Rooibos Vanilla Chai

The smell from this tea is pretty potent, maybe due to the whole cloves (but I love cloves, so I am pretty okay with it), the actual tea is much less spicy and I do get a subtle vanilla taste – not as much as I’d want but still nice. Not the best chai I’ve had but better than the vanilla chai from Davids!

This is another tea from my stop at Lollicup. I have been craving chai like a crazy person. You know its fall and about the only time I really like it. Except now since I am trying to cut out some caffeine, particularly at night all the chai I do have is off limits. So I grabbed an ounce of this to try. I was a little hesitant on this one because the cinnamon smell was so strong. The tea does have a strong cinnamon flavor, but the other spices and vanilla in the tea seem to help it out enough that I actually really enjoyed this one. The spice in this chai offered a bit of heat at the end of the sip, while the vanilla almost made it so that I do not need to add any sugar. Might have to stock up on this for the winter. As a side note, I am discovering that an ounce of rooibos does not go nearly as far as an ounce of black tea.

I actually drank this again last night before bed. I loved it so much that I got online and ordered more before falling asleep…..
I had forgotten that I already ordered some from whispering pines….
Oh well…. ;-)

One of my favorite loose leaf teas of all time. I love cloves and chai spices, and this tea gives me the chance to drink it before bed (caffeine-free!). When I was new to tea, the rooibos does tend to be a tad medicine-like in flavor, but there are enough orange peels, ginger, and vanilla flavor to win you over. At this point, I have come to like the rooibos flavor and adore all the additional flavors in this tea. It truly is creamy and spicy at once and I have loved its versatility in many blends. Add mint and you get the flavors of a gummy spice drop. Add lapsang souchong and you get a smoky, spice treat. Add fruit for an almost pie-like flavor. And add more rooibos or caramel to get a major evening dessert tea. Caffeine-free, spicy, creamy, and flexible. A great standard for any tea-lover’s cupboard.

I thought I would try this tea last night because I was trying to not drink caffeine so I could get good sleep. I was on standby to open this morning, meaning wake up at 4:30am. Luckily, I did not need to go in because I did not fall asleep until after 2am.

I’ve never had a rooibos chai before, I did not notice any vanilla but it was nice. I don’t think it is something I would want often. It would be great if my son did so he can have an iced chai latte when his dad does in the summer. So, I’m waiting for my son to get home from school to get his opinion. update: He loves it! He said it tasted a little like pumpkin pie and requested it again tonight. He was very happy to have a chai he can drink.

This actually turned out to be a surprise sipdown! (120)
A friend of mine piced up my roommate at an event and she just stayed with us and wanted to take home some tea. She ended up going home with some Super Ginger and Thranduil, and I had about 7 grams of this left so I just decided to do the entire package.
This is actually the first time I had this!

It’s nice and spicy. And.. yeah. That’s about it! It’s a nice mellow chai sooooo yeah.

Thought this one was really good. It smelled nothing like vanilla when I first opened it and I can’t say it tastes like Vanilla but it’s delicious. Just a hint of spice at the end of you sip. Loved it!

I expected some vanilla because of the name, but I don’t find it here. However, this is a wonderfully spicy chai. I like my gingerbread cookies seriously spicy, and drinking this tea was like having my favorite gingerbread cookie in a cup. The ginger is especially prominent. The cardamom is less so, but it is still one very flavorful and pleasant combination. This will definitely become the caffeine-free alternative to the chai I usually drink.

I added a little vanilla milk to the second cup, and it made it a real treat.

Central Ohio is several days into another deep freeze, and though I initially reached for something tropical to induce fantasies of warm breezes, palm trees, and lazy days on the beach with a stack of books, this vanilla chai caught my eye, and the promised warmth proved more alluring.

It yields a nicely blended, almost entirely smooth cuppa, especially with a splash of whole milk. The spices really come through at the finish, which explains my “almost” smooth reference—cinnamon nips your tongue at the end, though not unpleasantly. The vanilla and chai are what hit first, making it all a rather interesting and enlivening sip. I’m on my second steep of the leaves right now; occasionally glancing out of my studio window to the subzero, under-a-foot-of-snow world outside as I work, I do indeed feel warmed up and cozy.

I enjoyed this blend a lot! It is naturally sweet, added a little milk, and all of a sudden it was dessert! Great for when I don’t want the caffeine of traditional black chai.