Cofftea

Smoothie style. 1 serving Green Machine Matcha + 1 cup frozen peaches as the “ice” and an extra tsp matcha. Not really the thing to drink in a clear glass LOL. The Peach is the main flavor and I actually can’t taste the matcha at all. But that’s ok. It’s smooth, and fruity, and cold, and healthy!

Finished the last half of my 15.2oz bottle. I’m definitely gonna have to get a 64oz bottle!

Most of my friends (especially my friend Kristine that thinks even regular steeped and decanted tea is like drinking grass clippings) already think I’m crazy for drinking matcha, so might as well be flippin’ crazy. ;) I saw this in Starbucks again today and finally had the guts to try it. I figured if there was any weird taste to it, matcha would cover it up. Let me just warn you now that this looks nasty. I mean REALLY nasty. Shockingly enough most of the flavor comes from the juice- not the matcha. The juice is really sweet with apple being the predominant flavor. I also pick up on a hint of pineapple and banana. This is another way I like cold matcha! I wonder how it’d taste hot though…

When I went into Teavana today, my friend Casey was working and he said that Anjou Pear-adise is one of his favorite so I decided to have this with my iced matcha I’d already decided I was going to have. To my shock, it did not look like the matcha had been added at all. It just looked like regular, translucent, thin iced tea. And worse, it didn’t taste like matcha had been added. Has anyone ordered cup of matcha at Teavana before? I’m going to wait to rate this til I find out more information on what I should expect when ordering matcha.

I made this in efforts to cut the sweetness of the juice. It worked, not as well as I was expecting, but it worked. It’s definitely more sweet and more appley than any apple tea I’ve ever had, but it isn’t teeth rottingly sweet like juice and I can taste the black tea base. This is definitely a success. Gonna try a chai tea next time.

My mom was trying to be nice… she really was. Before she left for her 2 week business trip she decided to make me some lemonade. I’m not a real big lemonade drinker, but it’s good w/ matcha and in Arnold Palmers… except that she made Crystal Light and not real lemonade w/ stevia which is how I drink it. I can feel my teeth rotting just thinking about it. Oh well. I decided to first try to salvage this by making an Arnold Palmer.

2 bags steeped in 1 cup water just below boiling
1 cup Crystal Light
1 tsp lemon juice

Not as teeth rottingly sweet as I expected. Pretty good.

Oh my gosh… what’s in this stuff? As soon as finished my half bowl 5 hrs ago I was craving it again- intensely. I have a lot of matcha on a daily basis, but I very rarely crave it like this. I lasted as long as I could (and intentionally til my craving died down) to have a second half bowl because I was afraid I’d be craving a 3rd. Sooo good.

Grumble…Grumble…Sigh…Grumble…Grumble…Grrr…Grumble…Grumble… OK, let me explain. The theme for this week’s Vegan Dinner Night with my friends was smoothies. I instantly thought to bring matcha (I often do and it goes over very well!), but that required a trip to my local tea store since I was almost out. I arrived fully prepared to buy Rishi’s single serve matcha, but I was pleasantly surprised to see bulk matcha (it’s been almost 2 years since I’ve been there)! I grabbed my matcha (and some Tea on Tap for me and my mom). I arrived at my friends’ Nathan and Ben and smoothies were soon in the works, but… CRAP! The matcha is sitting in my mom’s car. Not a big deal in reality, but I was craving a matcha fruit smoothie so I thru a silent internal temper tantrum and went on with the evening. I’m sure this matcha is good, but it’s SO expensive compared to what I drink on a daily basis ($1.05/g compared to 16 cents/g which is even ceremonial grade), so I called the store and asked about their refund policy because I really can’t afford this when there are better and cheaper alternatives out there. Unfortunately, because I used a gift card, my refund would just be reloaded onto the card vs. a cash refund so I just decided to suck it up and keep it. Oh well.

When I open the tin I notice that, while it’s not nearly as dull in color as some of the flavored matchas I’ve had or even Lupicia’s 100g matcha, it’s not as vibrant (like the smiley on the far right) as I’d like it to be. It’s also quite clumpy. This will definitely need to be sifted. After a sift and a whisk, a substantial froth formed. While the whisked color was again paler than I’d hoped, it actually had a pretty substantial flavor. The flavor was sweet and smooth, just like the mouth feel. It reminded me of my first match experience which was Rishi’s individually packed matcha which makes me think this may be Rishi. Not bad, but way too expensive. For as much of a tea addict (matcha specifically) I am, I really have learned to find great bargains so I don’t have to sacrifice flavor, volume, or frequency. If you’re not on as tight of a budget as I am (which doesn’t take much lol!) definitely give this a try. It’s a good one.

