Hot Buttered Banana Bread

Steep Information:
Amount: 2 tsp
Water: 500ml filtered water 212°F
Tool: Breville One-Touch Tea Maker BTM800XL
Steep Time: 2 minutes
Served: Hot

Tasting Notes:
Dry Leaf Smell: banana runts, hint of walnut
Steeped Tea Smell: walnut, banana runts, black tea, butter
Flavor: bitter black tea
Body: Full
Aftertaste: astringent
Liquor: translucent dark brown

(1/4)

Try 2

Steep Information:
Amount: 2 tsp
Water: 500ml filtered water 280°F
Tool: Breville One-Touch Tea Maker BTM800XL
Steep Time: 3 minutes
Served: Hot

Tasting Notes:
Dry Leaf Smell: banana runts, hint of walnut
Steeped Tea Smell: walnut, banana runts, black tea, butter
Flavor: astringent black tea, walnut
Body: Full
Aftertaste: astringent, bitter
Liquor: translucent dark brown

(1/4)

Try 3

Steep Information:
Amount: 2 tsp
Water: 500ml filtered water 205°F
Tool: Breville One-Touch Tea Maker BTM800XL
Steep Time: 3 minutes
Served: Hot

Tasting Notes:
Dry Leaf Smell: banana runts, hint of walnut
Steeped Tea Smell: walnut, banana runts, black tea, butter
Flavor: astringent black tea, walnut, banana, bake-y
Body: Full
Aftertaste: astringent, bitter
Liquor: translucent dark brown

(2/4)

Try 4

Steep Information:
Amount: 2 tsp
Water: 750ml filtered water 205°F
Tool: Breville One-Touch Tea Maker BTM800XL
Steep Time: 3 minutes
Served: Hot

Tasting Notes:
Dry Leaf Smell: banana runts, hint of walnut
Steeped Tea Smell: walnut, banana runts, black tea, butter
Flavor: astringent black tea, walnut, banana, bake-y
Body: Full
Aftertaste: astringent, banana
Liquor: translucent dark brown

So try 4 was the best, I got walnuts and banana and black tea, and it was a nice cup, however no butter!

Thanks Rachel for the prep tips.

images: http://amazonv.blogspot.com/2010/12/52teas-loose-leaf-black-tea-hot.html

Let me start by saying, I LOVE Banana Bread. Especially hot and buttered Banana Bread, and since I have high expectations of 52Teas, I was extremely excited to make this. As soon as I received it, I had to tear the package open so that I could indulge, the aroma of the dried leaves is heavily banana and a slight baked/sweet smell that you would expect from banana bread. Very exciting.

Made this yesterday, hot, three minutes, no additives.

The main flavor is a slightly toasty/baked black tea. Then there is a sweetness with the banana flavor, not artificial at all, natural sweetness and just a touch of it to not overwhelm the tea itself. There is a hint of nuttiness and followed up by creaminess from butter.

I think this would be fantastic with milk/half and half or whatever you fancy. Will definitely have to give it a try.

I got this in a sampler pack from iheartteas in early June and I am only now tasting it. The dry notes smell like banana bread. my nanny makes THE best banana bread.
once steeped I get a touch of artificial banana smell. it’s smelling more like banana bread now.
First sip and all I get is strong black base eek. Let’s see if this changes as it cools… I’m getting some artificial banana taste and that’s it.

Thank you so much to SimplyJenW for the chance to try this one! I’m a sucker for a good flavoured tea, and was super happy to have the chance to try this one. I’m not normally a ban of banana teas, but I knew that if this one caught that baked banana flavour I’d be sold.

And wow, it does taste like banana bread to me. Or at least banana muffins which is close enough for me! This is a flavoured tea where the flavouring dominates over the tea itself, but that is rarely a bad thing for me. I am glad I had this one after dinner because it screams dessert tea in all the best ways.

Received a sample of this from KeenTeaThyme (KiTT)…thank you!! This is wonderful and really yummy. Not only does it smell like Hot Buttered Banana Bread, but it really tastes like it too. So much so that a co-worker came into my office looking for the banana bread and didn’t believe me when I pointed to my mug. This also turned out awesome because I finally got my perfect tea temp kettle last night…wow was I missing out!

I think I’ll try this as a latte later with my new frother thingy! :)

This tea is legit.
My goodness.
I can’t stop sipping it and looking at the picture and the melting butter and gaaaah – thank you butter flavour!
Mmmm it’s good. I’m going to throw a bit of roasted mate and chocolate chips in my next cup to make a choco-chip banana bread that will keep me awake this friday night.

