English Teatime

We arrived at Duke Medical this morning for the removal of the skin cancer about a quarter of an inch from my eye. The paperwork had said to eat a good breakfast as most people can expect to stay from three to five hours, and to be prepared to send for a lunch. I had Carnation Instant Breakfast at 5 am and brought a granola bar and bottled water with me. Lo and behold, we get here and there is lovely classical music playing, Panera muffins and bagels, and TEA! That’s right, two wooden chests of Bigelow tea with lots of varieties to choose from and a dispenser for hot water, coffee, and hot chocolate. (Hubby had the hot chocolate and said it was the best he had ever tasted made with hot water. I use milk to make mine.)

This was my first tea. It was a good, solid, English style tea. I chose this nstead of the breakfast tea because even though additions were available – heck, they even have cream cheese for the bagels – I wanted to take it straight.

I won’t pretend this is fine tea. It didn’t make me swoon. But for something you could plop in a cup of hot water and drink in a waiting room, it did a nice job. Now on to the Bigelow Green…

Oh, the nurse says they got it all on the first try! Soon, Pottery Barn and Tin Roof Teas! :)

Purchased on the way to work today, honestly I can’t understand the other glowing reviews because to me this tastes like a really weak and mediocre black tea. I might have had too high a water to tea ratio so perhaps I will try it again someday.

I am pleasantly surprised by this tea. It has a bold, malty character that I didn’t expect – I was expecting something fairly mild and “tea-baggish” – but I didn’t get that here… this is really very good… one that I think the English might consider “moreish”

ETA: another THANK YOU to TeaEqualsBliss for sending me this tea to try!

One of those days that require a steady drip of caffeine to keep moving forward. This one does the trick. Smooth with a little sweetness at the end of each taste. Bigelow does bagged tea well and properly.

Wow, this is surprisingly tasty. No additives yet it is smooth and a little sweet. Very malty. I’m actually pretty impressed!

A review of English Teatime by Bigelow

Company: Bigelow
Tea Name: English Teatime
Tea Type/Varietal: black tea
Region:
Steeping Vessel/Amt. Leaf: cup/ tea bag
Plucking Season:
Liquor Color: dark amber
Leaf Characteristics:

1. Steepings

1st Steeping:
Water temperature: 190 Fahrenheit
Time: 5 minutes

I am having this blend of English Teatime taken from my in-laws pantry. And yes, I helped myself to their teas at time. I take one tea bag (placing it in my cup) and steep it in hot water for five minutes.

The tea’s color is dark amber with a somewhat roasted aroma and tasting slightly of malt with nothing added to the tea. Tea is smooth and full-bodied, with nothing added, I find that the tea is not astringent all instead having a smooth finish upon swallowing.

This tea is ideal for those favoring milk/cream and sugar with their tea which would make a good cup of morning tea and mid-day drinking.

I swear this used to be called English Breakfast. Now it’s English Teatime and there’s a pink box for English Breakfast…

Anyway, the chai didn’t wake me up enough so I went hard core. This has a very pleasant tea taste, robust and hearty. And caffeine-y.

I need to find my “fast lane” tea – that’ll get the job done.

Ahhh tea…..gotta love tea. This tea probably ended up being one of the tastiest teas I’ve had – not because it’s the best tea ever, but any post-disastrous day tea is bound to be tasty. Lost my tea stash in our house fire Wednesday (along with pretty much everything else – but let’s be honest, the tea stash is the biggest bummer ;) ) The hotel we stayed at had a pretty typical stock of Bigelow tea (yaaay). I had some of Verdant Tea’s Diyi Cornfield puerh in my purse and some more tea at work so I am pretty happy about that, but at this point tea is just one of those things that makes everything seem like normal again for a little while and I am enjoying every cup.

First of all, on the back of the packet, it says to only steep this for 1-2 minutes. Only 2 minutes for a black tea? I’m lost.

Anyway, I mostly grabbed this because I was in a hurry this morning and didn’t have time to prepare a loose-leaf tea. (But after a long night of drinking, I was craving tea as soon as I woke up.) Upon first sip, I was glad that I let it steep the normal amount of time.

It did get pretty strong, but the flavor is nice. It’s a keemun, I think, and just tastes like your standard breakfast tea. It’s good, but not really noteworthy. I wouldn’t turn it down, but if there was something else, I’d probably leave this one behind.

I found this slightly battered tea bag at the bottom of my tea stash. I’m not really sure where it came from or how long I’ve had it. But it’s tea, so why not brew it?

As I poured the hot water over the bag, the tea bag filled up with an inordinant amount of air. Despite my best efforts, I could not completely submerge the bag. Weird.

The brewed tea doesn’t have much of an aroma. Perhaps it’s because it’s so old. The liquor is a deep, dark, opaque brown. I accidently added some sweetener before I tried it out of habit. So, I can’t comment on what this tastes like sans additions.

But I was actually pleasantly surprised by this tea! It’s very smooth and still quite flavorful. There’s not even a hint of bitterness or astringency. I think I added a tiny bit too much sweetener because it’s a bit tart. And I can’t imagine that’s from the tea leaves themselves.

