Banana Matcha

Banana!!! I am going to tell you a (probably too long) story about my relationship with Bananas. I think it’s important to see my thought process that lead to choosing this matcha! Haha bear with me.

Bananas and I have a curious relationship. I don’t particularly enjoy them. Or their flavour. But sometimes I do. I crave them! What?! I loooathe those banana marshmallows, and banana runts were my least favourite! But that was when I was a kid – now I crave them! I despise the texture of eating a mushy banana, but I have fond memories of a Banana Curry I once had in Tonga. Sometimes I crave a peanut butter banana sandwich on soft white bread – oh, and I always love banana bread of any kind! I slather it with butter, yes, but I always love it! Bananas Foster in Cuba – that is also on my good list. Banoffee Pie? Yes. Frozen Banana from the fair? Yes. Banana in a smoothie? No. Somewhat strange and phallic cheesecake/phyllo banana dessert? Absolutely.

Phew – there’s my banana history in a nutshell. So I like bananas sometime! That’s the moral. Anyways – I was very curious about Red Leaf Tea’s Banana Matcha. I wondered what the flavouring would taste like – more like a banana-bread or more like a banana candy? Either way – I’ve been on a fruit flavoured matcha kick, and I knew I would prefer throwing some banana matcha into a smoothie as opposed to a real banana. Or even both – maybe I wouldn’t mind a real banana in there if there was some matcha too! A delve into the confusing workings of my mind x_x

Well! I do conclude that it leans more towards the sweet candy side of bananas – and for that I am a very happy camper! It smells so so sweet, just like the banana marshmallows I’ve come to crave – but the genius part is that you are in control of the amount of sweetener you add. Drinking a cup of this won’t have the same effect as eating a giant bag of candy marshmallows – although you will get a different kind of energy from the matcha :D
As always, you can find this matcha at Red Leaf Tea! ( http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/banana-matcha.html )

This matcha is amazing on its own, but I’m a masochist so I like to add just under a tsp of sugar. JK. It’s a perfectly acceptable amount of sugar and I do what I want. ;) As with most matchas, my favourite way to enjoy is in a hot latte. I’m still figuring out the logistics to a perfect iced latte or frappaccino, but when I do rest assured I will take a ton of pictures and blog it immediately :D

This is one of those matcha that you will want to have around for the kids, their friends, and when you want to make smoothies, or have a sweet treat. Its not my favorite from Red Leaf but its not bad at all it just reminds me of circus peanuts. Do you remember those things? Sort of like slightly hardened dried out marshmallow like candies. We used to get them at the dime store. Remember when we had “dime stores” … haha anyway I do enjoy this tea – takes me back to the good ol days, and really where they all THAT good? Oh well the point is – this is some good stuff and I do like it but its more of a banana candy like flavor rather than fresh ripe banana but at the same time I just don’t know how natural of a banana flavor one could possibly get – I don’t know if I have ever had a better banana flavor in a tea or anything else for that matter that was not a banana itself. I think that banana flavored things always tend to have that slightly strange flavor to it.
Now, this is where things get really good … I mixed my banana matcha with macadamia nut matcha to make a banana nut like matcha and it was excellent! Made a smoothie out of it that way too! It was QUITE yummy!

I did go with Robust flavoring on this one but I think you could easily go with distinctive and it have plenty of flavor.

You should get some yummy matcha – here is the link to the banana matcha!
http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/banana-matcha.html

I know that I should be drinking other teas right now… I have so many different teas to be tasting and reviewing, but I wanted more Matcha!

When I opened the package, it smelled very much like banana candies. I’m not a big fan of banana runts but I do like banana taffy. I don’t know why I don’t like the banana runts. I just don’t. So, as I was whisking this, I hoped that it wouldn’t end up tasting like banana runts.

It doesn’t. I don’t know, maybe it actually does but as I have it made up in my mind that I “don’t” like banana runts that because I do like this Matcha, I’ve decided that it doesn’t taste like banana runts. Does that make sense? Probably not. Does it have to make sense? I guess not.

It tastes good and sweet, but it isn’t an overly sweet banana taste. It tastes more like the fruit to me, rather than something overly sweet. The sweetness is more like the sweetness from the banana and the Matcha … which is what I mean about the tasting like the fruit rather than something too sweet. It tastes like banana mixed in with Matcha without the texture of the banana.

As I was opening this pouch and all the while as I prepared the Matcha, I couldn’t help thinking about the minions – http://youtu.be/BYBw_o_2nG0 – and their love of bananas. I love the minions.

I chose the distinctive level of flavoring together with the classic grade of Matcha, and I think that this combination worked well. The banana flavor is strong but doesn’t overwhelm the sweet taste of the Matcha. Interestingly, though, I don’t taste a lot of vegetative taste from the Matcha with this… it’s almost like the vegetal tones have melded with the fruit tones in some way. It tastes less vegetal and more banana-y, but I still taste the Matcha. The Matcha tastes more buttery to me this time around than vegetative. But it is still smooth and creamy and rich, and I’m loving it! You can get some of your own Banana Matcha here: http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/banana-matcha.html

It tastes absolutely lovely. I love it on it’s own, but I think it will also taste great mixed with just about any of the various Matcha flavors that I have in my cupboard. Cinnamon Banana … yum. Banana Cheesecake … yum! Strawberry banana … might be good. I think I’m one of the only ones out there that isn’t particularly crazy about the combination of strawberry and banana, even though I do usually add strawberries and bananas to my smoothies … I usually have other fruits in there too so that it’s not all about the strawberries and bananas. I am thinking I’d rather have boysenberry and banana.

