So my internet ate my review of the new Teavana Cococaramel sea salt tea yesterday. :( But I’m back with a review of this one!
The Teavana smelled especially alluring yesterday. Maybe it was all the new stock? The worker kept making me laugh because they insist on wafting these at you and it was like he was aiming for my forehead. I must admit that these new teas are very visually appealing in person. Large chunks of colorful fruit, lots of different shapes, sizes, and the smell is very strong. I’m a very visual person so that really is a great way of selling me something. The new tins are also really stunning looking, but $12 for something like that is way too much for me.
The Cococaramel sea salt one was a must have for me, but this one just smelled so nice! I also sniffed the mate/pu’erh one and boy was it weird. I might go back and try it later just because it is a lower price than many of their other teas, but damn. I don’t know how they’ll swing that one.
My husband noticed the new nutrition booklets and how instantly useless they are. The worker actually agreed with us that it is a waste of paper to just tell us a bunch of 0s.
I’m actually very surprised about how dark this brew is. It could easily pass as a black tea; I just read it has hibiscus, maybe I shouldn’t be surprised after all! Reading off the full list of ingredients this sounds like something from Willy Wonka! Something about this smells like it should be paired with some of the really tart and in your face mate blends that Teavana carries.
This tea is, well, interesting to say the least. The first kick is mint and finishes with some kind of herbal note that I’ve never run into before. It’s almost odd! It has a berry flavor, but it is nearing medicinal. It would be a great mixer in my opinion, but I’m not sure I like it just plain. There is a sense of creaminess that comes into play that is interesting and I wonder what is making that happen. I really wonder what would happen if you added milk/coconut milk to this. I think it’d probably really pop! On its own it doesn’t stand too much and although tasty, it is a little strange.
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I tried this one today in store as well. I got another waft of the mate and my friend pin pointed it perfectly it smells like those home sparkly worm/snake/dragon fireworks. I’ll try it eventually, have to remember one of the new teas they release last year smelled like nail polish remover and it tasted delicious.
That’s hilarious about the fireworks! I had a hard time smelling because of the over the head wafting, but what I did catch was awful. I think I know which one you’re saying smelled like nail polish remover. Is it that joie de vivire?
Because of the hibiscus, I wouldn’t add milk, it would likely curdle.
The nutritional books are hilarious! We make a big joke out of them, I tell people, “And here is the most useless nutritional guide you will ever see in your life.” Would make more sense as an “ingredients list,” right?
On the other hand, I had a woman in for “the Dr. Oz tea diet” (oh god) and she kept grilling me like, “Are you sure your teas have no calories? What about carbs? I can’t have carbs,” etc. She didn’t seem to believe my answers. Now I can just point to the Magical Booklet of Zeros, because customers like her will surely believe a little paper booklet that says “no” over the associate’s tea experience.
Oh, good thing I didn’t try it then! shakes fist at hibiscus I forget about that one. :(
I wonder who thought the tea nutrition guide would be a good thing really; because it is pretty obvious they spent some time making it look nice and orderly. I wonder if that person thought it as insane as we do.
I didn’t know there was a Dr. Oz tea diet. Now that, to me, sounds like a bad combination. That’s too bad that people would trust that notebook of zeros over the worker. I mean, unless there is sugar added to the teas there really probably shouldn’t be too much worry about carbs/calories in tea though (I would think…).
This woman knew nothing about tea, I’m afraid. Nothing at all. It didn’t sound like she’d ever had tea in her life; she kept repeating that she only likes wine, but, “I need to lose some weight fast,” so she wanted this Dr. Oz thing.
I looked it up, apparently it’s
-2 cups of pu-erh first thing in the morning (to shrink fat cells, or something like that)
-2 cups of white tea with lunch (prevents the formation of fat? or something? I don’t recall, I couldn’t care less)
-1 cup of chickweed tea in the afternoon (laxative)
-1 cup bilberry tea in the evening (to cut cravings)
Oh, P.S. guys, the nail polish remover tea you mentioned was renamed Peach Bellini Blush. In case you end up looking for it.
That diet sounds pretty misleading to me. I wonder how he feels about mixed teas or if they have to be plain. I’ve never even heard of chickweed tea before, but it sounds dreadful. I find it hard to believe it when I hear plans like this based on drinking tea because I thought there was not a lot of supporting evidence for it being as influential as people like him make it sound.
