Teajo Teas

T&C TTB 20/23
I used this to make Vanilla Rooibos cookies and they were delicious. I had planned on saving a little to try on its own but I forgot.

I think I missed sampling this one from Miss B’s package so pulled it out today. Kept the steep time shorter than average since I don’t like my black teas too strong. It’s got a lovely peach flavor. The black tea is not too strong either and I’m not picking up the bitter edge I sometimes get with black teas. Thanks MissB for putting this one in.

A very good chocolate tea, and one that surprised me a bit. Chocolate is so hard to get right in tea, and this is still lacking something for me… maybe it’s the slight bitterness in the cup, even after steeping at less than the recommended time. It’s still very good though – like a liquid brownie, depending on the sip.

I was a little hesitant to cold steep a chai, but I added a some agave syrup and then put it in the fridge over night and it came out delicious and “even” tasting. I’m notoriously bad at heating up chais so having all the flavours come through like this, without something being too weak or too strong, is a rarity.

I don’t specifically taste cranberry. It’s more of a backdrop; like a dab of cranberry jam on a hulking big slice of turkey. I think the agave helped bring it out more than it would’ve naturally been. The most dominant spice is the cardamom, which also adds to that tart sweet flavour.

I just wish I had some sweetened condensed milk, or a little umbrella thing with some pineapple slices. It tastes a little like that.

I’m getting the idea that raspberry is not an easy flavour to capture. I’ve enjoyed the chocolate/coconut raspberry flavours that are blatantly dessert teas, but the plain old raspberry teas tend to taste more like Swedish Berries than anything else. This one still falls into that category for me, although it tries hard not too.

There’s a tart citrus zap that’s convincing, followed by the raspberry flavour, which eventually descends into the category of sweetened jam. It’s the aftertaste and aroma that leaves me with gummies.. although it also feels like I have those raspberry hairs stuck in my throat. Mixed signals.

Oh, well. This tea mostly sticks to the raspberries of my mind, and if it becomes overly sweet I can’t pretend I don’t like jam and candy too.

I’ve had this iced a few times and the rose is what hits me the most. The sweet fruit flavour is a bit generic for me, but it’s not a deal breaker.

It’s a tasty, refreshing iced tea with no bitterness, but I’d rather reorder Teajo’s Tropical Mango or Raspberry Chocolate Bark. I don’t think I’m the biggest fan of black/green mix blends.

So my peach tea experiences thus far have been rather lacklustre…but I was pleasantly surprised by this cup.

The peach tasted the least artificial out of all the ones I’ve tried – still not quite authentic tasting, but better than a lot I’ve had in the past – and layered in rather nicely over the black tea base. There’s just a tiny hint of ginger heat at the back of each sip that goes rather pleasantly with the sweetness of the peach.

It’s an interesting cup – and one that I’ll likely have again – but I’m not sure if it’s a favourite.

I cold steeped this last night, and I honestly wasn’t expecting much from it.

Now I am eating my preconceived notions as I sip away at this magical something that tastes like dark chocolate raspberry truffles and liqueur. This teas is so satisfying and better than what I deserve right now (I need to get myself working).

I’m not sure if the deliciousness will carry through on a hot steep but this iced beverage is top class.

I’ll admit that I wasn’t expecting great things from this tea – for some reason the flavours seemed like they’d be discordant – but I was pleasantly surprised once I made a cup.

The green isn’t overwhelming, first off…and you get a great, smooth (albeit slightly artifical tasting) lemon flavour on the front and just a hint of the ginger taste and heat on the end.

It tastes a lot like the honey and lemon teas I would make for myself whenever I had a sore throat – and I’m betting a little honey would do wonders for this – overall it’s just a very polite and enjoyable tea…I’m impressed. :)

Earl Grey is one of those teas that makes me happy, truly, so finding a good one is a singular sort of pleasure…and this is a beautiful Earl Grey. I’m not sure what the “silky” part of the description means, so I’m deciding to translate it simply into “bloody delicious.” It seems accurate.

