New teas – three of them, in fact! It feels like it’s been a hot second since a new tea launch at DT and to be honest I nearly forgot that I needed to get tasting notes up for these ones – in fact, VariaTEA beat me to writing about some of them! Love you VariaTEA, but how often does that happen!? Oops!
The collection is iced latte themed, so that’s what I’m going to focus on for these reviews but I think it’s worth noting that I’ve tried all of these teas not just as iced lattes, but just iced, hot, and as hot lattes. It’s a collection I’ve been waiting to talk about for a while; I think it’s super cool and I love the nostalgic kinda vibe! In fact, here’s a fun bit of knowledge – this is the VERY FIRST unreleased tea that I tried when I started working at head office; so this will probably always be a super meaningful one for me and I imagine it holding a nostalgic place in my heart years into the future – the same way Birthday Cake does. Back then, the tea didn’t even have an official name; it was just a blueberry tea that I really, really loved!
I mean, I was obsessed with it – both because it was new and unreleased and I felt like I was part of a huge secret club (which, I guess, I am?) but also just because I adored the flavour. I don’t know if DT has ever released a blueberry flavoured blend that I disliked, though – I love when we tackle blueberry. Just adore it! So – what does the tea taste like!? Well, it’s sweet – definitely sweet. However, more a very dense, rich blueberry with a lot of creaminess and coconut kind of sweet – it reminded me a little bit when I first tried it of blueberries and condensed milk, in a very nice way. I think the coconut is a nice touch; I love the blueberry and coconut pairing; they bring out really nice qualities in one another. The rooibos is present, for sure – it’s kind of woody, mostly has a honey and very milk nuttiness to it. Not super strong; but I think distinct enough that those who really dislike rooibos will pick it out.
It was very cool getting to see the tea officially be named, since I was introduced to it because it was named and had already formed an opinion on it. So, do I think it tastes like a blueberry shake? Yeah, I think it’s pretty fitting! It’s sweet, very decadent, creamy! I think the one thing that doesn’t work for me, milkshake wise, is that sort of sweet nuttiness to the taste (from the almond and brittle pieces, and slightly the rooibos) but I suppose if you think of it as a breakfast shake then that makes a bit more sense?
I just know it’s good – awesome as an iced latte, also really good hot and as a hot latte!
One side bar that I wanted to talk about – there’s a gluten allergy warning on this tea! You can look at my Pitaya Power tasting note if you want to understand some of my feelings on that, but I just wanted to kind of note where that’s coming from: it’s because the hemp seeds in the blend are processed in a facility that also processes gluten. So it’s there because of the possibility of gluten trace, but none of the ingredients themselves have gluten. So that’s the explanation for that – not gonna talk about how I feel about gluten inclusion again; just look at Pitaya Power if you wanna know about that…
So yeah! Iced latte collection!! This is my favourite from the collection, for sure. Happy to get to talk about it!!
Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.
Gah… You make me want to do an order with them. I’ve been really really really good about ordering new tea the past few months too, but a latte when it’s hot sounds so good.