Thanks to Magic Carpet Tea for offering a great deal so I could try this. Oolong is my fave. Dates are a weakness. This sounded perfect!
Unfortunately, I learned that there was date sugar in this blend as well. And, upon receiving it, I could see it looked like quite a lot of date sugar. One, I’ve never put sweetener in my tea so am not used to it and thus don’t like sweetened tea for the most part. Two, I have type 1 diabetes. When I have to make calculations for everything else I put past my lips, I definitely don’t want to worry about how much insulin I need when it comes to tea. Tea is my refuge. I’d might as well go eat a piece of bread or a bowl of rice! One of my pet peeves is beverages that include sweetener and aren’t up-front about this. I find it a lot in flavoured matchas.
Another grievance is that this came really, really crushed. I can’t really even identify tea leaves at first glance since it is all crushed together and dusty. It also made it hard to strain. I’m not sure to what extent this is how the tea is blended because the package (an envelope) came pressed alarmingly, uniformly, completely flat. I’m wondering if it got sent as letter mail, which really isn’t acceptable for tea.
It is moderately enjoyable. There was an earthy date flavour that I expected from the combination, but it was a lot more muted than I expected. Especially with all the date sugar! I’m sure I’ll drink the rest of this but it won’t be a re-buy, unfortunately. I think it’s not the kind of experience I was expecting from an oolong blend.
