. My phone note just reads “just chamomile and a ton of licorice root – ew.” And I didn’t finish it before bed, so there it is.

sipsby bagged advent, day 7

Right up my alley.

Sipdown! (13 | 360)

I’m not sure when or why I bought this one, but it was a terrible idea. I don’t generally like honey-flavored teas (even though I like honey) and this also has licorice root…

Given all of that though, it’s not bad. I sipped through the whole box without complaining, if that tells you anything. Mostly it tastes like chamomile with some extra sweetness. I do get a touch of that licorice note in the background, and the accompanying sweetness at the end of the sip, but it’s pretty minimal. The honey is quite mild as well, and it’s contributing more of a light clover-y floral note than anything?

So overall, mostly chamomile with a touch of licorice root. Not something I would buy again, but it was fine to sip on as my last tea of the evening each day.