I also almost always add milk to black tea. I usually find it either tannic or bitter. But this is great even without milk! That’s pretty impressive to me.

This is really quite good. My Twining’s English Breakfast may have a contender. Now I have to go pick up a box of this!

Bigelow was my introduction to tea beyond Lipton. Back in the day, I lived on Constant Comment and Earl Grey. This started my Earl Grey addiction. Even liked Lemon Lift and Cinnamon Stick. When I was given a bag of English Teatime it took me back a few decades (even though I have never heard of this particular tea). So I put on appropriate music – BTO’s Sledgehammer and started brewing. First off this appears to be a 2g bag. Most Bigelow is a wimpy 1.6g anymore. Second I did not read the instructions – I steeped for 5 minutes. Should have steeped less. The pucker factor was pretty high. This was followed by a moment of blandness but surprisingly the aftertaste was very pleasant. I don’t drink a lot of unflavored blacks because of the aftertaste. I found this tea enjoyable. I would definitely add sweetener and maybe a bit of milk.

It’s a smooth black tea, nothing fancy, but definitely not the worst bagged black tea I’ve ever had. Actually, since there’s no flavorings or additives, it’s really good for being a bag. I may even pick up a full box of this sometime to keep on hand (this was from a sampler box).

In fact, it’s a perfect compliment to my breakfast: Honey Bun Cake.

This is a smooth, flavorful black tea that doesn’t need additives, but is awesome with a bit of honey.

This is not as strong as Teavana English Breakfast and I like this better! It is the perfect blend of bitter and smooth with more on the smooth end. Nice smell in the mug and took a splash of milk perfectly. You can’t beat the price for this tea.

Dad bought me this tea because he didn’t like the idea of me drinking plain hot water while I was sick this week. Gotta love that man, even though I wasn’t drinking tea because I didn’t want to waste my little stash all up when I couldn’t enjoy the taste of any of it.

This stuff is pretty good, I had it with honey. It has a better taste than Twinnings, which I was surprised by. I got the water up to boiling and only set the bag in for about 45 seconds and it was surprisingly strong and flavorful.

I ended up dumping half of it out in favor of more hot water, after all, I was sick.

Okay, so knowing that I SOMEHOW screwed the first cup of this tea up the first time I made it, I tried, again, and made sure to make it as carefully as I could.

This tea was included in a sampler I picked up at Sam’s Club a week or so ago. After trying The London Cuppa, I was originally in the mood to try more of the same, and so I yanked one of the bad boys from the sampler out.

Now, here’s where things screwed up, horribly. Without thinking anything of it, my ditzy self left the damn tea bag in the drink. I left the tea bag in the tea, and I somehow managed to make the most bitter, godawful tea that I have ever made. And I am sorry for the rating I made for my original tasting of this tea, which showed my own mistake in the rating itself. I know I did this, because tasting it now, I cannot taste ANY of that “bitterness” that I tasted before. So, to Bigelow Tea, I am genuinely, from the bottom of my stupid, naive heart, sorry, and I really like this tea. As in I really like it as a step up from the usual straight-up black tea that I have tasted before.

This is an incredibly strong, in my opinion, black tea that does not stand for you draining all of its flavor into a cup of hot water. Do not make the mistake I did, friends, or else this one will bite you in your mouth like the innocent fool that you are. TAKE THE BAG OUT AS SOON AS IT HITS TWO MINUTES!

This tea reminds me of happier times; of my biological father’s iced tea, which, to me, was that rare treat that rarely lived past a full day in the fridge. What I think lead to my warped previous review of this particular tea is really its strongest – sorry for the pun – point: its strength.

A really very rich black tea, this one is great hot or cold, sweetened or not. I made my close-minded fiance take a drink of this, and he said that this did, indeed, also reminded him of his childhood homemade sweet tea – sun tea.

As I said before, I do believe that my earlier, um, scathing review was due to a misunderstanding on my part. Thank you, Bigelow Tea, for apologizing for my own stupid mistake, and agreeing to let me try you guys in another tea, but it’s really not necessary – everything that I’ve tasted by you guys is delicious, and I really just appreciate the nudge you gave me to try it again – properly steeped this time around!

I think your guys’ great prices, great all around quality, and compassion regarding my own stupidity have made me a lifelong fan of your brand – I really think I’ll especially enjoy this tea, made into a really delicious iced tea that even my choosy fiance will drink.

Sorry I even had to re-write this review, but trust me, I’ll definitely be buying a few more boxes of this tea down the road.

Thought I’d try this since we had some at work and I probably wouldn’t ever buy it for myself. Pretty okay standard black tea – kind of a mellow blend. Not terrible, not amazing.

Bold, dark, rich in taste, warming—this tea is perfect for its cheap cost. Not the classiest by any means, but working with a limited budget, Bigelow is the knight in shining armor.

I like this tea. Steeped for only 3 minutes, because the package specifies 1-2 minutes. Anyway, great color and great earthiness.

Revisited this tea for the first time in forever while on vacation. You know, Bigelow is just good and consistent. I really enjoyed my tea these past few mornings.