Very happy friday! All the other reviews are spot on, so I won’t repeat. I’ll just enjoy.

Kristen sent me a sample of this in a swap. This tea is much better than I expected. It smells a little like banana laffy taffy, but it tastes like banana bread. I’m getting the walnut flavor in the finish. It’s pretty good. I sweetened with agave nectar and gave it a tiny bit of silk soy creamer.

Update – lowering my rating as I could not drink a whole cup of this. It’s not totally the tea’s fault. I just think banana in tea is not my thing.

Mmmm this smells so delish! It is a bit lighter on the banana than Monkey Fart and you can smell the butter as well as walnuts! Yummy!

After the steep, all I can really smell is the bananas maybe a hint of walnut but that could be because I just want to smell that, the whole house smells like bananas :)
It is a pretty light amber color for a black tea.

The first sip, I was confused, the smell is so strong but the taste not so much?!?! The first sip is a pretty mellow black tea with hints of bananas. I take another sip and sure enough you can taste the banana and it is juicy, as well as hints of something else, I think it is the butter or walnuts, whatever it is it tastes good!

This is a really mellow tea, the flavors blend together really nicely and you can taste the tea which sometimes gets lost in the flavors but not this one! After letting it cool a bit the flavors are more prominent and I really,really really like it. I think that I really enjoy a bananas in my tea, maybe Frank could do a banana creme pie flavor!

Full Disclosure: I hate bananas. I hate how they smell, I hate how they taste, I hate how they’re squishy… the list goes on and on. Occasionally, they’re pretty good caramelized in brown sugar… with lots of other stuff (like oatmeal) involved. I’m not sure why I “forgot” that this tea had banana in it… perhaps because I was really looking forward to the “hot” “buttered” and “bread” part of it. Which is really too bad, because i didn’t get anything out of this tea except banana.

The banana reminds me of the flavored fruit shaped candy you could get from 25 cents out of a machine at the grocery store and various other places. I wasn’t a fan of the banana ones, and I’m really not a fan of the flavor in this tea. I don’t get anything buttery or bread-y about it, and there isn’t even a strong black tea base (ok, I didn’t exactly expect to find one, but when I drank the tea, that was probably the first thing I noticed). I’m going to try it with milk, maybe some sugar, to see if it changes my opinion of this tea.

Thanks to LiberTea for passing on a sample!

Experience buying from @Ashley: I bought this tea from Ashley when she was selling all of her tea. I received the tea quickly through the mail and my package was filled with many surprises. Thank you Ashley!

Age of leaf: bought sometime in October, brewed up mid-November.

Packaging: 52Teas packaging is very professional: small silver zip locked bags with a clear front that has a 3” X 3” label on it which has the name of the tea, an ingredient list, and an expertly created picture of the food item that the tea replicates.

Appearance and aroma of dry leaf: CTC leaf with bits of banana; smells just like banana bread, incredible!

_Brewing guidelines: two tsp. dry tea for 16 ounces of water. I used a metal basket strainer inside a ceramic 16 oz. cup, such that I put a lid over the top to keep the heat in. Cup was warmed before steeping. Stevia added.
…………….1st: slightly off the boil, 2’
…………….2nd: near boiling, 4’
…………….3rd: boiling, 6’
…………….4th: boiling, 10’

Aroma of tea liquor: Spot on banana bread!

Flavor of tea liquor: hard to get the HBBB flavor on the first steeping when still hot, but when cooled I could totally taste it. Good flavor up through three steepings.

Aroma of wet leaf: I believe the aroma here was the same as with the liquor itself: spot on!

Overall: I do have to admit that I am not a big banana flavored person, and that is why I didn’t rate this tea as high I have a few other teas of Franks. Having said that, this one’s still a keeper, especially if you love banana bread as there is clearly banana bread flavor swimming around all over in this cup! Next time I will have to search for the butter, and I wouldn’t be surprised at all it I can find it doing the breaststroke right next to the banana bread. Right as I was in the middle of writing this up, I went to Steepster to verify something about the description of the tea, and I glanced at the number of ratings and at the overall rating of the tea itself (which I try not to do before I review and rate a tea); I noticed that there are lots of reviews, and the tea has a high rating. Wow. I may be a little tough on my ratings, but I am certainly with the crowd on the reviews on this one. You rock, Frank!