Author: Michelle

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Tastea Treats’s Chocolate Mint Black Tea

Chocolate Mint Black Tea by Tastea Treats
Black Tea / Flavoured
$9.00 for 100g

I took part in a Secret Santa tea exchange on Instagram in December 2019. I received this tea as part of the gift from my Secret Santa, a review was not requested.

First Impressions

Chocolate Mint Black Tea comes in a sealed, resealable shiny black pouch. There’s a lovely colourful label on the front that tells me information about the tea (name, description, ingredients, and preparation tips). The tea itself has a really lovely smell – mint and chocolate and it reminds me a lot of candy (which is always a plus!). It’s a surprise to me that there isn’t any actual chocolate pieces in this blend since it smells so much like chocolate

The ingredients in Chocolate Mint Black Tea include: black tea, blackberry leaves, peppermint leave, and natural flavours. I don’t really smell blackberry, but I think that’s because the peppermint is such a strong ingredient in terms of aroma. Either way, the idea of a chocolate mint aroma without actual chocolate is interesting and entices me to try it out.

Preparation

Tastea Treats recommends steeping Chocolate Mint Black Tea in “freshly boiled water” (100°C/212°F) for 3 to 7 minutes. I opted for an initial steep of 5 minutes.

First Taste

Chocolate Mint Black Tea steeps to a golden orange colour. There’s a very lovely mint aroma to the steeped tea. The flavour of the tea is nice – there’s sweetness, minty flavour, and also chocolate notes without being overwhelmingly chocolate. I think it’s pleasant that chocolate isn’t an actual ingredient because chocolate pieces often leads to oils floating on top and more clean up is involved. That said, the mint is definitely stronger in flavour than the chocolate, which I think is fine. I would say that you probably wouldn’t need any sweetener since there’s a good amount of natural sweetness in the tea (but I would recommend an unflavoured sweetener if you opt to add some, so you don’t distract from the chocolate minty goodness).

A Second Cup?

I attempted to resteep Chocolate Mint Black Tea. Unsurprisingly, the flavours weren’t quite there with the second steep –  I found that the mint was considerably less compared to the initial steep and the chocolate flavour was quite weak. The black tea base does come out in the second steep though, it reminds me a bit like a breakfast blend with some malty notes. So if you’re drinking this for the chocolate mint flavours, stick to the initial steep but if you’re also a fan of black teas then a second steep would do you some good.

My Overall Impression

I loved Tastea Treats’s Chocolate Mint Black Tea. I really enjoyed the aromas and the flavours from the initial steep. What really impressed me was the fact that chocolate isn’t an actual ingredient in the blend, which meant not having to wait for chocolate to melt and finding the oil slick floating on top of my tea. It makes for a very pleasant and smooth dessert tea. If you wanted to really push it over the top, I’d pair with some creamer or evaporated milk to add an extra layer of decadence and make it more dessert like.

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DavidsTea’s Organic Anji Green

Organic Anji Green by DavidsTea
Green Tea / Straight
$24.98 for 50g

First Impressions

Organic Anji Green was a purchase I made last year when there was a sale going on (so full disclosure, I got this at 30% off with my online purchase). The tea itself came in a very familiar pouch – albeit a bit larger than the usual one. The bag itself is sealed, and resealable with a bright pistachio green label on the front. Tea that takes up more space (usually traditional teas with unrolled leaves) come in bigger bags than the usual small ones.

The leaves of Organic Anji Green are beautiful – bright green, you can see the leaves and how they’ve curled up on themselves in the drying process. The veins of the leave are visible in some, and the vibrancy in the colour is quite amazing. The aroma is pleasantly sweet, with some fresh grassy notes to it. It’s quite enjoyable to inhale, and hopefully a good indicator of what’s to come. Organic Anji Green consist of organic green tea from the Anji County of Zheijiang Province, China.

Preparation

DavidsTea recommends steeping Organic Anji Green in 85°C (185°F) water for 2 to 3 minutes. I followed the steeping instructions and did an initial steep of this green tea for 3 minutes.

