Cha Yen Thai

Oh… Oh my. Color me pleasantly surprised. Looking at the ingredients list I had been all prepared for another snarky “Oh look, it’s another Teavana candy-tea” review. And as most Teavana teas are, it is very sweet. Open the package and the scent of an almond cookie wafts right out.

But the ingredients are intruiging: pink peppercorns, entire star anise, slivered almonds. Brewed up to a lovely deep amber, it’s like sipping on a delicious almond spice cookie, and I love it. I can see the chai, kind of, and I can see the thai, kind of, but really let’s call a spade a spade. This is a cookie tea, and a tasty, complex and drinkable cookie tea. It’s plenty sweet with no extra sugar needed. I’m enjoying the combination of red and black tea. It makes for very good sipping.

You’ve done right on this one, Teavana. Let’s hope you can make more like this.

This is my favourite non-fruity iced tea. Well, I suppose it is a bit fruity with the pineapple, but mostly it is a mixture of sweet, woody rooibos, strong black tea, and chai spices.

I can really taste all the ingredients (anise, cardamom, clove, ginger, coconut, rooibos, black tea) and the pineapple is a tiny bit fruity and sweet, which goes with this very well. I’ve only got 10 cups worth of loose leaf left, an I’m really disappointed that this was discontinued.

I like this hot, as a latte (or slightly sweetened latte), or as an iced tea. It has many applications!

I’ve been savoring this tea for years, but it is time to move on. Only 1-2 servings left in my collection, and you cannot buy this at Teavana anymore. Anyway, I’m sure there are suitable replacements out there for this tea. I just have a sentimental attachment to this because it was the first Thai-style tea that I fell in love with and drank with enthusiasm.

What I love about this tea is that it is creamy right out of the tin. I did not think that possible with tea before, but now I know better! It is sweet and nutty, and the right amount of spice. Also, it is an attractive tea to look at in the tin, probably because of the colorful spices and the star anise.

I usually enjoy this tea with almond milk creamer, to enhance the nutty flavors.

This one smells better than it tastes.

Dry, its like a spice cookie. Steeped, its just spice and astringency. Not bad, but kind of a let down based on how good it smells. Probably should have had it with milk and sugar, but I didn’t have any at work.

Not a fan of this one. The myriad flavors don’t seem to express themselves very well after a shorter brewing time, but a longer one makes this tea come out pretty tannic. Fruits and stuff totally gone after one steep, and not enough actual tea in it to make more than one steep worthwhile. I suppose its one redeeming quality is that it made a halfway-decent iced tea.

A flavourful tea with body. Deeper than other teas I’ve tried at Teavana so far. Nice strong colour, tastes of Bubblegum!

It has been a long time since I have crossed paths with this tea. It is easy to overlook teas in my out of control amount of tea. It smells a little soapy and a hint of that is coming through in the taste. I’m guessing the culprit is the old coconut. I’m hit with a wave of spices mingling with tropical fruit flavors. It is nice despite it’s age. It doesn’t remind me anything of Thai tea, but that is okay. I’m noticing rooibos being much more tolerable when blended with other teas and that is definitely the case in this tea. I really enjoy this tea, but I won’t be sad when it is gone since I have so many other teas I like more.

Enjoying this Cha yen Thai tea mixed with Black dragon pearls also from Teavana (1 tsp. black dragon to 2 tsp. cha yen). It makes a very nice Thai iced tea with milk and sugar. And I love Thai food and Thai tea, so this is yummy. However, I am having serious cravings now that I am on Steepster for some “non-Teavana” teas—I can tell there is big budget breaker coming up in my future in the tea category lol!

I have been enjoying this tea as an cold brew. I only had a bit hot and I wasn’t particularly excited. As a cold brew, the cinnamon drops down a bit and the fruit flavors come up. I cold brewed it for about 18 hours. Sweetened with stevia.
It would be helpful to have steeping instructions for cold brew on our notes.

So I have lots of this because I received it from both VariaTEA and 221tea and I wasn’t sure what to do with it or where to start, so when I smelled it and thought it was kinda fruity I figured I’d cold brew the portion from VariaTEA and hope for the best.

I brought it to work and I could not resist going back to the staff room and drinking it when I should have been working and doing stock or other stuff. I thought it was really delicious! I should note; at this point I had not looked up the ingredients and I had no idea what was in it.

If I’d had to guess I would have listed things like: cinnamon, coconut, pineapple, apple, caramel, vanilla…

Now that I am looking at the list I’m not too far off on some things: there is coconut and pineapple (probably why I liked it so much) but ginger and star anise? Never would have guessed that, and I’m standing by those caramel and vanilla dessert type notes!

Honestly, I look forward to finishing this up (probably as a cold brew) but while it was really good I don’t know if the hassle of dealing with Teavana is worth seeking out more of this (just like how I feel about Caramel Almond Amaretti) so it’s probably not a restock…