Sparkling Sangria

I didn’t hate the previous version of Sangria, but I didn’t love it enough to add it to my collection. I don’t love this tea either. It’s a nice tropical fruit blend. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of hibiscus in the blend which is nice for those who don’t care for it.

I’ve never had sangria because wine isn’t my thing, but I’m familiar enough with the recipe. This tea doesn’t strike me as sangria or even sangria-inspired. Perhaps, it’d be a version of sangria if you lived in Hawaii and the fruits you had easiest access to were mangoes, papayas, pineapples, and passion fruits instead of oranges and apples.

It’s just a run-of-the-mill tea that’s tropical, fruity, and refreshing over ice. Thankfully, I’ve only opened one bag, so I’ll probably mix it with Queen of Tarts until I’ve finished it off.

I’ve never had Sangria before, but I imagine this is what it tastes like. The taste is very light and delicate. Not heavy on the fruit, not a hint of wine. Not bad but not collection worthy. Definitely worth a bag or two when its retiring or on sale.

A pleasantly tangy, refreshing herbal tea that works amazingly iced. I rarely say this, but the hibiscus works perfectly in this blend. It’s low enough down on the ingredient list that it doesn’t overpower the tea, instead providing a wonderful base note for the papaya, mango, and pineapple. I told myself I wouldn’t stock up on any of the Cocktail teas, but that might change because of this tart little tropical number.

I don’t believe there’s meant to be any wine notes in this tea, I think it’s more of a tea that you could mix with wine to make a sangria-inspired drink. I’m going to try it with a splash of red, or maybe even rosé if I’m feeling super adventurous. It’s also completely different from their Sangria blend last year, which is such a relief because Sangria and I did not get along.

This is some good iced tea. I like it just as much as last year’s sangria but this one tastes more tropical.

I’ve been away for a while, but I have a great excuse…

I am now the proud mama of two! I gave birth to my son on April 8th. We are so blessed to have two healthy, happy children!

I haven’t been doing my regular things because I’ve been so busy with a bunch of irregular things. First of all, being pregnant this second time around was no fun. Second, we bought a house! We also put a lot of work into it: all new floors throughout, new paint everywhere (and I mean everywhere, even the ceilings!), all new faux wood blinds, fixed the deck, and took down a knee wall in the living room. We still have more we want to do, but at least the house is livable and in much better condition now than when we moved in. We also had to take two trips down to my mother’s storage units in another state to sort through everything. We brought most of the furniture, dishes, and memorabilia back to our house. The rest was donated or thrown out.

My husband and I also both have new jobs. He still works for the same company but in a different area. I work for a new agency and have a team working for me. Life is very different and I’m really happy. It’s been stressful but overall, life has really improved over the last year.

My mom is still battling stage 4 breast cancer. She’s doing as well as could be expected, I think. At least she’s no longer on chemotherapy. They changed her treatment plan to oral drugs called targeted and hormone therapy. She’s responded well and it gives her a better quality of life.

Anyway, this is a tea review, not my personal journal. ON TO THE TEA!

I made this with 4 tablespoons in 8 cups of boiling water. I would recommend a higher concentration of tea. Next time, I think I’ll go for 5 tablespoons in 7 cups. The instructions say to brew for 4-7 minutes, but since this is an herbal, I steeped it for 10 minutes. I don’t usually add sugar to my teas, but again, this is an herbal! It doesn’t have any tea in it. The dry “leaf” is a lovely bouquet of fruits and flowers. So I tried a sip and decided it would be much improved with some sweetener. I added ¾ tablespoon of Truvia and then stuck the whole pitcher in the fridge to cool.

This one absolutely needs to be enjoyed iced! It is delicious! Fruity and sweet and everything you’d want from a juice or punch without the calories. This is pretty darn fantastic. It reminds me of 52teas’ Southern Boy Teas spin-off brand that closed a while back. I really miss Frank’s mastery of iced teas. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a chance to stock up before he closed shop. I will really miss a lot of his blends. But this tea helps ease the pain of that loss.

I feel like I can taste everything in the blend: apple, mango, pineapple, papaya, hibiscus (but just the right amount), with a hint of rose and blue cornflowers. Yum yum! I even get a little passion fruit. It’s soooo good! I love this just the way it is. The marketing says you can add wine to make it a real sangria. But my favorite part of this is sans alcohol. I tried a sample of Rosé All Day in the store and thought it was pretty tasty too. It’s strongly rose, which I love, but the hint of artificial wine flavoring was what made me get Sparkling Sangria instead. I think I’m going to need more of this because 3 oz will not go far. And I usually take years to finish off 2 oz of tea.

I have to add that the dry leaf really is beautiful. It smells heavenly and is probably the most visually appealing tea I’ve ever seen. Well, now I’m off to take care of the baby!

Mmm, this one is quite tasty! I only got 50g to try, since I wasn’t too sure about liking it, since I extremely disliked the Sangria from last year, but now I know I’ll have to get more of this one. It is way more fruity and lighter than last year, and therefore much tastier. I can also kind of taste the ‘sparkling’ aspect to it. The addition of the tropical fruits makes it so much better and I’m really enjoying this one. Yummy.

Next up from the cocktail collection.

I’m sure many people are going to be disappointed this year that the incredibly popular Sangria isn’t back, since this tea obviously draws inspiration from the same cocktail but is a lot different. For sure I consider myself part of that group; I love the old Sangria blend and every year in the past I’ve kicked myself for not stocking up more on it when I had the chance.

However, for people like me and others who never were a fan of the old Sangria tea hopefully this can be an acceptable alternative…

I tried my cup of it iced, and for at least the time being I’m still undecided on it. It actually doesn’t take bad at all, but it’s very tropical and different from the blend I’ve come to love. I think the mango, pineapple, and passionfruit ALL come through really strongly and clearly, and that aspect of the blend is really tasty. Plus, none of the summer iced teas launched this year have really embraced that tropical element so we’ve been sampling other alternatives (Maracuja Mango, Green passionfruit, etc). so I do think this fills a gap in the year’s collections. Downside is that it has the same sort of tangy/tart hibiscus background flavour that MANY of the summer teas have (Rainbow Sherbet, Blackberry Blizzard, Rose All Day…) and because of that I think that what could have otherwise been a really interesting flavour feels a little played out/unoriginal. I still want to believe there’s more to be gleamed from this tea though, so I know I’ll personally keep trying it out in slightly different ways to get the best flavour possible. In the mean time, I’ll focus on the sweet, tasty pineapple/passionfruit flavours.

I’m still mourning the old Sangria blend, though.

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts regarding the teas, and not the company’s.