Hot Lips (organic)

The dry leaves smell just like the cinnamon hard candy I used to have at my grandma’s house when I was a kid.

When drinking this tea, I taste the sweetness of the cinnamon and undertones of heat from the chili peppers. It’s pretty good, but I wish there was more green tea flavor coming through.

The second steep was also good— very similar to the first steep. I didn’t fancy drinking a third cup, but I imagine that the third steep would have also been good.

the green smells like grass to me. or maybe old spinach. or seaweed. something about the way the pepper mixes with the green i think? or maybe it’s the safflower? i don’t think i’ve had much safflower.
this tea just does not want to be my friend.
i know,… it’s not the tea, it’s me.

So this is day 9 of my ade advent calendar. I kinda liked the smell of the tea, but the taste just wasn’t for me.

holy awesome!
This one smelled delicious in the store, so i was hoping it wouldn’t disappoint. and it didn’t.
super cinnamon-y, but doesn’t taste fake to me.
I love it, and it’s perfect for fall

This tea was just too hot for me, I found it unpleasant to drink something this spicy. If you are a spice lover, I imagine it would be fantastic…

I wasn’t expecting too much of this tea because I thought it was like Cinnamon Heart. I thought Cinnamon Heart was ok…the smell was there, but got an earthly taste.

From the dry leaf, I got a similar smell to Cinnamon Heart: Cinnamon heart candies!

Steeped tea: At first it was very light. It had a nutty grassy flavour and I could barely taste the kick. Once the tea started to cool to room temperature, I began tasting the nice sweet cinnamon and finally felt the kick! I feel as though one tasting does not do it justice, so I have to try it again.

Alright so I’m two sips in…and I decided to write a note. The kettle was almost boiling, not sure what water temperature it was at – didn’t check. I took the note from a few people about steeping a little longer and waited about 5-6 minutes and wow does it have some kick to it. Definitely tastes like hot lips or if you stuffed your mouth with cinnamon hearts. Absolutely delightful tea, I’m going to have to stock up before this one runs out! Doesn’t have the same heady smell when steeped that it does when you open the bag with the dried leaves, however it tastes wonderful. As far as smells go I suppose I’m used to my two chocolate teas that I’ve been drinking all week. This is definitely one of my favourites and is starting to nudge Cinnamon Heart into second place for my cinnamon teas. I still need to try the Cinnamon Rooibus that Davids has.

First brew of this one (I got 50g because dry it smells exactly like its namesake, and I’m a sucker for cinnamon in almost all forms) and I’m not disappointed, but not overwhelmed. When I scooped out I noticed that there were twigs in with the leaves, something I don’t normally see in a David’s tea. Curious, I looked and saw it was just “green tea” on the label, so I suspect it isn’t a top quality leaf. Still, it smells amazing so I watch it brew happily. No red comes out in brewing (yay, no hidden hibiscus for colour!) and the leaves spread nicely.

First sip, I definitely had a top note of cinnamon but the body seemed . . . lacking. Curious, I sipped again and had the same experience. In went a dash of sugar to see, and it did bring out the cinnamon and kick a bit more, but as I sipped I felt that it was weaker than I’d expected.

I’m halfway through the cup now, and the afterkick? Definitely is there. My mouth tastes like I’ve been sucking on a cinnamon heart in all the best ways. I’m going to try a longer steep next time and see if I can pull the notes out a bit more.

Definitely not sad I got this one, and it is my favourite Tea of the Month from David in ages, I just . . . need to play with it a bit.

Liquid. Cinnamon. Hearts.

Is is just me or does it feel like this winter is dragging on and on and on? It doesn’t help that my husband’s side of the family is from South Africa and they’ve all been vacationing over there for weeks while posting lovely, sun-drenched, beach-laden pictures on facebook of their adventures. Sigh.