Why do you think they changed the name? O.o I noticed it when I tried to go find out what it was.
Yeah I did notice the renaming, it was “awaiting new harvest” so I wonder if they were reformulating to tweak the smell. As for the diet, yeah we had women coming in for that many months back. Someone was clever and decided we should tell them oolong will do the same thing as chickweed and that elderberry is the same as bilberry, it confused people “oh so this is the chickweed?” no this is oolong, but they bought it. Better than selling them yerba mate though.
Apparently the chickweed is the best-tasting one, like it’s naturally sweet or something? I’m actually sort of curious to find it now; there’s a health food store down the street from the mall I work at that apparently sells raspberry leaf; I was planning to see if they had the chickweed and bilberry, too. At least I could direct people there if they wanted that exact “diet” (although it sounds sketchy to me!).
They changed the name because people were less likely to buy it with the French name. Which is understandable to me, because I couldn’t pronounce the name myself, and therefore never sold it! Now that it’s “Peach Bellini Blush,” the number of sales have gone up very noticeably. Our tin of it used to be perpetually full, now it’s almost empty. We also sell a lot of to-go drinks of it. People now insist to me that it actually tastes like a bellini, LOL.
I don’t think anything about the tea itself is changing, though. I think your store was just out, Autumn.
The woman I had in, I sold her oolong too (Slimful Chocolate), although I didn’t tell her it was chickweed. (LOL, WTF?!) I just told her that oolong can potentially speed your metabolism. I’m not sure that would have helped her anyway, though…I got the impression that this woman had more bad dietary habits than oolong would ever overcome. So I also discussed how I used to be horribly addicted to soda pop, and how I completely gave it up for tea (and lost about 10lbs in the process). I told her that the more important thing would be to find tea that she adored and could drink every day over things full of empty calories.
She looked at me like I had two heads.
What’s wrong with selling the mate?
That’s so interesting about sweetness and the chickweed! I thought I’d look for it while I was at the store last night, but forgot. They always have that one brand of teabags that advertises lots of tisanes like raspberry leaf, dandelion, etc. Raspberry leaf lasts forever btw. I have a bag that is probably 3years old in a sealable bag and it still tastes good and works great.
Ok now the name change makes sense. I could never pronounce it either! I never really asked for it though. That’s an interesting marketing move. See though? Another Teavana naming funny. I’ve never had a bellini so I wouldn’t have anything to go off of. :(
Yeah, the whole what else are you doing plus drinking tea is always an interesting issue. I’ve known people who like to say, oh I drink tea for health reasons, as they bite into their huge danish pastry. I don’t think any amount of metabolism boosting will help overcome that! Soda is something that I’m still trying to get my husband off of. We never buy it, but he always wants one when we go out. I had a photo the other day which showed how much sugar is in the sodas and he was pretty shocked. I haven’t seen him order one since.
I think that finding something you really love is great advice! I think that drinking tea over soda is easy for me because I just enjoy it so much. If it wasn’t something I really loved I probably wouldn’t be able to get myself to drink it.
O.o I’m confused about the mate thing too. I love mate when it’s done right.
I tried this one today in store as well. I got another waft of the mate and my friend pin pointed it perfectly it smells like those home sparkly worm/snake/dragon fireworks. I’ll try it eventually, have to remember one of the new teas they release last year smelled like nail polish remover and it tasted delicious.
That’s hilarious about the fireworks! I had a hard time smelling because of the over the head wafting, but what I did catch was awful. I think I know which one you’re saying smelled like nail polish remover. Is it that joie de vivire?
Because of the hibiscus, I wouldn’t add milk, it would likely curdle.
The nutritional books are hilarious! We make a big joke out of them, I tell people, “And here is the most useless nutritional guide you will ever see in your life.” Would make more sense as an “ingredients list,” right?
On the other hand, I had a woman in for “the Dr. Oz tea diet” (oh god) and she kept grilling me like, “Are you sure your teas have no calories? What about carbs? I can’t have carbs,” etc. She didn’t seem to believe my answers. Now I can just point to the Magical Booklet of Zeros, because customers like her will surely believe a little paper booklet that says “no” over the associate’s tea experience.
Oh, good thing I didn’t try it then! shakes fist at hibiscus I forget about that one. :(
I wonder who thought the tea nutrition guide would be a good thing really; because it is pretty obvious they spent some time making it look nice and orderly. I wonder if that person thought it as insane as we do.
