Brazilian Acai Matcha

I didn’t jump on the acai fruity craze, but I see quite a few of my other brazilian jiu jitsu peeps always drinking something with either acai or just coconut water. I’m the only one who runs around with matcha looking weird. Pffff, they need to learn from me. Either way, I decided to give this matcha a shot, show up those others at class.

Specs on this matcha:

Brazilian Acai matcha
From http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/acai-matcha.html
Matcha Quality: Classic Basic Grade
Flavor: Distinctive

Out of the gold foil package, this matcha smells amazingly fruity. Super fruit amazing! The smell reminds me of really tarty berry yogurt. Brazilian Acai matcha appears slightly darker in powder form.

I prepared this as a traditional hot cup, getting me pumped up before my brazilian jiu jitsu practice (I seriously need the energy for class today)! This matcha didn’t froth up very well nor maintain froth, but I didn’t really care. Interestingly, this matcha prepared has a different colour than normal, a dark forest green, probably from the acai berry powder. By the way, I used 1/4tsp plus 175f water.

The taste of Brazilian Acai matcha is quite fruity. A mix between a tropical flavor and blackberries or blueberries. There is also a natural sweetness to this matcha – adding any additional sweetener would be overkill I think. With the fruityness and natural sweetness, this hot cup is very refreshing! There is no tart or bitterness to this matcha! I honestly was expected this to taste tart or puckery.

In the end, this was surprisingly good! I’m thinking this would be great iced, in my waterbottle, nearby to me while I do jiu jitsu. Or is that totally cheating getting a doubly whammy of heathly energizing matcha and acai? Don’t pass up this matcha – I’m thinking this is up there on being one of my fav flavors from Red Leaf Teas!

I never really intetionally jumped on health craze this berry had, but it’s been in so many things I’ve consumed and enjoyed (most frequently paired with blueberry it seems), that I wanted to at least jump on this!

Also. I decided it was smoothie time. I picked up a smoothie machine four or so years ago at a rummage sale and haven’t used it a whole lot. Fiance hates the sound of it (it sounds like a higher pitched blender), so I get the grumpy eye when I try to run it when he’s home.

So, I added 8 or so ice cubes, 14 oz of milk, (pretty much lined up to the appropriate ‘For Serving 2’ lines on the smoothie maker, honestly) and 2 tsp of matcha powder and gave it a pretty solid whirr. And wound up with a delicious, flavorful, frothy cup of happiness. (With an extra for Fiance).

The berry flavor is amazing. It’s like a cross between blueberries and blackberries, with the sweet tartness of blueberry, but the depth of blackberry. And it pairs really well with the subtle natural sweetness of matcha.

I really hope Fiance likes this as much as I did, because I really wouldn’t mind picking some up. And then maybe I can experiment and add frozen blueberries for a thicker smoothie. Ooooh. I’m excited.

Okay, so, fair warning. I’m not overly familiar with the acai berry or how it should taste. I’ve had acai berry/blueberry juice before, and loved it, so I’m hoping I’ll love the berry on its own. Of course now, all I can think of when it comes to this tea is RuPaul’s Drag Race with all the different queens trying to say “acai” for a TV commercial. It’s like the Pink Dragonfruit from Tealish. I’ve never had dragonfruit, but it smelled amazing and so I tried it and I loved it. Now I’m on the hunt for an actual dragonfruit to try. So while I can tell if I like the tea and if it tastes good or not, I have no real way to tell if it tastes like the actual fruit at all. But that’s okay! Everyone should be open to new experiences, and I am looking forward to this one (found here:http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/acai-matcha.html).

Okay, yum! It’s kind of like blueberry on steroids? I don’t know, it’s got this amazing berry flavor with a round tartness….yes, round. It was the word that came to mind as I sipped it. It’s just…lovely and unexpected. The flavor is very bold and very…unique. I don’t quite know how to describe it, but I liked it. I definitely want to try more acai flavored things if this is what I have to look forward to! I’m not sure if I need to restock on this ASAP, but it’s definitely in the running for my must-have list.

