Celestial Seasonings

Accidental Sipdown

I had 2 boxes of Celestial Seasonings in the cabinet and grabbed the wrong one. I had preferred this over the regular Sleepytime tea but tonight’s mug is not exactly inspiring. Pretty sure it’s because my mouth is sore from my dog headbutting me and causing a cut lip. It’s very sensitive, especially to heat.
Pushing through the sensitivity, this tea is pretty much as advertised. Creamy vanilla with spearmint and chamomile. I’ve enjoyed drinking this in the evenings throughout winter. It’s even better with a smidge of honey and cooling a bit. Pretty good for a grocery store tea.

I don’t drink this for the taste, I drink it for the specific purpose of helping me sleep. The taste is by no means, bad. It just isn’t anything spectacular but really, it doesn’t have to be, as long as it soothes me off to sleep. To my taste buds it’s predominantly spearmint with a hay-like background and a herbaceous/floral touch. As I sit here typing, I’m already getting sleepy. Sleepy time indeed!

I LOVE this tea! It is, bar none, my favorite pumpkin flavored tea. When I add 2 teabags to my 10oz mug along with some cream and a touch of sweetener, it tastes like pumpkin pie in a mug to me. I love how balanced the pumpkin and the spice flavor is. I only wish this was available as loose leaf because I would buy it by the pound.

Hmm, something in here is quite sweet. It tastes similar to Hot Cinnamon Spice, so maybe it’s the cinnamon flavor? Not sure.

Regardless, it’s still a pleasant enough tisane. Even though I’m not a fan of sweet teas, the hibiscus tartness counters it nicely. Really, it’s a bit like Hot Cinnamon Spice, if someone added a bunch of hibiscus to it.

It gives me a bit of a mulled wine or cider vibe. Not sure if I would repurchase it, but I could see it being nice during the holidays. Definitely doesn’t taste like plum though.

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 14/19

I thought this was a black tea, but it turns out it’s an herbal. Oops ha ha. :P

It steeps up unexpectedly dark due to the chicory. Flavorwise, it’s quite mild. The ginger and cinnamon are at the forefront, and I think there’s a bit of clove somewhere in the natural flavors. I don’t get a lot of chicory really, though I admit I haven’t had a lot of experience with it in general. There is a slight earthy toastiness and it does add a bit of body. The last ingredient is “luo han guo”, which is apparently monk fruit. Strange that they call it by the Chinese name, when monk fruit is a fairly common sweetener nowadays. Anyway, happily it’s not very strong in this blend.

To me, this doesn’t really taste like gingerbread, mostly because the ginger is quite zesty and tastes more like fresh ginger than the powdered kind used for baking. But it is a pleasant enough sweet spiced herbal brew that would be nice for the evening or after eating a bit too much.

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 9/19

I like this one more than I remember. This is one of the holiday teas that I recall sipping on with my sister when we still lived at home, along with Sugar Cookie Sleigh Ride.

It’s a nice sweet and nutty black tea, with a bit of vanilla and maybe caramel in there. The cinnamon is just a hint but adds a nice festive touch. I appreciate that it tastes like almonds and not so much like marzipan, although there is a hint of that too.

Overall, it reminds me of a buttery almond cookie, not unlike Simpson & Vail’s Almond Sugar Cookie. The only downside is the black tea is extremely thin and flat here, and doesn’t really contribute much other than a base for flavoring. Still, very nice for a grocery store teabag!

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 7/19

Yeahhhh, this one is not for me.

It tastes more like cherry than cranberry, and it’s definitely a candylike cherry. Add on the stevia, and it ends up tasting like a cheap cherry lollipop, or even a cherry throat lozenge. I don’t really taste the rooibos much under the flavoring and sweetness. The hibiscus is an attempt at balance, but there’s not enough to combat the overwhelming sweetness.

I think this one will go in my rehoming pile… :P

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 4/19

This one is a bit strange? It’s called candy cane and then it has cinnamon and chicory…?

It tastes good, but it doesn’t say candy cane to me. The peppermint is quite herbaceous and then the cinnamon adds just a hint of warm spice. I’m not sure I get why the chicory is here, it’s a bit odd. But the vanilla is nice and adds some creaminess.

It’s pleasant and interesting, and I can see it being festive. Not sure I would feel the need to purchase it again though.

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 2/19

Usually love Celestial Seasonings but this one is a miss. “Tea” is somehow bitter yet flavorless, combined with a phony pear taste.

