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I’m glad I finally picked this one up after all these years. I bought a 50g pouch of this not even two months ago and I’m almost finished it already. The dry tea itself looks so light and airy. Delicate. And there are beautiful yellow rose buds in here. And it smells wonderful. It’s primarily pineapple and lemongrass. It makes me think of summer. I can see this making a mean iced tea.

Steeped, this actually smells creamier? Like there’s some vanilla caramels mixing in with the coconut. Onto the taste. Also delicate and very gentle on the palate. I get primarily coconut with a touch of pineapple. There’s a perfect balance between the Sencha and fruits. Out of most of the flavoured green teas that I’ve tried, I find that it’s difficult to achieve that extra flavour from the fruits without oversteeping the tea itself and thus creating a bitter tragedy. So I’m delighted that I can steep this for a couple minutes (actually, I accidentally steeped this for almost four minutes this time and it didn’t get bitter. Yay!) and actually taste the coconut and pineapple. I’m surprised that I can’t pick up any lemongrass, as there’s a fair amount of it in the mix.

Usually when I can’t make up my mind about which tea I should have, I just grab my genmaicha as I find it’s very reliable. This one is becoming one of those teas too.

This one sucked me in for its juicy blueberry aroma in the store. It was quite fragrant and I imagined this to taste like a blueberry candy.

Steeping this changes the story. The tea, while maintaining the aroma, loses its blueberriness in the world of flavour. It’s mostly just black tea with a hint of blueberry. The blueberry flavour sits on the fence between artificial and genuine. Unfortunately, I find the black tea a bit too astringent than what I was expecting. It’s one of those teas that misleads you by smelling better dry than how it smells and tastes once steeped. Still alright. Will use up my little tin but won’t repurchase.

This has got to be the worst tea I have ever tasted in my entire life. Someone gifted me a bag of this so I thought I’d give it a whirl. The teabag smelled a bit questionable from the get go. Like an ultra sweet powdery orange candy. But steeped, it unleashed its wrath and turned into ultra bad Tang, or stale chewable Vitamin C tablets. Or something. I mean, I actually enjoy the latter. They make my cold battles fun times. This though? Was psychologically scarring.

Long story short: why?!

This was one of the first teas I ever bought from Tea Desire. So many moons ago. This review is a little unfair though because I’m going by some of this tea that I gifted my mom around two years ago. As a side note, she personally loves this tea but still has some for the mere fact that she developed a throat infection that lasted a long time and tea agitated it for a long time.

But, onto the tea. If memory serves me correctly, when I bought this tea I was also a fan of it. I distinctly remember the bright, sweetened raspberry note the dry tea gave off. And taste-wise, it was basically a raspberry green tea. The raspberry was a bit artificial but not overwhelmingly so. I could smell the mango and papaya a bit but once steeped, the aroma went away and I couldn’t taste them either.

Now though? After sitting for two years, the artificial quality of the raspberry note has been amped up even more and the taste isn’t so appealing. It’s ridiculously raspberry, but in a juice crystal kind of way. I can no longer finish a cup because it’s too artificial and cloying. But again, maybe it’s because it’s been sitting around for two years. Either that or my tastes have changed.

This is another tea that I bought when one of the stores and shutting down and everything was on discount. Despite growing a little tired of rooibos, this is one that I’m glad that I actually decided to buy.

Dry, this really does remind me of raspberries and cream. When I was small, I used to go to my grandma’s to pick raspberries in her garden. She’d then wash the fresh, juicy raspberries, put some in a bowl, then add some half-and-half, and I’d eat them just like that with a spoon. The aroma of this tea reminds me of that.

The flavour is quite lovely. Once steeped, the creaminess fades and isn’t palpable aroma- or flavour-wise, but the raspberry stays strong. I find that raspberry and rooibos make a great pair because the tartness and brightness of the raspberry helps to mask the things about rooibos that sometimes bug me.

