Berry Poppins

Holy blackberries, Batman! Blackberries are one of my favorite berries. I have very fond childhood memories of picking peaches and blackberries in the Hill Country with my grandparents. This tea conjures up those memories.

I was wary of this tea given the addition of hibiscus. Don’t get me wrong. I adore hibiscus, but two naturally tart ingredients in one tea concerned me.

I’m so glad I tried it and that I’ve got a good 100 grams to get me through the south Texas summer. I haven’t tried many teas that feature the blackberry, but this herbal blend is so surprisingly delicious that I may have to start actively searching for more blackberry tea blends. This is divine over ice.

I see that there’s a blackberry-infused moonshine on the markets now… ;)

I don’t know what it is about this tea, but it’s completely hit or miss for me. I drank it iced today, and I’m kind of glad I only have a bit of it left. I like my teas to be a bit more dependable in the enjoyment category.

Maybe it’s the amount of hibiscus in each cup? I think I want to like it because the store sample I consumed had a nice balance with the fake cream flavour…

For this particular cup, I poured boiling water over the tea in my steeper and then left it overnight. In the morning I threw it over ice. I might have benefited from a touch of sweetener.

I had it cold…and it’s a looooot better than hot. Though I think it could have been steeped a little longer to get more of the berry flavor. The blueberry comes out more when iced. It’s also a sweet tea, and reminds me of DavidsTea Blueberry Lagoon. It’s missing some flavor though.

Argh I added a bit of cream to the first cup because, hey— berries and cream— but it curdled. :( second try I oversteeped this (10 min or more) so it was a whole lot of berry flavor. No time for third try. But it is a nice berry flavor— artificial berry can taste soooo bad. I look forward to trying again.

I don’t normally enjoy fruit infusions. That said, I haven’t really had a lot of them, tending to favor black teas. This was a sample included with a gift and an enjoyable cup in the evening after work. Fabulous aroma pre-steep and beautiful color upon steeping. Tasted very much like berries and maybe almost a little like a hot Koolaid. I suspect this would be quite refreshing as an iced drink. Don’t think I would buy this one but if I received another sample, I’d try it iced.

It’s…okay. I’m just so sick of hibiscus being in everything and overpowering all of the other flavors. It’s ALL I can taste, and it just tastes the same as all of the other overly-hibiscus teas.

Sad sipdown.

I haven’t had the energy for tea drinking lately. Even so, this one has been a consistent favorite over the past two weeks. It’s very berry and very creamy and basically what I was hoping for in Teavana’s Strawberry Cream but didn’t get. I love this one … but also don’t feel like I can justify more with what’s currently in my cupboard. Yay, tea problems?

A friend gave me some of this to try today! She really liked it and suggested that I try it. We have now organized a tea trade system hahaha.

Anyways, I don’t know that I really like this. It’s not bad… but it’s not my thing really. I think that although the smell and taste are decent, it’s kind of missing something. Maybe it is the attempt at making it “creamy” that’s throwing me off. I can’t quite put my finger on it. I’m also wondering if I could have made it stronger. I did add just a touch of sweetner which made this more enjoyable for me, but I probably won’t be drinking this again.

If you like berries this might be for you, but where I stand I would much rather drink something like Berry Refreshing – it’s more “berry lemonade” ish.

Sampled this iced in store today, and all I really remember is that it was a bit tart and a bit berryish, but nothing really stood out for me.

Glad I got a chance to try it but I won’t be buying any.

2021 Sipdown 25/365!
(DavidsTea 71)

Hmm, I thought I had liked this more than my rating suggests. My recollection was of a berries + cream type tea that I should have stocked up on a bit, but perhaps I’m confusing it with something else (although it does contain cream flavouring?)

I should have listened to my gut when I poured the last of the dust into my infuser – yes, it was sweet blackberry leaf dust and wow, is this ever sweet. Surprisingly, though, I’m not finding it offputting, and am actually enjoying it, because the rest of the flavour I’m getting here is a strong, delicious, berry medley. Which… doesn’t totally match up with the ingredient list, unless I’m pretty much just drinking blackberry leaf + blackberry flavouring (which I’m not, there were some other ingredients there, but perhaps these two are just overwhelming everything else).

A better, albeit very sweet, sendoff to this tea than I had anticipated.

ETA: Got some distinct hibby in the last couple sips – but totally acceptable tartness level.