White Christmas

Bagged,
Aroma when Dry: Sweet, spicy, frosty, delicate
After water is first poured: crisp, can detect both the mint and ginger notes.
At end of steep:
Tea liquor:
first color: grassy brown
At end of steep: notes blend, deepen and warm.
Color: deep tea brown
Staple? YES, hope to stock up for full year this time. -looking into ordering the loose leaf. Would be a go-to tea if it were not seasonal.
Time of day preferred: Any, though lovely in afternoon.
Taste:
first notes: sharp, crisp, bright. The mint mellows the ginger through
Additives used (milk, honey, sugar etc)? No
Lingers? Yes, with a clean, crisp light texture, with same notes, though mint is a touch more prominent. It is here that the floral nature of the white tea is most noticeable.
As it cools? Fresh, fragrant. Mint takes lead note, with floral and ginger following.
Want to try chilled sometime.

I’m re-reviewing this tea again because I’ve been drinking it for years. I don’t know why, it speaks to me.

So, I drink this tea in the loose leaf and also the bags. I buy the bags 250 at a time from the Stash website, a couple times a year. If I happen to see it out and about at a grocery store around the holidays I’ll grab an extra box or six. I drink at least 3 cups a day, every day.

Firstly, I haven’t died, so if this tea had a high lead content, I’d have announced it by now with my death, so that’s good to know.

I’m not sure why I’m so particularly attached to this tea. I’ve rated it 100 again cause its my favorite and I do what I want. It’s white, and I prefer white. It says it also has peppermint and ginger root. Peppermint I love, but sometimes peppermint tea is too oily for me. This is mostly all white tea with a little peppermint, and little flecks of ginger root. It’s got a nice light pepperminty flavor, and the ginger root you don’t taste at all, which is great for me because ginger is not my cup of tea, if you get me. HOWEVER, tea often makes me feel sick as I drink it often on an empty stomach, but this stuff is a concoction for a better tummy, which is awesome.

Now I’ve started doing something even funner which is I got some white matcha and I’ve started sifting a little bit of that into my White Christmas. You can’t even taste it because the white tea and the white matcha meld beautifully.

Make sure you use a lower temperature for it so it doesn’t get bitter. I’ve been using 176F.

Now the loose leaf is a little iffy for me. I looooove the bags. But for some reason I get wildly different results from the loose leaf pot to pot so usually I just use the bags cause I’m stodgy. With the loose leaf you need to be precise, and you need to shake the bag. It’s got really big pieces and if you’re not careful you end up with a big scoop of only one ingredient. With the bags I just chill out with the bag in the hot water, with the leaves they HAVE TO COME OUT or it will taste baaaaaaaaaaaaaaad.

Overall it’s the best and you all need to drink it so Stash will never discontinue it.

Stash, still waiting on that sponsorship.

The Mint smells great but the ginger not so much. The taste is about the same…almost like the two are fighting each other. I don’t think I like that. It might be better cold. This isn’t a sipping tea hot…maybe after it cools to ‘luke-warm’ I will chug…to try and get thru it.

I passed this tea out to my co-workers and it was a hit during the holiday season. A nice tea for the season.

My go-to tea for when I have a cold during the winter holiday season (which I inevitably always do, grr!). Bagged is actually preferred in such situations, when I can barely crawl out of bed to boil water let alone deal with loose tea.

I have drunk this only from the bags. I think this tea is a delightful but delicate blend for the holidays. Although it’s not too different from many other varieties of Christmas tea, the subtle ginger note adds a great deal. This tea is a great one to let steep for a long while as you drink it; the subtle notes only become more pronounced. Stash is correct when they add that a bit of sweetener goes a long way, also.

Tried this Wednesday as per a recommendation of my supervisor… do not want. I just can’t stand herbal teas. I think this theoretically would be great for my stomach problems since it has both ginger and peppermint, but if it tastes bad, no can do.

Mmmm. This is a great tea to drink when you have an upset stomach. One cup of this and all your tummy woes just disappear.

I primarily drink this when I’m not feeling well, but it certainly doesn’t hurt its case that it also tastes pretty good. It’s very strong peppermint with a hint of ginger spice at the end. The delicate white tea is probably there, but my palate isn’t quite sensitive enough to pick it out. I imagine it soothes the overall blend a bit, though.

One thing I do have to warn about is that this is a strong tea. You WILL be hit with a sack full of peppermint bricks and then drizzled with burning ginger. It is not for the weak of heart! But if your mouth can handle it and your stomach has a need for it, this is a good tea.

I really like this one, but it can not be steeped for a long time. It’s perfect in the first few minutes, but if you leave the bag in the ginger will become too aggressive.

Sigh.

So I made an order from the Stash website specifically for this tea, because it’s apparently a website exclusive. And I like mint and white tea so it seemed right up my alley.

Welp, for a tea called “White Christmas”, I sure don’t taste much white tea in here. The peppermint leaf completely takes over the blend. It might as well be a plain peppermint tisane, because that’s mostly what I taste. I do get a touch of earthy ginger heat on the backend, but mostly it’s herbaceous peppermint that leans a big wet rag-ish.

I mean, I’ll drink through it as a bedtime tea, but I was so excited for it. Sad panda. At least I got a couple of cute holiday mugs in that order… :P

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 12/19