Celestial Seasonings

The Sleepytime varieties that I’ve tried taste almost the same to me. The only difference is the smell. This smells wonderful, very peachy. I taste a bit of peach if I’m paying attention. Otherwise, just another chamomile blend herbal tea.

I’ve been dissapointed by most of the teas I’ve tried recently. This one tastes very weak to me. I’ll probably be passing this one along to my mom.

I was originally planning on using my last two teabags in the same mug to get more flavour from this, because it was so weak last time. The lovely gmathis however suggested that you can leave these teabags in, so instead I popped them in a teapot and settled in for a cosy, slow-drinking afternoon. I’m glad I did, because I got a lot more tea out of them this way! And what do you know, after about half an hour or so of steeping in the pot, the tea was actually at a drinkable strength. Hah! Thanks for the tip, gmathis! I thought I’d be able to pick out more notes when the tea was stronger, but as it turns out it’s just not the kind of tea that has ‘notes’ per se past sweet barley milk and orange. Maybe it did once upon a time, given the age that this is now, but I don’t think it was ever particularly complex. It’s still nice though, and a decent one to sip at slowly while reading.

I went through my tea box and found a couple of teas I’d counted as sipdowns already, and this was one of them. So I’m trying to get through those because I don’t want to have to add them back into my cupboard – I’ve just managed to get it under 300 for the first time in years (even though I was apparently cheating)! This was a lot milder than I remembered, I’ll have to use the last remaining two teabags for the same mug I think. A little sweeter than I would have liked, with a creamy citrus background. Hopefully I’ll have more to say next time, when I brew it a little stronger.

Sipdown 59/375! Okay so now my cupboard’s up-to-date!

This was imo another great caffeine-free tea from Celestial Seasonings. It was sweet (I accidentally added sugar once. Big nope.) and thick and soothing and I wish I could remember more about it to give a more detailed note. If CS were available in the UK I would definitely stock up on a few of their herbal blends.

Thank you so much to the incredible Marzipan for sending this to me. You’re a star!

Apparently this tea never made it to my cupboard! I got a whole box of it from M a while ago (very generously, thank you so much!!), and for some reason just never added it to my cupboard or spreadsheet, or wrote up any notes on it. It’s like a ghost tea! I drank Santa’s Secret earlier today and got to thinking about other candy cane/minty vanilla teas, and remembered that this one had been really good. For a green, and a bagged green too, I was super impressed with the smoothness of the base. It was a decaf too, so I drank it at all times through the day and the box didn’t last me very long at all. Maybe that’s why it never made it into my cupboard. I’ve only tried a few Celestial Seasonings teas, but those I have have either been really delicious or completely horrible. I’m glad this was one of the delicious ones!

I was down to one “normal” herbal (i.e. ones that aren’t used for lattes, iced teas, sickness, etc) so I ran to safeway to pick up some different varieties. You know, it’s interesting: I helped out at the homeless shelter today for the first time and people were kind, appreciative and jovial. I went to a couple of stores (LCBO, shoppers, etc) and people were angsty. Really makes you think, eh?

Anyways, onto this tea: this is your standard vanilla rooibos, which to me means not enough flavouring and tastes more like rooibos than anything. I’ll use it up well enough but will not repurchase since it does not “wow” me.

Light tea, great for evening. available as of 12/18/2016

I’ve had trouble sleeping my entire life. According to my mother, as an infant I stayed awake all day, not falling asleep until around 10pm. Now as an adult I stay awake all day and without sleep aids fall asleep around 2-3 am.
This tea doesn’t work on it’s own, but still I drink either this or Yogi Bedtime every night, along with the rest of my very extensive pre-sleep ritual.
I probably wouldn’t this if it didn’t have sleep problems. To me it doesn’t have much taste. I drink it with milk and honey to give it some flavor.

This smells wonderful. I love how it makes my house smell like honey and vanilla. It doesn’t seem to have much flavor, however. I’ve been adding a bag to my cup of Sleepytime Extra for the scent, but I won’t repurchase.

I loved the idea of this, and while it did indeed have a “sugar cookie” taste, it was way too cloying for me. It almost tasted like drinking butter. However, the friend I tried it with enjoyed it, so I don’t think it’s inherently bad, just depends on your personal taste/preferences.