First Taste

Organic Anji Green steeps to a pale yellow colour after the initial steep of 3 minutes. It has a very subtle aroma that wasn’t really easily noticed until I was holding up the cup of tea to my face. The aroma is primarily grassy, which was pleasant. It smells a bit like spring, which is nice. The flavour of the tea is a well-balanced mix. I found some buttery notes, with a subtle cream flavour, mixed in with grass and flavours that remind me of asparagus – just a crisp freshness to it.

A Second Cup?

I resteeped Organic Anji Green a total of eight times (nine steeps total), adding an additional 30 seconds of steeping time to each subsequent steep. The tea deepened in colour and the flavour remained fairly similar to the initial steep. I found that it had strong buttery notes with each steep, which was quite welcome. I would recommend resteeping this tea to get all the flavour (and tea!) that you can.

My Overall Impression

I loved DavidsTea’s Organic Anji Green. I was really quite impressed with how well this tea goes from dry to steeped to being resteeped (so many times!). The flavour stayed delicious and I had a grand ol’ time of steeping this over and over again during one of the recent snow days that I experienced. While I was originally just crossing my fingers that the tea would be worth the price, I think it more than made up for it considering how much use I got out of the tea leaves before I decided to stop resteeping it.

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Book: Modern Tea by Lisa Boalt Richardson

Modern Tea: A Fresh Look at an Ancient Beverage
Author: Lisa Boalt Richardson
Published 2014 by Chronicle Books
Cover Price: $19.95USD/£12.99
164 pages

First Impressions

Modern Tea by Lisa Boalt Richardson is a book that I purchased early on in my tea blogging days (so likely circa 2016 or so). It’s a small, square book – hardcover, with full colour illustrations. The book itself is split into five generalized chapters: What is Tea?, The Art of Tea, Tea Ceremonies and Rituals, Beyond the Cup, and The Buzz About Tea.

In the first chapter, What is Tea?, Richardson touches on the types of tea, tea production and farming, and examples of specific types of tea within each type of tea (white, green, etc.). The photos are lovely, although not as vibrant as I would expect from a colourful illustrated book. The second chapter, The Art of Tea, covers how to prepare tea, equipment and water, and also has a section on how to eyeball water temperature without a variable temperature kettle – although for the sake of simplicity, I still prefer the ease of selecting a button for my preferred water temperature.

Tea Ceremonies and Rituals was the most fascinating to me, because Richardson goes over various cultures and their ceremonies – Chinese, Japanese, Moroccan, to name a few. With photograph examples of most, it’s nice to contrast and compare the teaware between cultures. Beyond the Cup goes over cooking with tea and also food pairings, which is something that I do reference when I’m thinking about my tea recipes. The Buzz About Tea covers caffeine, fair trade, environmentalism, and health benefits – although I think we’ve come a long way in science and understanding about tea since 2014, since matcha has spiked in popularity in the western world and more people in the western world are setting aside coffee for tea.

Things That Stood Out

I loved that Richardson included information about the difference between high tea and afternoon tea – a distinction that a lot of people don’t understand. If the tea that you’re thinking of includes dainty finger sandwiches, a tiered cake stand, and fine china – you’re thinking of afternoon tea. Richardson also goes over the origins of tea and cha – because of the different dialects of the Chinese language and how the language evolved and changed as it travelled (for example, in India, tea is chai and the Mandarin pronunciation for tea is cha).

Favourite Section(s)

I really liked the section in Modern Tea about how to incorporate tea into food and how to create food pairings. I think it’s a great reference for beginners wanting to add tea to their cooking or baking, because it gives some great examples (but the part that I didn’t appreciate was the lack of actual recipes for testing out the methodology).

My Overall Impression

I liked Lisa Boalt Richardson’s Modern Tea. I think it’s a fantastic book for those who are interested in tea, or a beginner tea fan. Richardson covers the basics of tea fairly well and in a language that isn’t too complex. I do think that if you’re more into the tea scene, you might find it not as informative because you might already know a lot of the information – but it doesn’t mean it might not be a great addition to your tea shelf. Richardson lays out the information in a great format that is easy to digest with some pretty photography. At the cover price, it’s not unaffordable and might even be available via your local library (which I always encourage trying first in case you can’t find a copy of it, since it was published in 2014).

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