If you like your EGs with a solid, high-quality layer of bergamot this is one of the very best I’ve ever encountered. I’m not sure why I find it so appealing, but this is the sort of tea you just want to roll around in your mouth and savour every sip…delicious, full-bodied and utterly drinkable – this might just be my favourite (non-creme) EG.

I guess I sent more of this to Heather than I thought, because I only had enough for one cold steep investment last night (10hrs).

I don’t know what I was expecting, but it’s refreshingly fruity and definitely on par with the fruity black blends here at Silk Road. I’ve never had passion fruit but this is almost a peachy grape (although not really) and quite floral. There’s also a bitter saltiness that hits the back of my tongue (calendula?). Overall, not bad at all!

I’m starting to get a hunch that the quality of the water comes through a lot more in cold steeps.

Again thanks to the fabulous people in the Tea and Card TTB for another exciting sample. Aroma is sweet sugary and vanilla. On tasting it the rooibos makes it’s presence known. I’m not always wild about rooibos but it isn’t wildly strong. The vanilla isn’t as good as I had hoped. It tastes a little fake even though it says natural vanilla beans. I could use a bit more vanilla, so I added a bit of a liquid vanilla/stevia. Adds just enough vanilla to satisfy me. It’s a nice cup of tea, it fills the mouth smoothly and leaves a gentle vanilla aftertaste. It is good for an sweet evening dessert drink.

Revisiting this one because I had a little bit left and it’s a pretty old tea in my collection. I’d like to finish off all these bags of scraps. The flavor was faded from what I remember, but still solid. The caffeine in the black tea had me feeling like an easter bunny. Bouncy bouncy bouncy, or maybe a Tigger?

It’s beautiful. What else to say? Tehe… I made a whole pot of it. I’ll probably be up to like 3am, but NO REGRETS.

I kept putting trying this one off because I actually bought a full 2oz without trying it first based on recs, BUT had been disappointed in the other samples I’d bought at the same time. I’ve been going through Adagio’s Valentines regularly recently, but after a whole weekend of it, I wanted something a bit richer in the tea taste, but wasn’t in the mood for a green.

One of Teajo’s big selling points I think is that they take care to make their flavored blends with a nice base. I definitely get that with this one. While it’s olfactory appeal is wonderful- very chocolatey and berry and tea-y, the tea taste and mouth feel is not at all disappointing, and this one had alot to stand up to because I had come from finishing McD’s strawberry covered frappe. For me, coming from something like a frappe- espresso+creaminess+sugar and not being disappointed by a flavored tea is wonderful.

Not only for the olfactory side, also the rich mouth feel from the creaminess of the frappe wasn’t harshly cut like some teas can do. The mouth feel was rich and full, and at first mingled nicely with the leftover richness of the dairy and yet left the mouth with nice clean tea feel after without the dry feeling you can get sometimes. (I have no idea if this paragraph made any since. It’s soo difficult to describe!)

I’m soo incredibly glad I didn’t get a horribly synthetic raspberry flavor with this, I generally hate raspberry flavored/scented things for that reason, no one gets it right…. and consequently I had developed an aversion to the fruit even because in my head it was always soo awful- another reason I had hesitated on this tea. The raspberry flavor to this one is warm and not too sweet. Even as not a fan of raspberries in general, I can get behind this tea.

Overall, it’s wonderful. A side benefit is that it’s organic if you’re one to care about those things. The way it’s set up is that it’s flavor profile is similar to Adagio’s valentines, but the tea base and flavor blending is like 6x better. I love it. However because Valentines is similar enough in profile and offered at a lower price point, I’ll probably keep that one in regular rotation, while I hoard this one. It’ll be a special occasion tea or a ‘I need a nice tea to cheer me up’ type of event… At least until I get to the point where I’m spoiled enough by nice tea I won’t even bother with Adagio anymore. This Teajo’s creation is definitely on that next level.

This tea gets a happy face. =D

Sipdown! Tried cold brewing the last of this, and it’s ok, but not great. It smells so good, I just wish it tasted as good. The best configuration I had was hot, with milk and sugar, though the milk seemed contradictory for this kind of flavour. It’s strange, though it mellowed the base, but seemed the wrong tea to add milk to.

