Category: Review

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Dessert by Deb’s Coco Goji Island

Coco Goji Island by Dessert by Deb
Green Tea / Flavoured
$9.00 for 50g

First Impressions

Coco Goji Island is part of Dessert by Deb’s debut collection of certified organic tea blends. It came in a sealed, resealable matte white foil bag with a pretty coloured label on the front. This is a green tea blend and I picked it out because it sounded intriguing (I’m always a sucker for interesting names). It really invokes the idea of drinking iced tea with a little umbrella on a beach somewhere.

I could smell the cherries, lemongrass, and coconut when I first opened the package. Coco Goji Island consists of: green tea, cherries, goji berries, oranges, lemongrass, and toasted coconut. The ingredients are all visible, with surprisingly large pieces of dried orange slices – they smell good!

Preparation

Dessert by Deb recommends steeping Coco Goji Island in 200°F (93°C) water for 4 to 6 minutes. My initial steep was for 4 minutes.

First Taste

Coco Goji Island steeps to a bright yellow, it’s a really tropical colour that it matches well with the shade of yellow used for the word ‘Coco’ on the package label. There’s a nice aroma from the tea – citrus and fruity. The flavour of the tea is light citrus, the cherries and goji berries linger in the background. I found there was a nice creaminess in the tea, and I think that’s from the coconut. I can’t really taste the green tea, but that’s not too surprising considering some of the other ingredients being quite heavy and flavour-forward in the profile.

A Second Cup?

I resteeped Coco Goji Island twice, adding an additional 30 seconds for each subsequent steep. I found that the cherries and citrus notes were much less pronounced and more of the green tea shone through – slightly grassy and vegetal. I found it to be pleasant.

My Overall Impression

I liked Dessert by Deb’s Coco Goji Island. I found the aroma of the dry leaf to be really inviting, and the flavour of the initial steep was perfectly fruity. If you’re a fan of the fruitiness and less of green tea, resteeping may not be for you. But if you’re a fan of green tea, I’d definitely recommend resteeping the leaves again for more green tea flavour. I think this would be a great candidate for being cold steeped – especially if you’re one that’s prone to oversteeping green teas.

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DavidsTea’s Blue Lagoon

Blue Lagoon by DavidsTea
Fruit Infusion / Flavoured
$7.98 for 50g

First Impressions

I picked up Blue Lagoon on a whim during the Semi-Annual Sale on the DavidsTea website. It was on sale as the blend was being retired – and at the time of writing no longer available on the website, but I know there are a lot of Facebook groups where people resell bags of sealed tea… Blue Lagoon comes in the familiar sealed, resealable silver foil bag with a yellow label that gives me all the information about this tea.

On first sniff of this fruity blend, the first thing I think is that there is a lot of fruit in the mix. The aroma is very fruity, and the majority of what I can make out is the berries – blueberries specifically. Blue Lagoon consist of: candied pineapple, blueberries, lemongrass, elderberries, cornflower petals, natural and artificial flavourings. This fruit blend also consists of sulphites, which is used to help maintain shelf longevity in food.

Preparation

DavidsTea recommends steeping at 200°F (95°C) for 4 to 7 minutes. I opted to do an initial steep for 7 minutes.

First Taste

Blue Lagoon steeps to an interesting colour that I wasn’t quite expecting from a fruity infusion – a reddish brown. Honestly, it was a bit off-putting when I first came back to it after the long steep time. The aroma is very sweet and and fruity, which does match the taste of the blend. I can taste berries and pineapple, and a large amount of sweetness – it’s almost too sweet for me.

A Second Cup?

I attempted to resteep Blue Lagoon but found the second steep of the same leaves to be very watery and tasteless in comparison the initial steep. I would recommend Blue Lagoon for just one steep.

My Overall Impression

I thought that DavidsTea’s Blue Lagoon was just okay. Blue Lagoon stays consistent throughout for me – smelling and tasting fruity and sweet. I think it was just too sweet for me, even though I am a self-proclaimed sweet tooth. The colour was a bit off-putting, but it’s the sweetness that really killed it for me. I think this would be a great candidate to cold steep or mix with minimally sweetened lemonade, because the acidity would help balance against the sweetness from the candied pineapple and berries.

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Masters Teas’s Huang Shan Mao Feng

Huang Shan Mao Feng by Masters Teas
Green Tea / Straight
$17.00USD for 1.5oz

Masters Teas has provided me with Huang Shan Mao Feng for the purposes of writing an honest review.

First Impressions

Huang Shan Mao Feng is a Chinese green tea from Masters Teas that came in a sealed, printed and resealable pouch. There was some information on the packaging, the rest I gleaned from the product page online. The leaves are dark green and wiry that have a mix of light fruity and floral aromas.

This tea originates from Anhui, China from the farmer Liao Xiao Juan. This straight green tea was grown at 800m elevation above sea level and harvested in April 2019.

Preparation

Master Teas recommends steeping Huang Shan Mao Feng at 170°F (77°C) for 2 to 3 minutes. I heated my water to 175°F (79°C) and allowed it to cool for 5 minutes before doing an initial steep for 2 minutes.

First Taste

Huang Shan Mao Feng steeps to a very pale yellow colour after the initial steep for 2 minutes. I found that the flavour was surprisingly more complex than I had initially thought it would be. Huang Shan Mao Feng has a well-balanced flavour profile that has both sweet fruity and floral flavours, as well as a hit of grassy notes at the tail end of each sip. I found that this green tea has a thickened mouthfeel to it, and it’s an easy tea to drink.

A Second Cup?

Masters Teas suggests that Huang Shan Mao Feng can been steeped up to seven times, so I did six resteeps with the same leaves. I found that the flavour got more savoury with each steep, losing that fruity and floral sweetness slowly and gaining more grassy and vegetal flavours as I continued with each steep. The tea itself also became more of a golden yellow in colour.

My Overall Impression

I loved Masters Teas’s Huang Shan Mao Feng. I really enjoyed the delicate complexity in the flavour profile of this Chinese green tea, and really enjoyed the texture in this tea as well. I loved that it started out sweet before giving way to being savoury and more grassy, which was fun to experience. I would definitely recommend resteep Huang Shan Mao Feng, because the leaves so do well with being resteeped and you can experience the different flavour notes and how it changes with each steep..

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