So I’m just starting off into the world of tea and I picked up a bunch of staple Black Teas by classic brands at my local Fresh Thyme including this right here. As a complete newbie, this is amazing compared to the Tazo and Great Value teas I’ve had. The flavor is simple but rather deep and satisfying, rounded out by what must be the Mate. Really, really enjoying this, especially for the price. If this is just a decent tea, I can’t wait to taste a really good one.

December 1st! Hard to believe eh? A colleague brought in treats and holiday teas today. This one really surprised me. It’s quite rich and buttery, and smells wonderful brewed up. Like seriously, warm fresh baked from the oven sugar cookie wafting aroma. It tastes pretty bang on too. Sugar cookies are a quintessential part of the holidays for me. I’m going to have to pick up a box of these! We also got a nice start to December choosing a picture to post by our desk that reminds us of Christmas. I chose the cranky mall elves and Santa from The Christmas Story movie – a holiday-must-watch each year for me!

More from mom’s tea cabinet. She’s a big fan of fruit tea blends. Here’s another one.

This one I like better. The orange fits better with the tea base. The orange is still soothing and prominent, but the tea base is still in the mix. Pretty good balance.

I would like it to be a little less spiced, but it is what it is. Good orange taste, too spicy, could use more tea base taste.

The Thanksgiving tea marathon continues. The next find in mom’s cabinet. I would normally never buy fruit tea blend, but it’s a holiday, so I might as well try something new.

Smells good. I do like fruit, and juice, and peach. So I should like this, yeah?

Of course it’s good. The peach flavor is nice and crisp and clean. And if that’s what you’re looking for, this is great. We can argue all day whether this is “tea” or not, but in the end, it’s just a good sipping peach flavored tea blend.

I would like the tea base to shine through a little more. But that’s me. I’m a stubborn tea snob. ;)

More interesting finds from my moms tea cabinet. She said this is close to a chai tea. Sort of. It’s really more of a strong Spiced tea. And when I say strong, I mean the scent alone cleared my sinuses.

I’m actually not a huge fan of spiced teas, but this one I like for some reason. Still, the spice flavor overwhelms the tea base. But I guess that’s what a spiced tea is supposed to be.

In that case, this is an amazing Spiced Tea. I’m just not a spiced tea fan.

I actually love this tea.

You know how caramel apples seem so brilliant and appetizing, in theory? It’s the holiday season and it’s dark out but the incandescent lights of a mall are so yellow and warm, and now that you’re inside you’re actually starting to get a a little toasty in your heavy jacket. You peer into the glass display case of That Commercial Confectioner (name withheld) and see rows and rows of sleek, shiny, beautiful candied fruits. You can just imagine the complementary marriage of apple and caramel: sweet-on-tart, creamy-on-crunchy, gooey-on-firm.

Then you buy the apple and the caramel is really thick and actually hyper-sweetened with no darkness or richness and you can barely even penetrate it because it clogs your jaw. And when you finally do, you’re left with a sad, naked, hardened Granny Smith, bare of caramel and bereft of flavor. And you are so sad. So you just eat the caramel and then feel bad because you wasted the apple, and curse Corporate America and The Holidays and spend the remainder of the day grinching out, surreptitiously trying to pry caramel out of your molars whilst being accosted by holiday salespeople.

You know what I mean…right? But this tea doesn’t do that. This tea doesn’t disappoint. Being a liquid, it doesn’t suffer from the logistical plights of actual caramel apples. This tea is the caramel apple on the rack, perfect and glistening and full of holiday hope, sweet and warming and delicious. It is wonderful. Try it.

This is an ok rooibos, sort of like a plainer version of Jeoffery’s African Celebration. There are definitely undertones of marzipan and vanilla, but not strong clean vanilla like vanilla extract. There is a kind of silty metal/mineral flavour? It is fairly common in rooibos and isn’t bad at all. The rooibos base is mediocre.

Very surprised by the quality of this teabag, a great caffeine free alternative to a Chai tea. The tea had a bold character full of cinnamon but the offnotes of Ginger, cloves and nutmeg seem to fall short and have no stamina. The warm spiced tea has no bitter or astringent taste even when steeped for an excessive amount of time. It is naturally sweet and doesn’t need any sugar.

See my full review, coming soon to Sororitea Sisters.
http://sororiteasisters.com/author/mrspremise/

Man, I’m surprised to see the low score because this has always been a great one to me with a very solid taste. I’ve also always liked the little paper bag that you have to unfold to get to the tea bags inside. If you aren’t looking to break the bank on solid tea, this one is a great choice!