Harbor Breeze

I don’t know about ‘wildly exotic’ – since I pretty much just taste hibiscus – but it’s a solid choice and claiming the hibiscus spot in my stash. It’s got a strong taste and color and will make a terrifically refreshing iced tea.

Sipdown (135)!

From Liquid Proust.

Last tea of the night; it was nice to have a herbal option conveniently on hand in my sample drawer. I definitely get a kind of citrusy/lemony apple vibe from this with a sort of ‘fruit punch’ kind of note. The hibiscus isn’t nearly as strong as I was expecting; actually the whole thing kind of came out rather watered down despite like a ten minute long steep. From the description I can see the intention here is strawberry lemon; at least one of those flavours landed.

Made a decent cup of tea before bed; probably will work out to be relatively forgettable in the long run though – I’ve tried so many similar tisanes at this point that it takes a lot for something like this to jump out at me.

I like this tea. There’s a good bit of hibiscus so it helps if you enjoy that, but it also contains apples, rosehips, other dried fruit, and lovely calendula petals. The calendula petals are a beautiful sunny contrast to the dark magenta hibiscus, but they don’t do much for taste. However, the apple bits add a softer fruity taste that mellows the hibiscus and rosehip. I find this to be really satisfying combination when I’m craving a fruity hibiscus tisane.

I’m surprised. After smelling the delightful, candy-like aroma of this tea, I thought the taste would be more fruity. Yet it was an overpowering taste of hibiscus – almost as if that were the only flavor. I do like hibiscus, but it was not what I was expecting. I will try it again iced and maybe add some orange slices, but I’m not sure I would order again when I could just brew hibiscus by itself.