Vanilla Rooibos Parfait

I picked up a tin of this at Starbucks as I was getting some coffee beans. I am looking for some low/no caffeine teas for evenings (my poor husband was up ALL night the evening we had the Tiger – literally not a wink of sleep!! Me – I’m pretty sure there is actually coffee and tea in my veins, and not blood, and it doesn’t bother me. ANYWAY!).

This was in the new pouches with the full leaf tea – well, as full as rooibos gets – they were like twigs (which is actually fuller than the plain rooibos I have which looks almost like a powder). There were all kinds of bits and pieces of Stuff in there too (the tin tells me licorice root, blackberry leaves, cinnamon, apple pieces, peach pieces, vanilla extract, chamomile flowers). I put a touch of tupelo honey in our cups – maybe half a teaspoon each.

This was really good! The tisane tasted a little like an herbal apple pie to me, crust and all :) I did a resteep at 6 minutes and it was a little watery- I would try it at perhaps 8 minutes. It was a real treat.

It’s a little expensive (a little over .46 an 8 oz serving if you don’t resteep) but really nice. Good job Tazo and Starbucks! I would definitely repurchase and now I’m curious about the other full leaf offerings! If you’ve had one you enjoyed, do tell!

Sipdown no. 12 for the year 2014, and my 550th tasting note. :-)

This is a fitting blend for it, as it was really the first “tea” that I felt I’d been successful in steeping (i.e., it had flavor!) and was what led me to try everything else. At the time I had no idea that rooibos was so forgiving-so it was a huge (though misplaced) confidence boost.

I owe it much, so parting is bittersweet.

Came home from the anime convention, brewed up this, and put my feet up. It was a ton of fun. We went to some good panels, and I bought some beautiful art. My favorite part was all the talented artists who were showing work, and the magnificent costumes. Everyone is so enthusiastic at a convention!
This tea was a Chrismas gift from a coworker, who knows my love of tea and vanilla, so that was unbelievably adorable that she gave it to me. And despite the presence of at least three vanilla teas in my cupboard, and one of them decaf, I always operate under the opinion that you cannot have enough vanilla.
Its not a strong vanilla. The rooibos is a little stronger than the vanilla. Hmm. But its a perfectly pleasant cup of rooibos, and I will happily drink it all.
Whew, what a day.

My illness has left me home for the whole day. I’m a busy body and very restless today. But, I get up to do something and then I get exhausted. So, I spent 30 minutes hunting through boxes for a book I read 5 years ago and want to read again. I can’t find it. So, I made tea and put on another girly movie.
I’m hoping this tea will help me relax, tomorrow I should feel a bit better and I can accomplish some stuff tomorrow.
I like this tea, I think it’s inappropriately named however. It’s more apple and cinnamon than vanilla. Which is why I felt compelled to purchase and actual Vanilla Rooibos tea. I’m bored with my collection at the moment. Then again I’m bored with EVERYTHING today!!!!! I just want to get up and go for a hike or even just do some laundry.

Another tea that I’m finishing off! Which is good…because my David’s Tea order has been shipped!

Update on my wonderful vanilla rooibos…ahhh how I love thee! I must admit I used to get the vanilla rooibos lattes from Starbucks at $3 something a pop and then I had an epiphany, why not try to make my own latte?! 1 cream and 1 sugar later and this is an exact replicate of the Starbucks version and so now I am even more in love with this treasure!

Ahhh…this is as good as I remember it. This was the cup of tea that started it all. Had an immensely flavorful cup at Starbucks when they first came out with the tea sachets. Was so impressed with the flavor I started my tea addiction, found teavana, found steepster and now have the cupboard to show for my addiction!

Sweet, smooth with a little bit of a spicy tingle in the aftertaste. This is good!

Every time I have a cup of this tea, I am pleasantly surprised, and it happened again today. Something about the blend is very appealing, despite my anti-rooibos prejudice. This must be the rooibos for non-rooibos drinkers!

I decided to take a break from my habit of walking home from Starbucks with a cup of Refresh in tow. I really enjoyed this herbal blend instead. I’ll definitely be drinking it again in the future. The flavor is completely different from any other herbal blend I’ve tried. Despite the vanilla and the large number of chamomile buds in evidence in the spent sachet, this blend does not taste at all like Sleepytime Vanilla (which I imbibed last night).

It tastes rather sweet and most of all like … Vanilla Rooibos Parfait: one of a kind!

Had a Vanilla Rooibos Tea Latte at Starbucks tonight. It was pretty tasty. I told them to leave out the sugar syrup that they usually add. So it was just the tea and steamed milk. Think next time I’ll just go with the tea because the milk muddles the flavor a bit I think- and they charge extra just to put steamed milk in there!

I was in an un-name-able store in order to buy little tea cups so I could have a tea party with my guy friends. Because I couldn’t have tea party without the cups. WELL they had freaking nothing, so I bought four “appetizer bowls” and they work perfectly! They even seem fancy. haha! http://www.webstaurantstore.com/cardinal-r0742-4-oz-spirit-china-deep-appetizer-bowl-24-cs/552R0742.html

I digress, the store also had some Tazo teas! I only go to Starbucks for Pumpkin Spice Lattes, but I thought I would pick some up knowing it’s a decent brand at least!

It’s a nice tea, it’s making me sleepy. It is a little bit like apple pie, but the taste is very mild. After eating a very rich supper of homemade jerk chicken and spinach feta pizza with 13% alcohol honey mead and dark chocolate beer… the mild tea is just what I need to sober up and go to sleepytimes.

It is a bit licorice-y but not too much. Mostly apple and cinnamon, with a lot of woody rooibos. I will try as a latte, and I have vanilla syrup to sweeten so it will be perfect!

My favorite way to sweeten lattes is just drizzle a bit of syrup on top, none inside. This has been such a random note…