Sugar Cookie Sleigh Ride

Hmm. The flavor is certainly mild. It’s not as strong as my favorite teas; then again, it’s a namebrand tea, they seem to be afraid of “BOOM B***H HERE’S YOUR FLAVOR”. (Except for Harney and Sons.)

It has a pleasant sugar cookie taste, and when I first started drinking it after adding sweetener I really liked it. But then I noticed a hingering aftertaste…research online shows they’ve added stevia to this tea as part of the ‘natural flavors’, which I’m not a huge fan of. I’d drink this again, but I wish I knew what the old formula tasted like.

I love this seasonal tea! I enjoy drinking a decaf tea often, especially at night when I really don’t need or want caffeine. I’ve drank this many times and have gone through two boxes of my stash of 10 from Amazon (a brilliant Amazon Prime purchase, if I do say so myself.) This is the closest to perfection in flavor and ability to be manhandled while brewing. It loses it’s lovely richness in iced tea, so it’s not perfect for all applications.

The flavors:
*I find the “natural flavoring” for the sugar cookie flavor isn’t unnatural or extra oily and is quite pleasant. It reminds me a lot of a shortbread/sugar cookie hybrid without the oily butter flavor that can start to taste slightly rancid in storage.
*There’s a tiny hint of almond and sweetness.
*I like that it’s not very sweet as brewed so I can keep it richer as-is or add my own sugar content to taste. I tend to add my own creamer and a small amount of sugar; So Delicious Coconut Creamer + agave, Coffeemate Original powder, cashew milk/cream + honey. I don’t consume milk products and don’t enjoy adding most milks because I prefer denser, richer flavors. This tea steeped longer could withstand milks vs creams, though.
*Mixes exceptionally well with peppermint tea.

Water temperature:
*This tea works well with boiling or just under boiling water. I don’t find any enhanced bitterness with any particular brewing method, which is lovely. For a grocery store bagged tea, that’s pretty amazing.
*I don’t enjoy it nearly as much iced. The cookie flavoring gets lost in iced tea. This decreases the rating slightly for me, but not nearly as much since this isn’t the type of tea one would normally make iced tea out of. It’s still pleasant iced, but the flavor isn’t as lovely.

Steeping times:
*3 minutes minimum, the tea is more malty and the cookie flavor hasn’t fully bloomed
*After 3.5 minutes the sugar cookie is more pronounced but not as rich as possible
*I brew it for a minimum of 4 minutes to enhance the sugar cookie flavor.
*Longer times don’t increase the bitterness much, if at all, as long as it doesn’t cool too much.

This is a shock! I made a cup of this while cleaning up my room, and within two minutes it smelled like I had been baking. The taste is warm and comforting too, and somehow this tea manages to be buttery, just like a cookie. I admit my reasoning for getting it was “hey, it’s on sale,” but I’m glad I went for it. Yum!

I’ve been wanting to try this one for forever… I finally found it at Shaw’s of all places (along with a fully stocked display of Caramel Apple Dream!)

I’m in love! This tastes EXACTLY like a sugar cookie. I’m on my second cup already. It’s a creamy tea, and it’s sweet and bready and buttery and perfect.

I wish they made this and the Caramel Apple year round, but I suppose if they did, they wouldn’t be as special.

So… Dry, this tea smells like Play-doh to me. Specifically, homemade Play-doh.

It doesn’t taste like that thankfully, however it tastes just like a crunchy chow mein noodle. It’s weirdly savory? I do get a hint of orange and vanilla, but overall it’s like some kind of savory cracker. There is a slightly sweet aftertaste.

Am I crazy…? XD

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 18/19

Because I am a lemming and thought this would be awesome, I bought two boxes of this (Target isn’t super close to my house).

The dry bad smelled like a cookie with a little citrus rind on it, so far so good. It brewed up a sort of non color, maybe almost clear but with a hint of something. Pretty murky and not so appealing.

Hot, I smelled COCONUT Alarm bells! I went and double checked the ingredients. No coconut. Folks, I ate a mouthful of hidden coconut last weekend and thought my head was going to do the exorcist spin. YUCK. Anyway, I took the leap and drank some.

First sip I didn’t like it. What is that flavor…buttery, sort of vanilla, definitely sweet. Couldn’t place it.

Marshmallow? OK. Marshmallow and butter. Then I had it! You know when you make homemade krispy treats, and the first step is to melt the butter and add marshmallows? That’s exactly what this tastes like. It tastes much more like a krispy treat than the krispy treat tea I had once. I bet if you made this with some genmaicha it would be right there.

But anyway, while it wasn’t super bad, it wasn’t good either. I will probably try one more cup and use someone’s suggestion to leave the bag in there. But it definitely wasn’t a wow moment.

This is disgusting. I got it after hearing how great it was last year, and had high hopes. I took my first sip and was alarmed at how much like cookies it tasted. Then, halfway through my big mug I was feeling slightly sick to my stomach at the sickly sweet scent and all I could taste was artificial flavoring. Huge disappointment, but I know so many people who love it, the rest of my box will be rehomed.

This reminds me of something at my grandmas house. Something that is not a sugar cookie. Or maybe its a store bought day old weird sugar cookie. Whatever the case… this doesn’t taste like a sugar cookie. It has a bit of vanilla and a cakeish flavor but… I’m just not diggin it…

I really didn’t enjoy this tea. It tasted to me like sweetened artificial butter flavoring and smelled like pineapple. The combination was very unpleasant to me. I ended up throwing the rest of the box out.

So glad I stocked up on this one! This one is just…so perfect. ^^ And caffeine free!!! :O :D