The matcha has a slightly darker color due to the acai powder. What I like about this tea is that there are no flavorings, sugars or odd additives. The acai powder is pure, ground acai berries. This tea has more of a matcha taste than an acai taste. There is only just a hint of acai. It’s not sweet and the acai doesn’t make the matcha taste bitter. This is a great way to have matcha, but with additional health benefits from the added acai powder. If you’re looking for something sweet or fruity tasting, this isn’t the tea for you. However, if you love matcha and the taste of pure matcha. you will love this tea.

This obviously isn’t the matcha for me. It tastes too much like strawberry protein powder. The fruit flavour tastes really artificial compared to blueberry acai juice and other acai flavoured teas. I know they do not use artificial flavourings, but it leaves a weird aftertaste. I think I’ll avoid fruity matchas in the future…except peach matcha of course (current favourite).

fine but smooth

Where did my previous logs of this go? Yesterday I used the last of my open unflavored matcha. This morning I didn’t want to mess with the unopened bags (I have 2 lbs in the freezer) especially since they are not in resealable bags. I did have 3 opened samples of flavored matcha. This one sounded fun at 6:00 a.m. I mostly wanted to play with my new frother. Abt 1 tsp and 3 oz cold milk in a 12 oz tumbler. Nearly filled with foam – so, happy with the frother. I haven’t had acai in a while and I kind of forgot what it tasted like. I was surprised it actually tasted good in combination with milk. Fruity, not tart. Good choice. Went down fast.

First tea of the morning/afternoon.

I fell asleep pretty ridiculously early last night, at least by my standards. I guess the major lack of sleep just caught up with me. In total, I think I slept for a straight 13 hours? And I could probably do it all over again – I still feel really tired.

But anyway, for my first tea of the day I decided to have some fun with experimenting – so I whisked a 1/4 tsp. of this and a 1/4 tsp. of Red Leaf Tea’s Cheesecake matcha into a glass of cold milk to make a “Berry Cheesecake” flavour for breakfast!

I really love the Cheesecake flavour, but the one time I had this one (a matcha soda) it fell pretty short for me and I figured I needed to switch things up and try it in a different way. However, straight Acai matcha milk didn’t sound appealing and I thought this might be a better way to try it. It’s actually very good!

Somewhat surprisingly, I can taste both the Acai and the Cheesecake – although I think the Acai is actually the strongest flavour which is awesome because my biggest complaint about the Acai soda was that it tasted weak and wasn’t flavourful. This is rich and creamy and does taste like a Berry Cheesecake. I’m really enjoying it!

I think both these matchas have also been featured free samples, so if you have both lying around I definitely recommended whipping yourself up a glass to test it out. You don’t really use much of each matcha so it isn’t a real waste if you dislike it, anyway.

Free Red Leaf Sample of the month! Thanks Red Leaf for offering this program. The more flavors of matcha I try the more likely I am to place an order soon, heh.

Anyway, I made a latte out of this today with 6oz milk, 2 ice cubes, 1/2tsp match and 1tsp sugar. Actually I made double what I just said and gave half to my husband! He really liked this flavor. He lived in Brazil for a while and was able to eat a lot of fresh Acai products, so that speaks well for this matcha. For me, not being very familiar with Acai flavor (I usually have it paired with blueberry or other fruits) it is a little strange. I think I might slightly prefer my “rich berry pie” flavored matcha, but I will have to do a couple more comparisons to come to a conclusion :)

Although I’ve never tried them, I think I’d prefer a creamy vanilla baked good, or nutty flavoring to my matcha probably…rather than fruity.

February’s sample of the month. This isn’t one of my favorites from red leaf. It tastes similar to blueberries, which is nice, but the aftertaste is more like cough syrup. I should also say that I’m not usually a fan of fruit teas, though. I’m not going to rate it for that reason. :)