Anyway… I don’t usually close my reviews with a song choice, but, I think it’s fitting to offer this song choice with this Matcha: http://youtu.be/wCkerYMffMo

Backlog!

This tea is everything I had hoped for and then some! Like fresh, fully ripe bananas mixed with a little bit of those yummy banana marshmallow candies! I got this one as part of the 3+1, husband tried to talk me out of it, but i kept thinking about this banana matcha smoothie that I used to get before work all the time. I got this as “There’s matcha in there” flavour level and it was definitely dramatic, in a good way! With this one I actually learned to sift prior to mixing. It actually bring out the flavour so much more and increases the amount of bubbles when you whisk! I actually preferred it without milk, which I wasn’t expecting.
This is definitely and absolutely a happy tea. The tea you have when you’re cranky to change it all. If it wasn’t so damn cold out I’d would try this as an iced tea. It’s going to be a great addition to a hot summer day. I think I need to tone down the flavour level because I can’t taste the matcha, which of course I should have taken the hint from the title, lol. It’s coming to work with me today though.
http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/banana-matcha.html

I’ve had this one a couple times now, and while I’m not loving it straight, you know how it is delicious? Make up the matcha a little strong, then add vanilla ice cream and fruit in the blender and whirl for a minute or two. That my friends? Is what I’m drinking right now and dang is it good!

(I’ve been a bit awol lately . . . RL kind of ate me. Hoping to get back and active now!)

I just want to say a gigantic THANK YOU to Red Leaf Tea for having this matcha sale. It has really opened my eyes to the magical world of matcha.
Here is a magical link:
http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/banana-matcha.html

Ok. So when I went to Red Leaf’s website I was stumped on which matcha to try next so I let my boyfriend pick one. He suggested we try the banana next (even though he HATES bananas. Weird? Yes). So I got my awesomtastic Red Leaf package today and decided to try this one first. The smell is so fantastic. It reminds me of that banana Runts(I think someone mentioned that in a different review). It smells so sweet it made me flash back to the good old times when my cousins and I used to fight over the bag of runts to get to the rare banana ones. Oh, memories.
The first sip was magical. It does taste like bananas but with a sweet twist. It’s obviously an artificial banana taste but it’s very well done. It has that banana runt taste to it too. I got the “delicate” flavoring and I’m happy I did! The banana is very strong and works VERY well with the matcha and it’s natural sweetness. This is definitely not for you if you want the more natural banana taste. But it most definitely is for you if you’re looking for something sweet and don’t feel like digging through a bag of runts for the banana ones :] So if you are that person I will gladly leave the link for you again:
http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/banana-matcha.html

Thank you again Red Leaf Tea!!!! :D

This is everything I wanted it to be, BUT, I recommend going with distinctive over robust. All my matchas have been robust, but this one makes me realize some flavours are way too strong for robust or higher flavouring. It’s a tad artificial and a tad overpowering with robust, but it’s still damn delicious. I just use a smaller amount when mixing or using it in a smoothie.

Banana taste was a bit mild but that might be age. I opened this one recently and it sat in my freezer for way too long, but it still quite tasty when made into a latte. Too bad I’m really limited to one of these per day if I want to sleep at night or I might go back for another one.

GCTTB Round 6

The Great Canadian Tea Box has landed, and I have to say that I’m very excited to be participating in it again! I had a lot of fun with it last round, and I’m sure that’ll be the case again.

This is my first pull! I’m very, very familiar with the Bananas & Cream matcha from RLT it’s a personal favourite so I was really curious how different the plain banana would taste compared to it. Sadly, I don’t have any B&C at the moment though so I’m just mentally comparing instead of doing a side by side.

Instead of milk, I whisked this one up in straight hot water because it didn’t feel right to do it in coconut or cashew milk (the two kinds of milk I have on hand) because back when I was regularly drinking the B&C I didn’t drink either of those kinds of milk so I wouldn’t be able to factor in the distinctly coconut or nutty notes each milk have respectively when used in matcha milk.

It was hard to remember to drink this one slowly; I was really thirsty and the tea tasted so good that I was slurping it really quickly instead of paying attention to differences. Honestly though? Maybe that’s because it didn’t taste that different to me. The banana was definitely VERY strong and really enjoyable but it tasted exactly like the sweet, creamy banana notes I got from Bananas & Cream. You know, a mix between banana pudding, banana medicine penicillin and those banana marshmallow five cent candies.

So good, but just not as authentic to the fruit as I’d always pictured the straight up banana matcha tasting. I can’t decide whether I’m disappointed by that. I mean, if there’s not a noticeable flavour difference between the two then what’s the point of having two distinct flavours?

Happy to have tried it regardless, though.

Ick! Maybe I got a bad matcha batch? I didn’t care for the artificial tasting flavour and the matcha base was super bitter (and this was matcha in milk). I compared it to the caramel matcha from red leaf (not bitter), and it was definitely a different base. Will be donating this one to the GCTTB, others are less sensitive to bitterness than me.