Tea and Me

Mermaid Mist is a limited edition fruit tea from Bird & Blend and was provided as part of the June tea club offering. Ingredients: Hibiscus, apple pieces, aniseed, rosehip, blue pea flowers, liquorice, blackcurrant leaves, natural flavouring They describe it thus: Mermaid Mist is a magical concoction of apple, blackcurrant & blue pea flower with notes of aniseed and liquorice! Add a squeeze of lemon & be hypnotised by the magical colour change!  ✨ The first thing to say about this tea is that it is a beautiful colour, or maybe that should be colours . Depending on the number of blue pea flowers in the teaspoon it can range from a lovely deep plum right through to an almost scary dark blue, more reminiscent of Ursula the Sea Witch than Ariel the Mermaid. Whatever the colour, it looks particularly impressive in my clear glass teapot.  The aroma is interesting, with fruit being the most prevalent when you open the packet. Once brewed it smells quit...

Today’s tea is White Fuzzy Navel by Adagio . It is one of their currently available seasonal teas (along with Key Lime Herbal tea) and I was sent a sample pack of it with my last order from them.   Ingredients: White Tea, Rooibos Tea, Apple Pieces, Orange Peels, Hibiscus, Natural Peach Flavour, Mango Pieces, Natural Orange Flavour And Marigold Flowers They describe it thus: The Fuzzy Navel, a sweet and lightweight highball of peach schnapps and orange juice, was an iconic beverage of the 1980s club scene. We've decided to throw it back this summer with a beverage for the 80s kids who grew up, and for those of us who only wish we'd experienced what was arguably the most ostentatious decade of the 20th century. Fear not - we aren't here to police the height of your hair or question the elasticity of your spandex. Enjoy an iced glass of White Fuzzy Navel and party on! So, I know you all thought the cold brew bottle I got last week would sit th...

It’s the final of Bluebird’s ghosts and another Christmas Future  —  Mrs Claus' Raspberry Prosecco . Ingredients: First Flush Darjeeling black tea, apple pieces, rosehip, hibiscus, Siberian ginseng, freeze-dried raspberry, orange peel, natural flavouring. They describe it thus: First Flush Darjeeling, the champagne of black teas, and real raspberry chunks; this light + classy fruity flute is perfect for toasting special occasions (or just after a long day out on the sleigh!). It is a not-so-secret that all would grind to a halt at Christmas time without the help of the fabulous Mrs Claus so she sure deserves this tea treat! I was expecting to really like this as I have tried and enjoyed several raspberry-flavoured teas ( Adagio’s Veritaserum from the Magic Potions sampler is one of my favourites, as is the Blue Raspberry from Bluebird) and raspberries are one of my favourite fruits so I’m willing to try just about anything they appear in. Unfor...

It’s another ghost of Christmas Future  —  Spiced Clementine . Ingredients: Hibiscus, cloves, apple pieces, ginger, star anise, orange flowers, rosehip, orange peel, natural flavour. They describe it thus: Remember when you were young and you got to decorate clementines with cloves? Remember how amazing and Christmassy it smelt? We're bringing you back with this delicious tangy but sweet Christmas blend! The perfect stocking filler or the best accompaniment for your Christmas pud! This is actually a far more subtle blend than I was expecting although it is a very nice tea. It smells lovely and orangey and spicy and tastes just like Christmas with the cinnamon offsetting the orange flavour perfectly. I left it to brew for about 7 minutes to bring out the flavour a bit more. Next time I’ll probably leave it for 10. Whilst this is a tea I could have drunk it without sugar as ever, for me, the addition of a teaspoon of demerara enhanced the ...

