Tea type
Black Fruit Blend
Ingredients
Not available
Flavors
Coconut, Tropical, Malt, Smooth, Sweet, Tannic, Wood, Astringent, Banana, Butterscotch, Creamy, Dark Wood, Tobacco, Vanilla, Cream, Bread, Cake, Nuts, Artificial, Candy, Caramel
Sold in
Bulk, Loose Leaf
Caffeine
High
Certification
Not available
Edit tea info Last updated by Cameron B.
Average preparation
205 °F / 96 °C 3 min, 30 sec 3 g 12 oz / 362 ml

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57 Tasting Notes View all

  • “Backlog from Sunday. I’m beginning to rather like banana teas, so I’m pleased to have another one to try. I think this is one of the last teas left from my first Bluebird order, so it’s past time I...” Read full tasting note
    50
  • “Uh-oh. My cupboard is suddenly up around 115 teas now! I went outside looking for my $5 Verdant sampler and found my order from Bluebird Tea (my last since I joined the ordering hiatus group) and...” Read full tasting note
    84
  • “Oops! Mustn’t forget the queue! Scheherazade shared some of this with me, and it has taken me almost the entire bag to work out what I think about it. I don’t think I’ve ever had a banana flavoured...” Read full tasting note
    77
  • “I have been putting off reviewing this tea because I am in two minds about it. The banana is on the delicate side and I find that the black tea dominates it much more than I would like. On the...” Read full tasting note

From Bird & Blend Tea Co.

Monkey Chops is an affectionate title, only to be bestowed upon the cheeky and the zany. Fitting, as this tea is Bananas… B-A-N-A-N-A-S! Some of our crazy blends (banana!) split the panel but this one has been a resounding hit all-round! Smooth, creamy and totally bananary..it’s simply the chops!

Ingredients: Ceylon black tea, freeze-dried banana, desiccated coconut, calendula petals, sunflower petals, vanilla pieces, flavouring

About Bird & Blend Tea Co. View company

Company description not available.

57 Tasting Notes

50
2238 tasting notes

Backlog from Sunday.

I’m beginning to rather like banana teas, so I’m pleased to have another one to try. I think this is one of the last teas left from my first Bluebird order, so it’s past time I tried it, really.

Dry, this doesn’t really smell of banana. I’m getting vanilla and caramel, and a generic sweetness, but not banana. I can see pieces of dried banana in the mix, though, so hopefully they’ll become more prominent once brewed.

I gave this about four minutes in boiling water, and added a splash of milk. The base tea here is Ceylon, so has a light citrus flavour all of its own. I think this matches particularly well with the banana (which I can taste after all), while the milk pairs perfectly with the vanilla to give a really creamy finish. It’s almost like drinking a banana split! I’m pleased with how well the banana comes over, as I couldn’t discern it at all dry. It really sings in the finished brew, though, and helps to make this a pretty awesome banana tea.

It’s not as in-your-face as 52Teas Monkey Fart, and it tastes a tad more natural (less like those foam banana sweets, and more like actual banana). I adore the creaminess, and the sweet caramel note that overrides it all. One of my favourite Bluebird teas so far!

Preparation
Boiling 4 min, 0 sec

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84
1598 tasting notes

Uh-oh. My cupboard is suddenly up around 115 teas now! I went outside looking for my $5 Verdant sampler and found my order from Bluebird Tea (my last since I joined the ordering hiatus group) and two packs of swaps!

I’m not really that upset though. :P I have high hopes for the Bluebird teas (Rhubarb & Custard rooibos, and Terry’s Orange), and the rest are smallish samples!

I didn’t expect to get 3 more samples from Bluebird with my order though. This is one of them, which is fantastic because when I saw they had a sale on for 15%, I nearly bought this just to give it a try. (The coupon was invalid by the time I saw it which is probably for the best. Now I can wait until I’m under 100 teas, and make sure I like it.).

Surprise? I like it!

The tea is very subtle but I can taste the Ceylon, bananas and more creaminess. I was worried that maybe I’d contaminated this sample with the Creme de la Creme Oolong I’d just finished (in the same cup), but I’m on the second cup now and it’s still creamy.

