Red Vanilla

I can see two big chunks of vanilla bean in my heaping teaspoon of rooibos blend steeped in 12 oz of 200 F water.

There is a strong honey aroma over the cup and another sharp aroma I can’t place. The liquor is clear and has a nice, deep red-brown color.

The taste gives me a warm honey flavor, then a sharp vanilla flavor, then the soft, earthy rooibos taste. The sip is not earthy overall, likely due to the strong, almost pungent vanilla taste. I think it balances the honey and earthy rooibos flavors well. A vanilla aftertaste remains.

I like this one enough to consider ordering more than this sample and trying it with milk.

I was looking forward to this tea – warm, nutty rooibos with a hint of cream. The problem is, the vanilla was so heavy, there was no “hint”-ing involved. I felt hit over the head with the vanilla instead. Good quality vanilla, to be sure, but not a seamless enough marriage of balanced flavors for my taste. Perhaps a different kind of vanilla would have been better?