I bought this primarily for the sake of having something around that may work as a great tea for when I’d be sick. The funny part is that whenever I’m sick, I always forget to actually drink this one.

Mixed in with the rooibos are the lemongrass and lemon peel which are quite noticeable. The aroma is predominately lemon, although the ginger eagerly follows behind.

Steeped, the aroma also leans more toward lemon. The taste, however, is more balanced, although I’ll admit that this blend is very rooibos. As a side note, I actually got kind of tired of rooibos after trying so many rooibos blends, so anything rooibos-y annoys my taste buds at this point.

I actually tried this in stir-fry. I steeped a cup of this for a good six minutes or so, and while I was stir frying some vegetables in garlic, I poured the tea in there and let it do its thing until it evaporated. I was hoping to get lemon ginger awesomeness but again, it turned out very rooibos-y. It’s interesting biting into a carrot or snow pea and tasting rooibos, but it’s a little confusing to the brain. Also, the lemon showed up but the ginger was lost. Interesting experiment but don’t think I’d bother doing that again.

Seeing that I’ve already finished nearly 150g of this tea, I think that’s a sign that I dig this stuff. I initially kind of ignored this one and only ended up buying it when one of the stores was shutting down and everything went on discount. So glad I did.

The dry tea itself looks warm and inviting. There are generous pieces of walnut in there, and even slivers of red sandalwood (love sandalwood oil so this feature alone intrigued me). The smell? Warm and nutty, and I swear I smell a hint of chocolate in this.

Who needs an actual walnut truffle when you have this? It tastes like nutty chocolate, although the chocolate flavour is barely there. The black tea isn’t overpowering at all, although I do find with this one you have to watch how long you steep it for, lest it’ll get a bit astringent.

Yesterday, I enjoyed four cups of this (crazy, I know), and enjoyed the third and fourth as a second steeping. It was mellower but I could still taste the nuts.

The second I smelled this, I knew it was going to be a winner. In the large canister, it truly smelled like cinnamon buns with icing on top.

I’ve brewed this for as long as five minutes in the past, and one good thing about this tea is that it doesn’t get über astringent. The black tea behaves itself and the cinnamon and vanilla are truly the stars of the show.

Simply put, it tastes very close to how it smells: smooth, sweet, and spicy. The cinnamon is rounded out by the icing and isn’t too sharp. I almost never add sugar to my tea anyway and I can’t imagine adding sugar to this one because it’s sweet enough already. I just finished my 50g pouch so now I’m going to have to get some more!

When I picked this up fresh, it smelled so wonderfully fruity. In the pouch, I can detect the black currant, pineapple, and a hint of papaya. It changes when you steep it though. In the cup, the scent of rose comes through, the tropical fruits disappear, and the berries dominate. I smell mostly raspberry now, and the black currant is very faint.

Now onto the taste. It’s definitely heavy on the berries. Again, it’s mainly raspberry, however, I can also detect the rose. It’s enjoyable for a rooibos but it’ll take me a while to use up my pouch since I always need to be in the mood for all rooibos in general.

I’m a sucker for vanilla. Love the stuff. Whether it’s vanilla perfume, vanilla ice cream, or vanilla toothpaste, it catches my eye. When DavidsTea came to town, all my co-workers were raving about this one and I thought I’d buy 50g right off the bat.

The dry leaves are actually quite impressive. Long and curly, they really fluff up the pouch. The employee had to grab a larger pouch for this one. The smell, while very obviously vanilla-y, is on the artificial side.

The taste is also artificial. It’s a little on the caramel-y side, actually, but still leaves a weird taste in the mouth. Perhaps it makes me think of caramel because it has a burnt quality to it, no matter how I steep this. After a couple steeps, it gets a little better. The vanilla isn’t as sharp, but it just doesn’t do it for me.

Honestly, I think this is a little overrated. I never understood why my co-workers always wanted a cup of this, and only this, and refused to give anything else a try. There are definitely better teas out there. If you have a chance to visit a store, I’d suggest trying a cup of this first before investing in a pouch of this.