I’m so used to banana and chocolate, but this is really nice as it is. And it tastes like REAL banana. I want MOAR. #someday

ETA: I bumped the rating up a bit more because I wish I had more in my cupboad. I hope I left the leaves on the counter so I can try to resteep it… Too bad Bluebird didn’t have a distribution office in Canada for cheap shipping. Hey… too bad that imaginary person wasn’t me! :P

Preparation
205 °F / 96 °C 4 min, 0 sec
Sil

bwahahahahahahaha 115 teas… mmm hmmmm

TeaLady441

:P 8 of those are from you! I better get that box out to you now so I can boost your numbers! I think there are at least 10 teas in there? Hahahah

Sil

hahaha like i need your help boosting my numbers. I’ve placed 2 mini orders this week, i’m looking at a third tonight from redleaf and there will be a 4th from steap shoppe just as soon as janet figures things out. plus two shared orders are sitting with kittenna and raritea lol and i have about 6-7 incoming swaps lol

TeaLady441

Hahah. You are your own worst enemy!
I forgot about the Steap Shoppe – so that’ll boost my numbers. And I’ll get my red leaf matchacinno in soon, and my Verdant sampler, which will just spur a Verdant order… :P

Also, there’s a Butiki order in the works with the BC Steepsterites. Maybe I’ll be under 105 before that arrives!

TeaLady441

Of course, when the box arrives you could just sit it on a shelf and stare at it.

Sil

i could… lol and yes…yes i am. But i’m feeling good. 7 packages went out today full of swaping goodness!

TeaLady441

7! That’s pretty impressive! Seems like the number of samples doesn’t matter so much if the total oz of tea is the same!

Oh, I like how you label all the bags with your name so I remember who I swapped with! I learn a bit more with each swap.

Sil

Yeah. I used to also put all the brewing parameters on the bags but when i couldn’t find the bigger labels i said to heck with that and just made sure my name was on them. Mostly since learning that there are people out there who shall remain nameless that have say 500 samples…i figure there’s no way that some people will keep that straight hahaha

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77
1353 tasting notes

Oops! Mustn’t forget the queue!

Scheherazade shared some of this with me, and it has taken me almost the entire bag to work out what I think about it. I don’t think I’ve ever had a banana flavoured black tea before. The only one I can think of which had banana in it was a white tea blend from AC Perchs, but that one also had some other fruits. A large part of me is a bit surprised that flavouring anything at all with banana is even possible in the first place. I don’t know why my brain wants it to be so impossible, but there you are.

The recommendations called for boiling water which is something, in a flavoured black, I routinely ignore because I find that nine out of ten flavoured blacks yield a better result when the water is slightly cooler. About the temperature normally used for oolongs tend to suit me best.

So the first time I had it, I brewed it in my own way, and ended up with a cup of tea which both smelled and tasted like nuts. That was it. Just nuts. No banana or any other sort of fruit in sight at all.

Next I tried it with boiling water which had just cooled enough to no longer be bubbling. That gave me a great deal of banana flavour on the first few sips, but eventually it cooled down to a temperature where it’s actually possible to drink it without burning the mouth and we’re back to having a cup that tastes almost entirely like nuts.

Now, I like nuts as a tea flavouring. I’ve even discussed this very recently and how it rather surprised me, but you see, I’m attracted to nut flavoured teas that are actually flavoured with nuts. A tea that tastes like nuts when it’s supposed to taste like something else just doesn’t really work for me.

Because I’m lazy today and a bit bothered by Girl Tummy™ I decided to see if this is a flavoured black that will continue to be unusual and actually give a passable resteep.

Not quite. It’s a bit thin, but now it tastes like banana again, at least at the beginning of the cup. By the end, at this point, I’m fully expecting it to be nuts.

It’s difficult to rate this. If it had kept that banana flavour all the way through and not gone nutty, I would probably give it around 85. While the nutty flavour is quite nice as it is, it’s not banana and therefore I can’t give it more than 70. Therefore, I’m going to aim for the middle ground here.

I’m still quite curious about the whole banana flavouring concept, though. I might see if I can investigate this further.

Kaylee

I don’t know if you’ve gotten Butiki before, but their Foxy Roxy’s Banana Walnut Treat sounds right up your alley.

Angrboda

I’ve had a few Butikis but not that one. I’ve only tried ones I got through swaps, but I’ve been playing with the thought of making an order from them. I’ll try to remember to have a look at the one you recommended. :)

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1379 tasting notes

I have been putting off reviewing this tea because I am in two minds about it. The banana is on the delicate side and I find that the black tea dominates it much more than I would like. On the other hand it’s still quite nice, more black tea with a hint of banana than banana that’s black tea based.

I don’t think it’s the sort of tea that I would re stock but perhaps I should try it iced before I make such a decision. After all I do adore strong black based iced teas.

