Wow, that’s a mouthful. I was very impressed with Oregon Chai’s concentrates. I felt it was necessary to try more of their products. That’s the beauty of blogging about tea. Fortunately, this one is just as good as the last, if not better. This concentrate really packs a punch. It has the same great (sweet & spicy) flavor as the original chai flavor, but this one is taken to a new level with matcha, honey, and almond flavors. If you are new to matcha, you are missing out. I’ll have a lot more matcha blogs in the near future. All of the flavors are present in this mix. You simply add half of your desired serving with the concentrate and the other half with your preferred milk or milk substitute. Mix it, heat it, and mix it. That’s it. I microwave mine. When it’s ready you can smell the delicious matcha swirling around the honey and almond.

This drink is packed with sugar, but they do offer reduced-sugar and caffeine-free products. If you love Chai from “coffee shops,” you have to try this. Find it in your local grocery store and then compare the price to what you pay at the “coffee shop.” The 32-ounce container of concentrate might save you a few bucks - you do the math.

Visit Oregon Chai

marTEA

Mighty Leaf offers a delicious pear and caramel flavored black tea. This is a flavor pairing that I wasn’t quite certain about when I placed my order. However, after trying several cups, this is definitely one I recommend to black tea drinkers. Obviously, you need to like the flavor of a pear and caramel to enjoy this tea.

The black tea came in a sealed 4-ounce pouch. When I opened the pouch for the first time, I wasn’t overly impressed by the scent of the tea. Once the tea has steeped, the scent mellows to produce a dessert like aroma. I don’t want to get caught up on the scent, but I’m just letting you know not all teas can be judged by scent alone. Just a few minutes in 200 degree water, and you’ll have a delicious cup of tea. This is a great morning and afternoon tea.

Mighty Leaf describes the tea as: Pear Caramel is made with Washington state pears blended with Ceylon and China black tea and sweet bits of caramel.

In the end, the caramel is the dominant flavor. It’s much better than other caramel flavored teas I’ve tried.

Visit Mighty Leaf

marTEA

Lately, I’ve been extremely busy with work.  I’ve been drinking a lot of ready-to-drink beverages, and at times I’ve been forced to drink drive-thru coffee to get me through multiple 12 hour days in a row.  Let me tell you, I can’t wait to sit back and relieve my stress with my favorite teas.  I have 3 awesome teas I’m trying to find time to drink.  If I don’t find the time, I might just collapse.  I’ve read several reports that show that black tea helps to relieve stress.  I’ll put the theories to the test.

marTEA

I wanted to try a Maté, and I picked the right one. My goodness, this is good. It’s so flavorful; I crave it in the mornings. It’s a substitute for both tea and coffee. Yerba Maté is a species of holly, and Teavana credits Argentina as the origin of the shrub. Maté is made by steeping the dried leaves of yerba maté. This particular maté is mixed with almond bits, crushed cocoa beans, cactus blossoms, sunflower, and cornflower petals. The scent and flavor reminds me of a mix between coffee and cocoa. I’ve read that maté has a strong veggie flavor that is reminiscent of green tea. This maté couldn’t be further from that description. If you are a tea and coffee drinker, you should give this a try. The texture of the beverage is very smooth and relaxing. If you like the ingredients included in this mix, you’ll love this herbal. I almost forget that it is an herbal. Lately, due to my work schedule I’ve been drinking more coffee than normal. Yerba Maté helps me get back to tea drinking on the weekends. The ingredients mixed in this maté are very well balanced. This is a great change-up beverage.

I want to stress again that this is not tea. It does contain caffeine. I can’t deny that I really enjoyed this beverage.

Visit Teavana

marTEA

My wife could not resist buying this bottled tea for me. It’s from a beverage company called Fuze. The bottle labeling is very busy to say the least. I’ll try to knock-out some of the specs on the bottle.

1.) Green tea with Honey and Ginseng, Natural Antioxidants and Vitamins C, E, B2, B5, B6, and B12.

2.) Equivalent to 2 servings of vegetables per bottle. Measured by Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity (ORAC)

3.) No preservatives, no artificial colors, no artificial flavors

4.) I could go on and on. I’ve never seen this much labeling on one bottle.

Let’s discuss the flavor: First off, it does not have a strong green tea flavor. You can taste a hint of green tea, but the primary flavor is honey. It tastes very sweet. That said, it tastes very good. The color of the beverage is very light - almost lemonade like. I was actually surprised by the sweet flavor until I found the label that states it packs 16g of sugar per 8 fluid ounces. The bottle has a total of 18 fluid ounces of flavored green tea. It really does taste good. It’s something I would grab again as a substitute for a carbonated beverage. If it’s as healthy as the label makes it out to be, you should definitely try it. If you are avoiding sugar, you may want to skip this one.

• Visit Fuze

marTEA

A lot of the people I know that enjoy tea, like to drink Chai. I know ‘Chai’ means ‘tea’ in Hindi, but I’m referring to the spiced-up flavored black tea. Typically, it’s mixed with milk to give it an almost flavored coffee character. Many popular tea stores offer a loose leaf Chai.

This week, I’m drinking Teavana’s Masala Chai. It’s a great way to start my loose leaf hot tea drinking as the summer ends. Teavana describes the tea as: Black tea from India mixed with ginger, cinnamon, cardamom and vanilla. It’s very fragant. As you can tell by the ingredients, it makes for a very flavorful mix. Teavana does not reveal what region or estate the tea comes from, but it is very important to know it’s CTC (crush, tear, curl). I’m not a huge fan of CTC tea, but it works out well for this Chai. I recommend steeping the tea at a temperature of around 195 degrees for no more than 3 minutes. That’s plenty of heat and time to extract the flavor from the tea and spices. I’ve been putting a splash of milk in the Chai to give it a creamy texture, but you can drink this mix without any additives. If you want to sweeten it, you can’t go wrong. In the end, I found this to be very enjoyable. CTC has never been my favorite, but this was very good. I highly recommend this tea to Chai lovers. If you are new to tea, and you want to start drinking loose leaf tea, this is an excellent start.

• Visit Teavana

marTEA

It’s been a hot summer, and I’ve drank a lot of ready-to-drink teas.  Hopefully you tried some of the beverages I blogged about this summer.  Now that the weather is changing, it’s time to shift my focus back to hot tea.  I plan on trying several new teas this fall and winter, and I cannot wait to blog about my experiences.  I met a lot of helpful people at the World Tea Expo and I discovered a lot of great products that were displayed at the show.  I can only hope I find enough time to share all the product news I want to blog about.

marTEA