I can’t believe it’s cold enough to drink apple cider today… it’s been 90 the past 3 days. 1tsp chai in 1 cup hot Mott’s Medley’s Apple and Carrot Juice Blend. The sweetness and flavor of the juice surprisingly hold up well. Next time I’ll add some caramel creamer. Very good and healthy. :)

Ok, this is amazing. The weather here has been a bit bi-polar. 60 yesterday and 90 today. Same thing predicted for Thurs/Fri: 67 Thurs and 97 on Fri. The A/C isn’t on yet and while it isn’t unbearable, I wanted to satisfy my chocolate craving in a cold format vs. hot. May I present my Iced Mexican Chocolate Chai:
1 cup ice
1 cup cold milk
1 TB chocolate creamer
2 tsp chai
2 tsp unsweetened cocoa powder
2 pinches crushed red pepper
Blend til smooth

Extremely rich and decadent and smooth and cold and hot and yummy (haha yeah I know that’s a lot of “ands”)… Next time I think I’m going to add caramel ice cream topping and dissolve 2 packets of instant coffee in to the water I make the ice out of.

Decided to be brave: 2 pinches of crushed red pepper steeped in 8oz boiling water for 3 min, reboil the water, add 2tsp chai, 2tsp cocoa powder, 2 TB caramel coffee creamer, and 8oz fat free milk. WOW. Definitely even more of a kick w/ the red pepper. So good though. Gotta get some decaf instant coffee to add to this.

Funny story. Mom and I went out for dinner w/ my grandparents and I wanted to treat my mom to coffee after. It’s a bit of a hastle getting my chair in and out just for a quick trip and mom had things to do yet tonight so I just gave my order written on a piece of paper (you’ll see why in a bit) for her to run and get the drinks. I ordered a tall double pump mocha, double pump white mocha, double pump caramel, double pump SF vanilla, double pump iced dirty chai Americano w/ whip and mocha and caramel drizzle. The poor barista just kinda chuckles and says “I think we’ve made this before” and dubbed it “the works iced Americano”. It’s bad when you’re known by your drink and you’re not even the one ordering it! This really is not as good as it could be. I wish the chai concentrate itself was better. It’s kinda like ordering a fat free sugar free brownie instead of the full fat and sugar version lol.

Ate a pizza last night that made me sick… attempting to detox at work. 2tsp matcha 4TB lime juice, strawberry kiwi protein water, and 16oz water.

Finally slept great… but I was awake at 6:30. Caffeine will help me from crashing later. Mom left me about cup and a half of coffee this morning so I used the last half of a cup or so to make chai w/ milk added to make it a full cup. Normally just “dumping” really annoys me, but this turned out good.

1TB of wing sauce added to my chicken yakisoba bowl for lunch… BIG mistake. Had to try to calm my mouth w/ matcha protein water. This was strawberry kiwi. I think pink lemonade would have worked better, but I haven’t been able to find it.

My first experience with an angry client at work today… I’m just greatful it was in an e-mail and not a real time phone call. I’m extremely sensitive and need to work on not taking things personal. You’d think working 3 months as a telemarketer would have worked, but desensitization thru exposure just isn’t effective for me. I need a matcha break. Full chawan.

CRAP! I found almost a half of a container of this that’s a year old! I must have gotten distracted w/ Frank’s matchas or something. Dispite the nose dive in color, this is actually still pretty good.

Matcha OJ seems even more smooth and creamy than normal- YUM.

Matcha OJ to cut the spice of dinner.

Have some of these and had no clue what to do with them. Decided to have a yakisoba chicken noodle bowl so I steeped 2 bags (because there’s 2 servings per bowl) first, let it cool, then added it to the bowl before microwaving instead of plain water. Definitely gives it a nice flavor (along w/ the 2tsp of wing sauce I added). Now if there would only be more veggies and actual chicken in it. The other half of the bowl will be my dinner.

Done w/ work for now. My position is newly created and my boss is really behind so I often don’t work for long periods at a time- that will DEFINITELY change in the future though. Paid my phone bill (for the next 3 months- YAY!) and my credit cards (not yay). It was my first payment since getting my computer fixed and it wasn’t recognized so I had to enter a verification code… that’s when I noticed 2 phone numbers were shown on my account. This can NOT be good. Grrr… I need matcha. Good ol’ fashioned hot matcha in my chawan. I may even have a full bowl.

Was sooo tired last night I actually fell asleep at 9. Then woke up when breaking news started and forced myself to go to bed at 11:30. Really should have been up at 7:30, but I slept til 8:30. Having coffee w/ a tsp of chai and a tsp of cocoa powder to try to wake me up.

Decided to sleep in so I chugged some matcha protein water before work. Didn’t help my headache though. :(

Bucked up and actually tried this plain today. …And it’s surprisingly good! It tastes like a mixture of chocolate, coffee, and tea (in spite of this being an herbal)- and I can’t taste the licorice at ALL. YAY!=D Definitely still affective. Much more delicious than any other alternative.