Will have to decide at one time or another…for now I shall not rate this.

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6105 tasting notes

Sipdown! Due to a) throwing out the last of my funky-smelling Lime Gelato and b) apparently not deleting a tea that I sipped down a few days ago, I’m now at 786! Woo! Nevermind that order that we jointly placed on Monday… and the Butiki order. And Della Terra….

Anyways. Almost done with my Bluebird Tea Co. samples (thanks for this one as well!), and have high hopes for this one. Unfortunately, however, this one’s a bit of a miss for me. It very well may be user error (too long of an infusion at 2.5 min?), but there’s too much astringency here for me to enjoy this tea. The base is likely nice (when not astringent) and I can almost taste some yummy flavours, but… nope. That said, I would likely request this one as a sample if I made an order in the future, as I think it’s promising. It also just occurred to me that it’s possible that there was just extra leaf in the package, and so I ended up overleafing my cup… the astringency tastes more to me like “too strong” than “crappy finicky tea base”. Hmm. Oh well, it’s mostly gone now, so as I said, I’ll save a second attempt (and a rating) for sometime in the future!

Preparation
Boiling 2 min, 30 sec
TeaLady441

Haha. I better hurry up and move to Ontario so I can split some orders with you guys. But… 786 – sounds like you’re making some progress!

Kittenna

Yes yes!! Move to Ontario! We love splitting orders :D The only reason my cupboard is so high is because I always used to get tempted into free shipping thresholds… and ended up with lots of 50g pouches of tea. (That and my sample-hoarding habit that I’m trying to kick.)

Kittenna

And yes, I think 786 is good progress! Especially since I’m not really focusing on sipdowns. I have lots of 1-cup things to drink, but I’m choosing to drink what I want to instead. So slower progress, but more enjoyment :)

TeaLady441

That’s much better, for sure. I was in sipdown mode and I basically spent half my day choking down teas to finish them off, and then rewarding myself with a few choice ones. But that’s not sustainable!

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79
761 tasting notes

Drinking this one today because I’m a total nerd.

I got word earlier today that a certain David Tennant will be coming here to film Gracepoint (the American version of Broadchurch) about a month from now, and will likely be in my city for a few months at least, while filming. Additionally, there are talks that the neighborhood that I work in, with be used in the filming.

SQUEE?!

So I thought that this banana flavoured tea from a British tea company was quite fitting (and nerdy) to drink today.

I cannot tell you all how excited I am about this. I have a real chance of seeing DAVID FREAKING TENNANT walk by on the street. I work on the main street of the neighborhood which is quite likely to be used in filming…it’s incredibly picturesque.

I can’t stop squeeing, really folks. If my heart could pound out of y body, it would. My head feels giddy and on the verge of exploding.

OMG OMG OMG

Always take a banana to a party…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQ9f878BBt0

Roswell Strange

My roommate is very jealous of you right now.

Plunkybug

Lol…it’s a bit hard to believe, actually.

Mike Turner

Not just a British company… Our registered address is Stratford upon Avon (although we’ve since moved away)… A little tiny town which happens to have a very good theatre which David Tennant is often at (including at the moment I believe). – so even more link than you thought!

Plunkybug

Ahhh, how marvelous, Mike!

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71
652 tasting notes

Received this with some other samples from Bluebird Tea Co. First can we please discuss their adorable presentation and packaging??? Their tea photos with the little ‘cut here’ graphic, the samples came in these little glassine type packets SEWN closed with baby blue thread, their website and graphics and logo and everything is just so freakin cute. Goes with the name. I notice stuff like that. And love it. So good job guys!!! I always appreciate an artistic/creative display.

The only thing I couldn’t find were steeping instructions?? Perhaps those could be added to the teas on Steepster also.

Now for the tea, I was interested in this one based on the description, sounded different.
Hmmm. This was different! I did two steeps, first time around was boiling water for 2-3 minutes. I’m at work, no timer so I wasn’t too picky since it is black tea.

The tea was very roasty. I did not get any banana taste though, possibly a very mild hint which served to soften the tea a bit. There was nothing fake about it which was nice. I imagine if the tea was more banana-y it would also taste more fake. I bet it’s hard to achieve that balance when making a tea.

I was thinking this would make a nice breakfast tea because there was a satisfying coffee feel to it. I think teas that taste like coffee are gross (ever use water from a Keurig machine to make a cup of tea?? Ew. Don’t.), but this was more the feeling of satisfaction you get from a good cup of coffee duplicated in tea form. Serious coffee fans know what I mean, there’s just something substantial about it. I drank it black but milk would probably have been nice.

