There is a lovely woman who goes to a three-day camping event that I attend every year, puts up a canvas wall tent, and sells iced teas of 7 or 8 different types. I like a lot of what she brings; she obviously knows her tea and knows how to brew it and keep it tasting good in the plastic dispensers. Also it’s usually hot as hell and just about any drink tastes good when you need it that much.
But the one I keep coming back to is her honeybush tea, and now—ta da!—I think I’ve found it! (Or rather, my friend Sarah found it for me, and gifted me with it today, along with other yummy stuff in a gift bag. I adore Sarah!) I can’t recall if “The Tea Lady” at my camping event uses vanilla honeybush or just honeybush. But I know she sweetens it slightly, and it’s just perfect on a hot day.
Having just discussed happy memories of iced honeybush, here I am drinking it hot. It is January 1st in Wisconsin, after all. It’s a lovely surprise to find it’s good hot too! I have a spoonful or two of Teavana’s sugar crystals in it, and (because I’m kind of a sugar fiend) it is really tasty, but I tasted it before sugaring it and it was very good that way too: smooth, sweetish, slightly woody. The pre-brewing leaf seems to have a lot of woody-looking bits in it too, more than I remember seeing in other honeybush teas, but then maybe I wasn’t paying attention.
I can say that the honeybush teas I’ve tried in pursuit of the lovely, sweet, resinous taste I get in that wonderful Tea Lady’s iced tea, have been a disappointment. This one: not a bit. Can’t wait to try it iced when springtime comes!
