Frontier Natural Products Co-op

The last time I reviewed this was during the Great Snowpocalypse of 2011 (that was a year, lemme tellya!) and I was fortifying myself to help hubby tackle 18 inches worth of snow shoveling.

Just for the record, this is not the same batch. But it is the same basic, inexpensive bulk no-frills, black tea I remember. Flavor profile reminds me of dark pumpernickel or Ry-Krisp crackers. Takes milk well. (I’m ready for milk in my tea again … like y’all, certain flavors and combos are strictly seasonal, and that’s a fall/winter thing for me.)

More than 18" of snow with drifts half again that high; wicked wind chill; it’s still falling; legs and hips already aching just thinking about the shoveling that’ll have to take place once it stops tomorrow: just needed something hot, dark, cheap, and no-nonsense. Sometimes it’s just too cold to be subtle.

Sticking with my previous opinion…there’s nothing absolutely outstanding about this purchase-in-bulk tea, but its cheap, basic, and goof-resistant. A solid pantry tea.

Fighting a mild cold, so I tossed in a couple teaspoons of dried peppermint leaves from my own plant hoping for a Vapo-Rub vibe. Didn’t quite work—I really have to hunt for the mint taste. Wonder if it’s due to leaf-drying error on my part (I just let them air-dry.) But it’s warm on a scratchy throat.

Purchased in bulk because it smelled h-e-a-v-e-n-l-y rich and malty in the jar. Didn’t quite live up to the in-store marketing, milder than expected. More like a genteel English breakfast, instead of a hearty kick-yer-hindquarters-awake Irish.

For medicinal use this evening—-de-tensing and de-toxing with a strong cup cut with a little peppermint.

This has made it into my permanent line-up of herbal/medicinals. First time I have tried it chilled—two parts leaf to one of peppermint. Refreshing.

I had forgotten that this has its own listing, but it’s too much effort to backtrack all the chance-combos and re-categorize. It’s just been a “too much” day all around, Charlie Brown. Sigh. Slump.

However, the bright spot was the evening’s steep-speriment: equal parts red raspberry leaf and dried lemon verbena, courtesy of the horticulturally talented k s. Left to steep easily 20 minutes, partly to wring all the herbal goodness out of the raspberry, and partly because it is just too wicked hot today to drink anything warmer than tepid, so I just let it cool in the cup. Perfect pairing. The lemon out-lemoned the strong leafiness of the raspberry leaf and made a nice little evening tisane.

Well, girls…after watching the calendar and drinking this for several consecutive evenings, I believe I can give it a thumbs up for doing what it’s purported to do! Symptoms reduced pretty significantly. Still looks like dryer lint.

With honey. It certainly sweetens, but doesn’t mask the dark-green-leafiness.

This is going to be an acquired taste, I think; drinking for the health benefits more than anything else. A deep forest-y taste; something an Ent or a wood elf might offer you to drink. Just now reading indigobloom’s comment from a previous note that it works with honey. Will try that next steep.

This is my other alt-health experiment for girl stuff. Husband teased me; said it looked like dryer lint. (He’s right.) But again, health benefits outweigh attractiveness. Here’s a rundown: http://wellnessmama.com/5107/herb-profileraspberry-leaf/

It tastes like what you’d expect from a raspberry leaf—35% raspberry, 65% plant roughage. Not particularly sweet or bitter; just leafy. I’m thinking it might be really pleasant chilled come summer.

First sample from TerriHarpLady! Brewed it gongfu style in my taiwan, while using Premium Mutzha Tikuanyin to season my new roasted oolong yixing teapot.
This is my first Se Chung oolong, and I can taste the woody astringency, but the peaches are rather in the background. This is an OK oolong, but not something to write home about. It’s not as roasted as other roasted oolongs, which means that there’s a tad more of the perfumy flavour that I don’t enjoy that much, but not enough to make the cup unpleasant. It’s the kind of oolong that I’d hand over to a friend who’s just venturing from the world of black teas into the world of green oolongs, and wants something “not too risky” to start with.
Dry leaves are various shades of brown, but a dark olive green emerges when they are brewed. The brew is a light copper, almost pink colour, and the smell is oh so typically oolong.

Another one from terri! (sipdown) I feel like i’m in the home stretch with those, though i have apparently really neglected the awesome swaps i received from fiddling and shmiracles heh opened up my swap box to pull new ones out and there were a bunch.

This is a nice middle of the road sort of roasty oolong. there’s a woody feel to this one and it leaves me mouth a little dry but over all it’s pretty tasty. I do like that it’s not overly charcoal feeling and the aroma of the leaves is pretty pleasant.

SIPDOWN! (249) Had a lovely cup of this in the morning to accompany my wafer cookies. I enjoyed this one while i had it :) thanks again terri! nearly done all your samples lol

I had this tea a really long time ago today. It appears that the story of my life these days is to make tea, be busy all day and barely have time to formulate my thoughts on the tea until late at night when i just want to go to bed :)

This one was a pretty average every day black tea for the morning. It was pretty mellow and on the milder side but still a relatively nice breakfast tea! Thanks terri!

Good all around black tea.

Spdown! Brought this one to Toronto with me for my morning cup just in case dad wouldn’t let me have any of his tea. Happy to have this one to kick off the morning.

thank you terri! I also had this one earlier today and remember finding it to be a rather uinremarkable darjeeling. A little astringent but not overly so. Mostly it’s just a tea that i can drink or not. Still glad to cross another one off my list and it won’t be a pain to finish the rest of this up!

sipdown! So looking forward to the weekend to really tackle my smaller sizes of tea that can be finished off relatively quickly. Especially since i have some new teas that i received in swaps and from orders that i really want to try but have to wait. go go self imposed restrictions!

Another lovely tea that Terri shared with me that i enjoyed. Confirming my suspicions that i really do enjoy assams. :)