Pumpkin Spice Chai

I’m trying this a second time. It just tastes like Chai. Chai is my favorite kind of tea. Its a perfect day today: 58 degrees, I’ve got the AC on. I’ve been cleaning for an hour or more. All I have left is the bathroom. I went to the local market to eat a salad for lunch and make flash cards for chapter 5 Spanish. I’m enjoying this weekend, taking time, sipping tea, and no school on Monday. Thank you Veterans. I’m visiting my Grandpa’s grave on Monday. He’s a veteran and died on Veteran’s Day.

I got this in my tea haul at Walt Disney’s Epcot in the Twinings Tea Shoppe in England in the World Showcase. It’s one of my staple autumn/winter teas. Perfect for when the weather is cold and either pumpkins are on your porch or a lit up tree is in you living room (hopefully not at the same time).

Somehow this manages to taste like a canned pumpkin with the most unappealing spice blend. Issa no from me.

A few teabags of this tea ended up on my desk from a coworker because it gave her heartburn.

It does have more of a pumpkiny taste rather than just pumpkin spices, but at the trade-off of tasting really artificial…. like an exaggerated sweet pumpkin pie flavor. The spices, too, are really strong and taste of flavorings rather than actual spices, which really slap in the face… especially the clove note. It leaves a sort of pepperiness on the tongue, so I can see why this could give my coworker heartburn.

That said, I don’t hate it… for a quick bagged tea that I’m going to mindlessly sip from my work thermos, it’s fine. But it doesn’t hold a candle to the multitude of loose leaf pumpkin spice offerings I’ve tried.

This was included in Lexie’s advent box, thanks Lexie!
I wasn’t expecting much here as I’m not a big fan of their regular chai, but this has a nice mellow pumpkin and a ginger note too. Steeped up nicely in my go cup when I probably steeped it too long. I’d grab a box of this if I saw it in the store. A nice change of pace from regular chai.

Unlike with their Apple Chai (need to try that one again) this one, I don’t care much for. The spices here are kind of muddled and very earthy I suppose? Not in a pleasant way. It’s very clove and nutmeg heavy and milk helps but probably a latte method would be ideal. I definitely get pumpkin spice which is a plus but prefer a tea that is balanced in taste prior to adding milk. It’s not bad at all for a bagged tea and for someone who usually makes lattes a good choice. I probably just need to stop expecting a chai to taste good without milk. It smells really good though and the base isn’t bad.

I only had one teabag of this, so this is a latte sipdown! It is a bit older (2 years maybe?) and I don’t really drink bagged chais very often because I prefer most herbal ones. However, in the interest of cleaning out my stash, this makes a good cup with breakfast.

Twinings uses a malty but brisk base in their chais. The cinnamon, orange rind, and clove are apparent, but not well balanced with the nutmeg. Pumpkin pie tastes best with clove, allspice, and mace in it instead of just clove. I actually can’t tell the difference in flavour if I taste the spices by themselves, but I swear pumpkin pie tastes better using all three. My grandmother’s recipe uses orange juice, nutmeg, cinnamon, clove, allspice, ginger, and mace. I think maybe my expectation of pumpkin pie flavour is skewed by the family recipe.

Anyway, this made a really nice latte and I enjoyed it a lot.

This tea tasted nothing like pumpkin spice to me, it tasted more like nutmeg tea than pumpkin spice. I love nutmeg, it a fun ingredient to use when cooking but it is extremely potent and a little goes a long way. Personally this just wasn’t a great tea to me. I’m going to finish off the box but I wouldn’t label this as a true pumpkin spice but a nutmeg based chai.

My fiance has discovered that the quickest way to turn my bad mood into a good mood in the fall and winter is to put a steaming cup of Chai into my hands (and to be honest, he is right). So, when I got curious over this tea in the store he picked it up with this rationale: it is Chai, you are almost out, and even if you don’t love it you will drink it or give it to your mother.

Once again, he isn’t wrong. Luckily, the spices in this one are strong enough that I don’t have to double bag the tea with half a cup of hot water before adding milk. One bag is normally enough to do the trick.

This morning, I goofed a little on the amount of milk. Let’s be honest, I goofed a lot. The cup was more milk than tea, but it was the best cup of Pumpkin Chai I’ve had with this so far! The extra milk brought out the sweetness and creaminess of the pumpkin while having a nice rounded spice finishing aftertaste. It was delicious and complimented my sausage, egg, and spinach breakfast really nicely.

This does make me wonder if I’ve been making this tea all wrong in the first place though. If that much extra milk brought out extra sweetness and creaminess, then I should just pick up a little bit of cream to see if using less of cream instead of milk will bring about the same sort of deal without cooling down the cup to iced tea levels. Luckily I still have about four bags of this left, so I have time to expirament a little and see.

Wow, so disappointing! It smelled FANTASTIC! You could really smell pumpkin and a great chai blend. I checked my expectation levels before sipping and was still disappointed. I tipped it out (a rare occurance). I agree with another reviewer that this tastes a bit of rooibos? Weird.

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