Main Squeeze

Day 16 of the 24 Days of Tea

Interesting – a mate tea. I’ve never had one before, so I am curious to try this.

At first sniff: When I smell it, it smells like Tang, or some other orange powder drink. It doesn’t smell necessarily natural, but smells good. I am not getting any earthy smells or anything and the blend looks quite peculiar. I guess that’s what mate looks like hey?

At first steep: Honestly, it doesn’t taste like a whole lot. It tastes kind of like a muted green tea with a hint of citrus. It’s not unpleasant by any means, just a bit of a let down from the smell. I get earthy notes towards the end of the sip and the after taste that lingers if that of a chemical flavour taste. Curse my sensitive taste buds. I am applauded for them with wine and food (my family relies on me when we go out to eat to pick out spices and herbs in dishes, for replicating at home.) But the down side is, is it makes me sensitive to artificial way too easily. As this cools, I am getting more earthy notes as well and again, I don’t mind it, but I get an astringent quality at the very end of the sip that I am not fond of.

Ugh, what a long few days. Between going in to the city, looking at apartments, scaring people with my Halloween makeup and all the while working nearly full time, I’ve been pretty wiped. No end in sight just yet, but soon. Moving tomorrow after work, so yay for more work and more stress, but I’ll be glad to be in my new place, even if it means sleeping on the floor a while.

Anyhow, I brought a bunch of my new teas in to work with me to try while I work, and of course I forgot my filters. So I tore up a coffee filter and tied it around the tea to steep it. It’ll do for now.

This tea is fantastic, and I wish I’d gotten more while I was there because I love it so much. No worries though – I’m going back for the winter collection soon so I’ll pick more up then. It’s definitely orange juice-y, naturally sweet, a bit nutty to me at the end of the sip. Really light nut, though, like a hint of cashew. It’s nice warm, but I think I almost prefer it cold. If I had this with me all the time, I don’t think I’d drink coffee again.

I have tried and tried to love this tea. On a good day, I do really like the citrus notes and I love the fruit, but the base is sooo strong. I find the earthy notes of the mate detract a little from the overall flavour. I have had the best luck with this tea by steeping it then flash chilling it over ice.

okay, yuuum!!! I absolutly adore this tea! I like the taste! but I LOVE the energy boost! this is my first mate tea, this was one of my samples from davids tea! and I am so glad they threw this in!and I am going to have to buy this! and I just orderd jumpy monkey and super excited to get it! yay for this tea! its kinda like drinking warm orange juice and that sounds gross but its actually really awesome! but I imagine I would love this cold too, but I may drink way too much cold lol…. p.s I cant change my rating on my teas for some reason! lol

This tea has quite the citrus herbal scent to it! I would put this in a chicken dish haha! The taste has a great herbalness from the Mate with a nice and balanced sweet citrus taste. Extremely simple, and because of that I thoroughly enjoyed it!

29 down – 471 to go!

mmm! i am pleasantly surprised! i have to admit, i wasn’t expecting much (not really liking mates and not really believing fresh orange juice flavour would translate well into tea), but it is good!
it’s late, so i can’t drink the whole cup (only brewed for tasting purposes!), because i’m afraid it would keep me up until 4am, but it’s hard to resist!
i’ll definitely pick up some more next time i’m at a davids, but i’ve got other morning teas to keep me going until then ;)

Well this is exciting…my 100th tasting note of teas from David’s Tea! I told the staff at the store how many I had tried the other day and they said that was more than most of the staff who work there and even gave me a coupon for a free cup of tea (which I have yet to use)! This tea was a recommendation by a staff member and, unlike most of the ones they have recommended, is actually one I had yet to try. The smell immediately hits you as being very citrusy, and strong. It reminded me of fruit juice (like a Sunny-D or even Five Alive). When steeped, it retains its smell quite well and I was pleased that the actual fruity taste was milder. I picked up about 20g of this tea, at the same time I went in for an Iced Tea Mug and tried Guava Cadabra, and when I got home, made it iced. Compared to the other mates I’ve tried from David’s tea, I found this to be slightly oilier; which reminded me more of a pu’erh. For me, the oiliness in this one is still light enough to be drinkable (unlike most pu’erhs) and I will absolutely have no problems finishing the 20g pouch over the summer. I also liked the fact that even iced, I was able to get 2 full steeps out of my tea bag. Overall, it is a nice tea and will definetely be great for the summer but I can’t see myself picking this one up again.

This is quite nice. I’d definitely like to try it over ice, as it was a little sickly sweet tasting while super hot. But once I’d let it cool down some, it had a nice fruity, citrusy taste that was neither overbearingly sweet nor tart (which, given the fruits in it, could have easily happened). The mate gives it a nice kick and helped me to actually focus in my morning classes on what SHOULD BE a holiday Monday.

More from my backlog!

This is wonderful, and a great mate. This itself has really gotten me into mates, and it’s pretty wonderful. So, I recommend this to anyone who likes some tropical flavours (or any mate fan!)

This is my first time trying a flavored mate. It has a very pleasant natural orange/fruity flavor that blends with the distinctive mate taste nicely. Plain green mate tastes like green beans to me! I’m not finished with the cup yet but looking forward to the mate kick ;)