This one is from CrowKettle and I wish I liked it more because it seems like it has so much promise.

Oversteeped or overleafed=bitter and astringent. I think I’m gonna use a shorter steep next time. I have a sense of deja vu with this and Vicky’s Sponge Cake with respect to steeping.

Thanks to crowkettle for allowing me to try. Hoping it turns out better on a later steep.

It’s on the icing side of vanilla, for me, with a distinctive handful of rooibos. It isn’t quite what I was looking for but I did get a handful of simple evenings out of it. Goodbye, rooibos!

They were out of the sample I ordered, so I had to pick another. Piccolo recommended this one, so I gave the OK.

I’m either learning that I just don’t prefer rooibos, or I just am not getting anything from these blends, so take this note with a grain of salt.

I double leafed this one, but I must still be brewing it wrong. Usually I have to underleaf a chai since they’re soo spicy, but I’m not quite getting what I want out of this. Maybe if I boil it for a very long time? The steeping directions say 5mins at 212F, which isn’t what I did, because I’ve never had to steep a tea for that long at that high a temp before. I haven’t quite mastered the learning curve for this one yet, but I might run out of this sample before I do. The sample size is 8-10 servings for 8oz cups, I usually do a 12 oz cup, so this might only last me 3 tastings if I keep doing double leaf. =(

I made the best mistake with this tea the other when I forgot about it for 15 minutes. Instead of turning into a nasty vegetable mouth wash it decided to become awesome instead- finally capitalizing on the full powers of dark leafy mint.

Now I always steep it longer than I’d dare with any other green.. I’ve been reading too much of a certain series lately, and every time I write “green” I simultaneously think “lots of warders”. Not impressed with myself and life decisions right now.

This isn’t fancy, and has the cocoa pieces I’m so skeptical of, but it’s usually comfy and sometimes that’s all I really want anyways.

EDIT: I think my roommate really liked this one too, despite the long steep. She’s a huge After Eight fan.

This was awesome! I got it in a sampler pack and it was hard to pick. I’m glad I tried this one as the first from Teajo because now I’m looking forward to going through the pack. I did it as an iced tea since I had made a green tea hot. I hated the green tea so I drank this to try get the taste out and it was sooooo good. Fruity and juicy, it tastes like I added passion fruit juice to it. I would buy this again.

It’s only very very VERY lightly mango, I’m getting mostly rooibios flavor, which I’m not the greatest fan of, I’m discovering. I sat there just sniffing the liquor for the longest time waiting for hints of fresh mango, any type of mango really. It’s more like faint mango whisperings, and very synthetic. I caught it only in the scent when I’m outright gulping it down. I thought it might make a nice before bedtime dessert tea… but the only fulfillment it gave was ‘before bedtime’. I’m not sure I’ll finish up the sample.

MissB sent a sample of this one over! thanks so much! I could always try anything from Teajo. Raspberry chocolate is one of my favorite combinations! This blend is true to its name. Definitely equal parts juicy raspberry and a lingering wispy milk chocolate. I noticed a tiny piece of raspberry in the dry blend itself. The black tea base goes perfectly with the flavors… I think it’s the same base as the other teas I’ve tried (Earl Grey, Peach). Very tasty!

That recommendation is for Earl Grey lovers. Individuals who have long since established a general horror for The Earl know what’s best for themselves in this situation.

Crazy backlog sipdown combo from four days ago. Why I’m posting it now when I’m sleep deprived, I don’t know. I hypothesize it has a lot to do with procrastination and little to do with logic and self-preservation.

When I smelled this one for the first time I was a bit worried; the bergamot is like a slapstick puck up the nose (except my nose and skull remain gratefully intact, could you imagine the actual damage that would do?). Err.. however, I found as long as I didn’t add milk, this would usually turn out to be a pleasantly fresh and fruity evening pick me up. I guess I don’t mind bergamot and Earl Grey teas after all (as long as milk is absent). Possibly a repurchase for the summer season.