Minty Black

I have a confession, I am addicted to those plastic drawer oraganizer…things…I blame my side addiction to organization as the cause for this. It is a dream of mine, one day to have a room separate from my tea/art room that is just a room where every wall is nothing but those stacked up drawers. Perfectly labeled and everything is sorted and probably color coded. It makes me all warm and tingly thinking about it. I bring this up because yesterday on the side of the road Ben found one someone was getting rid of and he brought it home for me, meaning my tea collection is even more organized, this makes for a happy me!

Today we are looking at a fun blended tea from BlendBee, a fun company that has ready made blends and the ability to make your own blends…something I need to try because these are always so fun! Specifically the blend I am checking out is Minty Black, a blend of Chinese Black Tea, Carob Beans, Peppermint, Licorice Root, and Natural Flavoring. I admit I was drawn to this tea because of my fond memories of summer time minty black tea slurping, though as an adult I find I am more drawn to the hot version rather than the iced version, it makes my belly happy. The aroma is pretty intense, this is not a tea to stick your nose into and inhale deeply…unless you have a stuffy nose and want to just clear those sinuses, because wow, mint! So much cooling fresh mint, I feel like I fell face first into a mint plant..and yes I know exactly what that is like. Underneath the pile of mint is some mild malty notes, chocolate, and a touch of sweet licorice root at the finish.

The aroma of the now quite soggy leaves and other bits is a double blend of mint and cocoa, with sweet undertones of licorice and a touch of malty richness. There is so much mint, lots and lots of mint, though it is not as strong as the mint-splosion that is the dry leaf. The liquid is sweet and minty, cooling with notes of chocolate and mint, with sweet undertones, it smells like a Andes mint…and fun fact, every Christmas I would get a whole bag of those in my stocking as a kid…and they almost always were gone by the end of the day and I would not want them again until next Christmas!

Ooh! The tea is brisk! It combines a brisk black base tea with strong cooling mint, talk about a refreshing tea. After the initial mintiness, it moves to cocoa notes and then a nice burst of licorice sweetness that lingers for quite a while. This tea reminds me of drinking black tea while shoving Andes mints in my face, like imagine the sensation of having the chocolate melt in the tea in your mouth, and that is what this tea reminds me of. It is very refreshing while also being soothing, just the way I like my minty teas.

blog and photos: http://ramblingbutterflythoughts.blogspot.com/2015/11/blendbee-minty-black-tea-review.html