Tiesta Tea

Super tart cuppa from last night; far too much of an acidified apple taste to be enjoyable. I was feeling tired anyway, so I just didn’t bother finishing the mug. Anti climatic tea to be ending the day on…

Had a coworker make this one for me iced, but we just let it steep for like half an hour.

I think a longer steep time was really beneficial for this one because it just drew out so much extra flavour – it was sweet and robust with these mega juicy apple notes, sweet but a little tart lime undertones and then some actual cooling/crisp and distinct mint notes in the finish. That’s right guys, the mint finally came through!!! Ah!

Also, I feel like I haven’t gushed enough lately about how much I love and appreciate working something that’s not just tea related but with coworkers who can, for the most part, get on my level when it comes to my raving ‘tea talk’. It’s also really nice to be able to say “Jessica, can you make me a cup of INSERT TEA HERE” and for them to actually be able to make the tea, and make it well! I love my coworkers.

Tasted like fresh squeezed lime juice, with granny smith apple undertones. I don’t know how they did it, but I felt like I got the distinct taste of the apple skins as well. Again not as much mint as you’d expect from a mojito but it was present in the finish just slightly following the wave of acidity from the lime/apple combo.

It’s kind of a weird profile, and I don’t hate it – in fact I think the lime and mint is totally growing on me, but it’s definitely not something I’d say is ideal for hot tea which is how I drank this cup.

Cold Brew!

I do think I enjoyed this one a little bit more as a cold brew – the flavours seemed a bit juicier and the finish was very crisp/clean. I got a lot of apple, again, but also quite a strong presence of lime and hints of lemon as well. However, once again I just did not taste the peppermint in the blend apart from the part it likely played in terms of that really clean/crisp finish. What is a Mojito without mint!?

Maybe this is a good candidate for some peppermint agave experimentation…

So, a fancy ass coffee shop recently opened up near me downtown and a coworker let me know that they also carried a selection of Tiesta Teas – I figured I’d go take a peak and see if anything jumped out to me.

Honestly though? The majority of the selection was pretty boring. You know a lot of standards/classics in terms of flavour: A straight green, a chai, a jasmine scented tea, a generic orange flavoured tisane…

I did want to grab something though, and I ended up opting for this one. I thought it seemed like the most original/inventive of the flavour options they had – and I thought it might be a nice addition to my cupboard. I have had different Mojito inspired teas before so there’s definitely a mental comparison between those blends and this one, but why not give it a shot? I don’t hate Mojitos in general, so this could be fun!

Now, I’m pretty sure the sweet spot with this one is gonna be as an iced tea, but the first way that I tried it was hot despite that belief. It smelled very strongly of apple both as dry leaf and while it was steeping; and to be fair there are a lot of very large apple chunks in the blend. Like, very distinct sliced apple segments.

Flavour wise, not surprisingly, it was also very heavy on the apple notes. Now, that’s not a bad thing – but considering apple isn’t one of the main flavours in a Mojito I found myself craving more of those sort of notes. The lime was present though; it sort of transitioned out of the tartness of the apple top notes and then become part of a coupling of apple and lime notes in the body. I didn’t taste any mint though, which was really disappointing to me. I mean, what is a mojito without mint!?

Overall, I didn’t hate this – but I did find it pretty disappointing in terms of flavour profile compared to what I’d expect from a Mojito inspired blend.

Pleasant but pretty generic. I definitely prefer the lychee black from the Asian market.

The floral notes came out for me this time, in addition to the citrus. The finely ground rooibos planted it all nicely. Quite enjoyed it. Raising my rating to reflect this newfound joyfulness in the cup.

To me, this tastes like Red Rose tea, but it’s a rooibos. It’s ok. It might benefit from additives, ie. milk and sweetener.

This tea is disgusting. I have had and liked an herbal cocoa mint blend in the past (I recall the company had rooibos in the description), but it had been discontinued and I’ve been searching for a replacement since. This is not a proper replacement for it. All I can taste is watery rooibos with a little chocolate mint. The whole thing is weak and watery and unbalanced. I’m glad I found it in bulk and only bought a little bit of it. Bad tea makes expensive compost.

This tea brews up a surprising pink, but is just as sweet, creamy, and nutty as it smells. The flavor is on the light side, so perhaps adding more ‘leaves’ would help strengthen the brew. It has hints of apple, almond, cinnamon, and cream that leaves a nice, comforting feeling behind. I’ve noticed others have compared it to David’s Tea Forever Nuts; I had a sample of that one quite a while ago, but I recall being unimpressed with it. Tiesta Tea’s version is one I would go to rather than David’s Tea (although perhaps I just need to try it again).

One of Tiesta’s Immunity blends, it’s a delicious and sweet way to fight off being sick.

There are very few teas that achieve what’s basically staple status for me, but this is one of them. It’s tangy and citrusy, and what’s not to love about that deep pink color? The best part, though, is the distinct cooling flavor of the eucalyptus that just totally makes this tea for me. A great anytime tea, but especially good for those under the weather days.

This is a very utilitarian tea for me. If I need a quick pick-me-up, this works. As a part-time coffee drinker, this is like taking Folgers when you prefer freshly-ground whole bean local roasts. Its greatest boon is being a widely available, loose tea, and if I’m all out of something decent, I can grab this at my local grocery.

Sipdown (1025)!

Adding the last of this to the travelling tea box, since it was requested. Decided to have one last “goodbye” mug though before sending it along to be tried by others. I found it pretty generic fruity, maybe a bit more papaya and strawberry? Having never tried Fruity Pebbles cereal I’ve never fully been able to speak to the accuracy of the name but for a fruity green tea this is very inoffensive.