It’s the second ghost of Christmas Past  —   White Christmas . Ingredients: Chinese white tea, Apple pieces, cranberry,  Hibiscus, Rosehip, orange peel, Cocoa shells, Morello cherries, Rose petals, Flavour. They describe it thus: Apparently everyone is dreaming of a white Christmas… One full of white tea, white chocolate and Morello cherries by any chance? No?! Well, you sure will be once you've tried this brand new limited edition Christmas blend. Packed full of juicy cherries + white chocolate chunks, this tea is sure to be top of your Xmas gift list!  Just as the Mulled Wine was brought back for the day yesterday, so Bluebird have resurrected White Christmas for one day only and made it the advent calendar tea bag of the day. The first thing to say about this tea is that it smells absolutely fantastic, with the most mouth-watering cherry smell that transfers in colour to the mug. This isn’t a particularly strong flavoured tea tho...

It’s apparently a ghost of Christmas Past  - it’s the Mulled Wine tea bag. Ingredients: Hibiscus, rosehip, apple pieces, lemon pieces, orange peel, orange flowers, cloves, cinnamon. They describe it thus: A steaming mug of mulled wine on a frosty winter's eve is just about our favourite part of the chilly Christmas season. Brew up a Bluebird Mulled Wine and delicious scents of clove, cinnamon and orange will waft you right into a winter wonderland! You can also add to red wine on the stove for the real deal. So, today’s tea is classified as a 'ghost of Christmas past', but as luck would have it, this week Bluebird are reviving five of their ghosts, each for one day only.  Today’s 'ghost' is the same Mulled Wine as the advent calendar tea bag and you have until midnight to get it if you want it (and better still there’s still free delivery until then as well). This is a really tasty fruit tea, full-bodied and full of flavour with all those...

Today we’re back to a traditional tea bag and it’s the always festive Mulled Cider . Ingredients: Apple pieces, ginger, rosehip, hibiscus, cinnamon, cloves, lemon peel, flavour They describe it thus: Aromatic winter spices, cinnamon, cloves + ginger, steeped with apple chunks to create this mellow + comforting hot tea toddy. Brew up a fruit infusion or use to create Mulled Cider, serve steaming with a splash of dark rum and snuggle up on a chilly winter's eve! The first thing is that the bag smells fantastic, all spicy loveliness that makes me think of cold winter nights and crackling fires and settling down to listen to carols by candlelight. It says to brew it for 4+ minutes but I left it for about 10 as I wanted a decent strong flavour. Unfortunately, because this was a bag rather than loose in a teapot the tea had cooled quite considerably by the time I drank it. This wasn’t that much of a problem as it tastes just as good cold – but obviously,...

I feel like summer has suddenly returned — it's Strawberry Lemonade tea. Ingredients: Hibiscus, rosehip, apple, lemon, orange, strawberry, elderberry, sunflower petals They describe it thus: Amazing iced or hot, any time of year, all ages, girl, boy, dog . . . This versatile little number is a big hit all-round. With real strawberry bits and zesty lemon peel, it's easy to see why. Get a pitcher on the go will you, love? So, you might remember that I bought some of this tea back in the summer but lost it so I never got to try it. I still haven’t managed to find it so I’ve no idea where it went — I’m guessing the fairies stole it — so I was rather pleased to see this tea bag as one of the advent calendar gifts. The tea bag itself had a strong smell of strawberry so I was expecting that to be  the dominant flavour, but I can be a bit funny about strawberry-flavoured products so I wasn’t sure it would be to my taste. Once again, I left it way l...

Like the previous review, today's tea is one of the limited-edition teas from Bluebird Tea Co. which is in their poll to decide which ones will become a permanent blend (as will be the next few reviews, no doubt). It is called Bramble Ramble and is one of a trio of teas inspired by cocktails. This one is, apparently, based on a gin cocktail called The Bramble , of which I've never heard, but then I'm not really a cocktail aficionado (not since the dark days of the 1980s, anyway, and gin was never really my tipple of choice). Ingredients: Chinese Chunmee green tea, juniper berries, elderberries, apple pieces, hibiscus, angelica root, coriander seeds, freeze-dried blackberry, liquorice, lime leaves, cardamom, lemon peel, blackberry leaves, blackberries, raspberry pieces, strawberry pieces, flavouring.  They describe it thus: " The Bramble cocktail is a delicious, blackberry based, sweet yet sour gin cocktail, garnished with a slice of l...