I didn’t know there was a Dr. Oz tea diet. Now that, to me, sounds like a bad combination. That’s too bad that people would trust that notebook of zeros over the worker. I mean, unless there is sugar added to the teas there really probably shouldn’t be too much worry about carbs/calories in tea though (I would think…).
This woman knew nothing about tea, I’m afraid. Nothing at all. It didn’t sound like she’d ever had tea in her life; she kept repeating that she only likes wine, but, “I need to lose some weight fast,” so she wanted this Dr. Oz thing.
I looked it up, apparently it’s
-2 cups of pu-erh first thing in the morning (to shrink fat cells, or something like that)
-2 cups of white tea with lunch (prevents the formation of fat? or something? I don’t recall, I couldn’t care less)
-1 cup of chickweed tea in the afternoon (laxative)
-1 cup bilberry tea in the evening (to cut cravings)
Oh, P.S. guys, the nail polish remover tea you mentioned was renamed Peach Bellini Blush. In case you end up looking for it.
That diet sounds pretty misleading to me. I wonder how he feels about mixed teas or if they have to be plain. I’ve never even heard of chickweed tea before, but it sounds dreadful. I find it hard to believe it when I hear plans like this based on drinking tea because I thought there was not a lot of supporting evidence for it being as influential as people like him make it sound.
Why do you think they changed the name? O.o I noticed it when I tried to go find out what it was.
Yeah I did notice the renaming, it was “awaiting new harvest” so I wonder if they were reformulating to tweak the smell. As for the diet, yeah we had women coming in for that many months back. Someone was clever and decided we should tell them oolong will do the same thing as chickweed and that elderberry is the same as bilberry, it confused people “oh so this is the chickweed?” no this is oolong, but they bought it. Better than selling them yerba mate though.
Apparently the chickweed is the best-tasting one, like it’s naturally sweet or something? I’m actually sort of curious to find it now; there’s a health food store down the street from the mall I work at that apparently sells raspberry leaf; I was planning to see if they had the chickweed and bilberry, too. At least I could direct people there if they wanted that exact “diet” (although it sounds sketchy to me!).
They changed the name because people were less likely to buy it with the French name. Which is understandable to me, because I couldn’t pronounce the name myself, and therefore never sold it! Now that it’s “Peach Bellini Blush,” the number of sales have gone up very noticeably. Our tin of it used to be perpetually full, now it’s almost empty. We also sell a lot of to-go drinks of it. People now insist to me that it actually tastes like a bellini, LOL.
I don’t think anything about the tea itself is changing, though. I think your store was just out, Autumn.
The woman I had in, I sold her oolong too (Slimful Chocolate), although I didn’t tell her it was chickweed. (LOL, WTF?!) I just told her that oolong can potentially speed your metabolism. I’m not sure that would have helped her anyway, though…I got the impression that this woman had more bad dietary habits than oolong would ever overcome. So I also discussed how I used to be horribly addicted to soda pop, and how I completely gave it up for tea (and lost about 10lbs in the process). I told her that the more important thing would be to find tea that she adored and could drink every day over things full of empty calories.
She looked at me like I had two heads.
What’s wrong with selling the mate?
That’s so interesting about sweetness and the chickweed! I thought I’d look for it while I was at the store last night, but forgot. They always have that one brand of teabags that advertises lots of tisanes like raspberry leaf, dandelion, etc. Raspberry leaf lasts forever btw. I have a bag that is probably 3years old in a sealable bag and it still tastes good and works great.
Ok now the name change makes sense. I could never pronounce it either! I never really asked for it though. That’s an interesting marketing move. See though? Another Teavana naming funny. I’ve never had a bellini so I wouldn’t have anything to go off of. :(
Yeah, the whole what else are you doing plus drinking tea is always an interesting issue. I’ve known people who like to say, oh I drink tea for health reasons, as they bite into their huge danish pastry. I don’t think any amount of metabolism boosting will help overcome that! Soda is something that I’m still trying to get my husband off of. We never buy it, but he always wants one when we go out. I had a photo the other day which showed how much sugar is in the sodas and he was pretty shocked. I haven’t seen him order one since.
I think that finding something you really love is great advice! I think that drinking tea over soda is easy for me because I just enjoy it so much. If it wasn’t something I really loved I probably wouldn’t be able to get myself to drink it.
O.o I’m confused about the mate thing too. I love mate when it’s done right.