It was relatively dark yet mild, and subtly sweet on its own. Probably thanks to the banana.

So that being said, steep two (5 min or so) had not much flavour, zero banana, just kind of like a black tea. I didn’t finish it because I decided to make something more satisfying instead, that’s how I roll.

Based on steep 1 I will rate the tea pretty well, points off for no substantial banananess, but the lack of fakeness was appreciated. Happy to try my other samples soon!

Thank you for the sample, Bluebird Tea Co!

TeaLady441

Did you just get your samples today? I’ve been waiting for mine for a bit now and I’m starting to get antsy! ;O

ohfancythat

Yesterday actually!

TeaLady441

Well, hope that means are close behind! :D

Tealizzy

Yes, their packaging is super cute! They do have steeping instructions online under Universitea, and their main bags have it (just not the samples).

ohfancythat

Oh good to know, I didn’t think to look there, thanks!

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1440 tasting notes

BIRD & BLEND IS HERE!

Check out the unopened box on my Instagram story here (also will be posting an actual photo later of all the teas!): https://instagram.com/stories/biologistcourtney/2440935902711447631?utm_source=ig_story_item_share&igshid=1cw3w4rs5k521

I’ve been waiting to crack open this tea and finally I did! Lex is having the Carrot Cake rooibos next to me and the scent is so on point!

This one naturally had a delightful banana scent in the dry leaf, which translated into a nice banana-ness in the steeped tea. The base is not astringent at all, which is thrilling. This is just a nice smooth cup of banana black tea and I’m here for it. The banana doesn’t come off in a fake way at all either. Yay! Even Lex was intrigued and she doesn’t really care for banana-flavoured things!

Preparation
4 min, 0 sec
Cameron B.

Yaaaaaay B&B! Love Monkey Chops, and I think I have a sample packet of Carrot Cake that I need to dig out…

Courtney

Yes, we just got the sample pack for Carrot Cake as well. I’ll be doing a review for that one soon!

VariaTEA

I loved this one as an iced latte this summer

Martin Bednář

It seems I need get Insta for seeing the tea-stuff :D

Courtney

Good idea VariaTEA!

Martin, you really should! My instagram is mostly for my biologist photo-taking, but I use my story for all kinds of stuff. :)

Martin Bednář

Courtney: Have I said that I am nature-friend as well, though my thesis is about warehousing? I DO like nature and going there! So, I wouldn’t care (and I would enjoy) your stuff about biology (I even did High-school leaving exam from Biology). Oh well…

Courtney

Martin all the more reason to sign up :) I am doing my Master’s in biology now, but my undergrad was also in biology (conservation, ecology, & evolution).

Martin Bednář

I don’t want to admit it yet :P

tea-sipper

Courtney, that is awesome you are focusing on biology. I wish I was wandering around the woods every day. :D

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297 tasting notes

I received this as a sample with my order. There was enough for a small cup, but I ended up using too much water, that wasn’t hot enough. I’m at my mom’s & her stove takes forever to boil the kettle & her kettle is really hard to tell when It’s boiling.

After these less than optimal conditions I went & steeped this too long. So on top of being too watery it was also bitter. I did get a touch of banana, so when I do order again this one will be on the list so I can try it properly.

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88
615 tasting notes

So, this regional dairy company recently released a 1% banana milk that Fiance just insisted on trying. It’s not uncomfortably sweet smelling like some stuff, but it’s definitely got this creamy banana thing going on. That is exactly what this dry leaf smells like. Milky, creamy, natural banana. Yum.

This tea pretty much cements my love of banana flavored tea. Which is weird, because I don’t really much care for real life bananas. Kind of a texture thing. So tea is really the best of all worlds here.

The base here is rich, smooth and has a little of it’s own natural sweetness going on. There’s definitely some astringency here too, but it’s not overwhelming. The astrigency is kind of a neat little thing here too. You know how when you eat a slightly-green banana and the starch makes your mouth a little dry? It’s just like that.

And the banana. The banana is the star here. It’s not loud banana taste. It’s this nice subtle flavor that runs through each sip. It tastes like slightly green (the best) bananas. It doesn’t taste like artificial banana flavor (I’m looking at you Banana Pudding tea) but real, fresh bananas.

I’m going to have to add this to my shopping list too, because I think this would just be too good with milk and sugar and latte-ized.

Preparation
205 °F / 96 °C 3 min, 15 sec

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