To be honest, I have been so extraordinarily busy with work this last week or so that I haven’t had much time to enjoy tasting new teas. When I’m head-down over the laptop for dozens of hours on end I need lots of tea to keep me going, but it needs to be the stuff I can chug quite happily without thinking about it, and without needing to think about writing a review afterwards. This means that I’ve basically been living on Milk Oolong (of course) from various suppliers (hence no link), Garden of England and this weekend’s favourite, Apricot . However, I did manage to sneak in one new tea as I’ve had it for quite a while now and really wanted to try it. It’s a fruit tea by Kent & Sussex Tea & CoffeeCo. called Gentle Pumpkin Fruit Tisane . Ingredients: Pumpkin Pieces, Apple Pieces, Orange Peel, Apple Cubes, Natural  Flavouring, Vanilla Pieces, Safflower, Freeze-dried Tangerine-Orange Fruit Pieces. They describe it thus: “Pumpkin Tea! Using the sweet ...

It’s a lovely summer's afternoon with blue skies, the odd fluffy white cloud and a gentle breeze rustling through the trees and I am drinking Strawberries and Cream Tea by T2 , the company with the funky orange boxes, (okay, so really it’s 30 odd degrees out there and absolutely bloody baking so I’m hiding indoors, but I can see the blue sky and clouds out of the window). Ingredients: Apple, hibiscus, rosehip, strawberry granules (glucose syrup, strawberries, fructose, modified starch: E1414, thickener: E401), sweet blackberry leaves, yoghurt crispies (skimmed milk* yoghurt, sugar, maltodextrin, modified starch E1412, acidifier: E330), flavouring *contains milk. They describe it thus: “Strawberry fields are forever with this beautiful red brew and sweet aroma.” You may remember a while back when I went to afternoon tea at the Horseguards Hotel that I tried someone else’s Strawberries and Cream Tea and I quite liked it. Therefore, when I saw...

Enrol in a School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, think magical thoughts and drink this. Ingredients: black tea, cinnamon bark, natural pumpkin spice flavour, cloves, ginger root, natural vanilla flavour, natural caramel flavour, marigold flowers, cardamom The teas used to create this blend are: pumpkin spice , vanilla and caramel , accented with apple pieces. Pumpkin Potion is one of the blends in the Magic Potions sampler box by Adagio Teas . I absolutely adore the spiciness of pumpkin pie and was delighted when the wizarding world was revealed to drink pumpkin juice in the same way the Muggle world drinks orange juice.  It was the drink I was most excited to try at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, and the one I loved the most (sorry frozen Butterbeer, although you were amazing). Sadly, it isn’t available outside the US as it’s not transportable, so I have to make do with tea instead. I have tried both this and Adagio’s Pumpkin Spice tea which is...

The Draught of Peace is a potion which relieves anxiety and agitation. Its ingredients are powdered moonstone, syrup of hellebore, powdered porcupine quills, Valerian root, and powdered unicorn horn. It should be a turquoise blue when finished and simmered before being drunk. It is ironically a difficult potion to make, requiring that the brewer follow the directions carefully because making a mistake can have drastic consequences. Adding too much of the ingredients, for instance, will put the drinker of the potion into a deep — and possibly irreversible — sleep. Ingredients: black tea, apple pieces, natural apricot flavour, natural creme flavour, marigold flowers, apricots, natural vanilla flavour The teas used to create this blend are: apricot , cream and vanilla , accented with marigold flowers. Draught of Peace is one of the blends in the Magic Potions sampler box by Adagio Teas . It is chock full of apricots and tastes every bit as good as it smells. Bright and bo...