I was fighting off the last of my Winnipeg cold this week, so I tried to make a bit of a conscious effort to drink some of my older teas or teas that are lower quality/that I don’t love all that much, as a cold is a good opportunity to put a dent in some of those since my tasting is still off – this was one of those teas I pulled, and it kind of ticks all three of my aforementioned boxes? I was somewhat surprised that it was still an ok cup though; I think it’s actually kind of decently balanced and the fruity note (while INCREDIBLY generic) isn’t unpleasant or overly sweet. It’s a mediocre tea, but you gotta drink one of those every now and then to really appreciate the good stuff!

Cold Brew!

Set this one up to cold brew because I was craving it, but by the time it was ready to be strained I wasn’t craving it anymore so I just let it keep sitting. For nine days, because that’s how long it took for me to feel like maybe I’d be in the mood to drink it. Probably goes without saying, but after nine days of brewing it no longer tasted drinkable. Just weird sour grassiness, and far too intense perfumey florals and fruit notes. I’m not surprised; I’ve done this to myself enough times that I should know better by now – but evidently I just don’t learn from past mistakes.

Cold Brew.

So, you know what happens when you forget about this tea when it’s cold brewing and let it cold brew for a solid eight fucking days? You get a liquor that tastes EXACTLY like grass, and strawberry scented soap. It’s kind of the worst.

Obviously didn’t finish the cold brew. It was nasty.

My cold brew game is slipping; I need to get to my brews more promptly! That was 100% my fault for putting off straining this one/forgetting about it. Poor, poor ruined tea…

Iced, with the smallest smidgen of honey to brighten it up a bit.

This was REALLY good iced; it almost entirely tasted like really ripe, sweet strawberries but there was a pinch of something more tropical in the undertones. More pineapple than papaya, I’d say – there was a juiciness that I just don’t associate with papaya typically. Touches of grassyness in the finish; nothing too strong though.

Overall, I found this one REALLY refreshing and perfect for a hot summer day.

Tea Popsicles!

…gross ones though.

For the added fruit, I mixed in chunks of apple and orange segments that I thought would add to the fruity frlavour of the tea, and honestly the only thing that ended up tasting good about the whole creation was the added orange segments. The apple just turned to nasty mush, and despite the tea being a really fruity one and having been cold brewed instead of steeped hot it just tasted very bitter. No one wants a bitter popsicle; that’s just a sad time…

Cold Brew!

So, I spent the better part of drinking this trying to figure out why it tasted so painfully familiar to me. It took the better part of 25 oz, but eventually I landed on the fact that it’s really similar to DAVIDsTEA’s Strawberry Shake! I mean, I even went and double checked the ingredients to see how much overlap there is… and there’s quite a bit.

This has the green base, papaya, and the strawberry. Only thing missing is the yogurt, and then of course this has pineapple and rose which the DT blend does not.

That makes sense to me because the sweet strawberry and papaya notes were both really present but I didn’t get the light creaminess that’s in Strawberry Shake. I do enjoy the creaminess in DT’s tea, so the absence was a bit odd. However, I think because of the additional pineapple the fruitiness in this tea is a lot more robust and distinctly tropical tasting so the trade off is more than worth it. I couldn’t taste the added rose, though.

Overall I liked this one! I thought it was fun and rather appropriately Spring/Summer flavoured. I do think the choice to name it after a cereal is kind of odd? I guess I’ve never had Fruity Pebbles before so I don’t know if the comparison is realistic, but nothing in this reminded me even remotely of cereal and I can’t see it going well with milk either. As a dupe for DT’s Strawberry Shake though, I think this COULD work if you were looking for that kind of thing.

This is a fantastic, very flavorful herbal tea! I’m currently on day 8 of a 10-day diet detox for which I’ve had to cut out gluten, meat/animal products, dairy, alcohol, sugar, and – you guessed it – caffeine. This tea has been one of my saviors over this period, because it’s delicious without sugar and really easy to steep on the go, since the fruit doesn’t need to removed from the water after a certain period of time. Drunk hot, this blend reminds me of orange juice, and there’s an underlying sweetness from the mango that I really enjoy. I can’t wait to try this one iced!

Sipdown (343)!

This isn’t really a sipdown I’m upset about, like at all. In fact I feel pretty accomplished having now finished off 50g of this – a tea that on the whole I really didn’t like. I just ordered some new rooibos blends as well, so out with the old and in with the new!

It’s a very, very tart hot brew with really sour hibiscus notes and then undertones of equally tart/sour and acidic cranberry and currant. The only reason I’m not totally against it is because it’s Thanksgiving and the cranberry notes actually feel really on point/fitting for the holiday. Like cranberry jelly, without the sweetness. That, and the bright red liquor looks REALLY pretty in the new glass ghost Nordic I picked up from DT’s new Halloween collection this year. This is the first tea I’m trying in it, and the while ghost outlines really pop against the dark crimson liquor.

But yeah – glad to be done with this one.

Iced, at work.

I’m just trying to sip this one down right now; I don’t really enjoy it so there’s zero point in hoarding it at all. Iced goes through the leaf pretty quickly…

On its own I found this too medicinal/cough syrupy: probably from the excess of currants in it, in combo with the hibby. I added quite a bit of the strawberry kiwi cocktail sugar we have at work to try and soften it some more, and that made it drinkable. Not really ‘good’ but alright enough. Still very currant heavy, with some elderberry and then strawberry flavours – the latter from the flavoured sugar.

Meh.