Definitely lives up to its name – maple and ginger scent permeates the packaging, and upon steeping, those are the major flavors this herbal tea delivers. The ginger is nice and spicy, and the maple is a tad on the “syrup” side but not overly sweet or artificial. I find double-bagging and a slightly longer brew time really brings out the spiciness of the ginger, which helps the maple not be overly sugary. It’s a good cool-weather option (I can’t imagine enjoying this iced). If you see a box and it interests you, I think it’s a pretty safe buy.

This is the third of three Camomile-Honey-Vanilla teas I am comparing tonight. CS is the one which puts Honey first in its description. This is evident in its taste.
Of the three teas I compared tonight: Ahmad, Twinings and Celestial Seasonings, this was both the darkest and most flavorful for the single cup. For that alone it deserved the highest rating of the three, since to me that means one gets more oomph for the money. I haven’t looked to see whether the teabags themselves weigh more or not—they all seemed to be of the same quantity per bag. After all three cups had steeped for 5 minutes, I sampled them in order of mildest to strongest, out of fear the weaker-looking ones wouldn’t have the same olfactory overtones if I waited for them to cool.
I have to say that of the three, the Celestial Seasonings one has the best ‘stand alone’ quality. The one aspect I didn’t like as well was its aroma: I found the predominant honey just a bit cloying. However, that was not evident in the cup.
While I prefer the aroma of the Twinings, I have to admit that to drink alone, the Celestial Seasonings wins this particular taste test. I can still mix them with White Tea for a special nighttime blend, but now I know which one to go to if I want just one cup by itself!

I forget how easy this is to brew and go, with no bitterness or excessive cinnamon. There was a box squirrled away in my cupboard that I opened to take on a road trip. I use two tea bags for a 16 oz go mug and get spicy cinnamon goodness to keep me awake. I certainly wouldn’t reach for it at other times, but for fall or winter travel, its pretty convenient.

Surprisingly good! The tea is not overly harsh and the vanilla is right there. Does not have an overprocessed or chemical aftertaste. It does pack a punch – the caffeine is real. I checked the recommend box because it is good enough and does the job of giving me a kickstart in the morning; enough that I picked up 2 additional boxes. Can’t say I don’t recommend it if I’m buying more.

Do I get double points for two April health teas? This particular line of wellness teas evidently isn’t catching on in our neck of the woods—I keep finding them on the discount-please-take-it-home shelves; this time, at Big Lots.

Ah, well…serendipity for me, especially in the case of this oddball, but tasty blend that contains oatmeal, cinnamon, coconut milk, green banana flour, a little licorice, and dried blueberries.

I steeped my first bag in a mug with a dark interior, so I couldn’t tell whether it looks cloudy or milky due to the grainy ingredients. The oats are the first thing I noticed, then the cream from the coconut and banana flour (which didn’t taste banana-y), and the cinnamon that strengthened along the way, since I just left the bag in.

Overall, it was quite tasty—think “baby food” but in the most pleasant way, and if it cleans out the residue left by less-than-stellar dietary habits and a few Easter jelly beans, all the better!

Well, cold and flu season is upon us — one of the three in our household is significantly under the weather, one is sniffling, and I have neither the time nor the inclination to follow suit. So I’m spraying, sanitizing, and Cloroxing like a woman obsessed, and following up with all things immunity-boostish.

So I’m glad I still have a few bags of this Immune Support variety on hand. It’s got ginger, turmeric, and black pepper to clean out whatever clogs you; creates a pleasant little throat burn on the way down. I wish they had tweaked it to be just a touch more lemony, though, to camouflage the mild metallic tang that must be the added zinc and/or supplemental Vitamin C.

I found this box at a Big Lots, which is often the last stop before a product is discontinued, but it looks like the TeaWell series is still readily available from Celestial Seasonings.

Here’s my April healthy tea: a “take a chance” grab on sale for $2 since I like to keep a lemon ginger tea on hand for tummy troubles and didn’t have any.

I’m too lazy to get up, but I need to look more closely at the label and compare to the Celestial Seasonings information I copied here. I would swear mine has lemongrass as well as regular ol’ lemon itself.

Plenty of ginger in the cup to warm your tongue, but either the lemon is very understated or the minerally taste of the zinc is very overstated, so it has a medicinal, rather than a fruity feel. A little honey might help next time around.