It was free tea day yesterday, but I felt guilty about just popping in to abuse this perk, then leaving… so I lingered around a bit and got talking to one of the new sales-associates (I know because almost all the others know me by now, or at least they know my adorable toddler) who kept suggesting to me teas I have already tried. When he asked if I had tried Hot Lips I told him I hadn’t… that I’d just never gotten around to it. So, he took the canister down, popped the lid, and even before I leaned over the canister I could smell the cinnamon-y magic.

However, once I got home I had to wait to steep it, since my caffeine tolerance is so low even this would keep me up. This morning I brewed it and BAM the whole apartment smelled like cinnamon hearts. Drinking it is like liquified cinnamon hear candies are flowing down your throat, minus the overwhelming sweetness and burn of the cinnamon. So good, I even got two really flavourful steeps out of it!

I had to get some of this tea – I love spicy food! This tea seemed pretty cool idea.

Dry, this tea is 100% smell of those cinnamon heart candies sold during Valentines day. I was tempted to just reach in and chomp on the leaves (I had a hard time finding those cinnamon heart candies in stores this year).
Seeing the little peppercorns floating the in the steeper was a sign of spicy things to come!

Taste wise – well… cinnamon! As it goes down, you can feel the heat going down. For a 3 minute steep, you get a warm blast of cinnamon and heat. The more I drink this cup, the more cinnamon I taste.

For you cinnamon/spicy masochistic folk try steeping the tea longer, or what I did at work, just add the leaves to a travel tea glass and leave them there. As time went on, the cinnamon came out a bit more and the heat came out TONS more! By the end it was like my mouth and throat were on fire! HELL YEAH – I was awake all day at work, not sure from the green tea caffeine or the heat of this tea. It scared my coworkers.

So – if you love cinnamon and those cinnamon hearts, give this one a try.

Me? I find this tea not really multi-dimensional. It’s just cinnamon and heat. It’s cool, but I wish there was more to it. I don’t think I’ll buy more – but I will try it as a latte or boil it down for awhile to make concentrated chai syrup and see how that goes (I’ll review it again if I do).
I’m thinking this tea would make a crazy Spicy chai latte.

OMG. I am so glad I stopped at David’s today. We were doing some flower deliveries for my BIL (they are short couriers so we fill in sometimes) and between deliveries we were driving by David’s in Westboro in Ottawa and I decided to take a few minutes and stop. Wow. This was the tea of the day and I loved it. When it was hot the cinnamon heart candy flavour was so great. After it cooled some it was really cinnamony (is that a word?) and I still enjoyed it but it was really hot. Almost made me reach for my Zantac. I am looking forward to making this one at home. Hope they make it permanent.

I threw this in with my David’s order, as it contained all my favorite things – namely cinnamon and peppercorns. I love cinnamon, and I love the bite of peppercorns. I failed to notice that this was a green, so I was slightly disappointed when it arrived. I like the option of milk in spicy teas, but I don’t put milk in green tea.

I’ve had it twice now. The first time I let it go 6 minutes and it was probably a bit oversteeped. The second, at 4.5 minutes, was just right. The tea is strongly cinnamon – that is certainly the strongest element! With no sugar, the tea has a bit of a dry, bitter edge (I think that’s the peppercorns.) It disappears with sugar. This tea lacks the natural sweetness of some cinnamon teas (Harney’s hot cinnamon spice, for example.) I don’t taste the tea at all. The base could have been anything, because all I get is cinnamon!

This tea is just ok for me. I loooove cinnamon, and I think I expected something more like the Harney tea. I do like that it has less caffeine than black tea. I took it with me to class today, where it kept me awake through a friday, but I was still able to nap later.

On the other hand, if you want to drink more green tea this might be a way to start! I’m not a huge green fan, mostly because I like strong flavors, and this one satisfies me. A great valentine’s tea, very pretty to look at, and it’s different from all the chocolate flavors.

Thank the sweet lord this is out and now I can talk about it.

It went from strange new tea to Top 10. Easily.

If you like Cinnamon Heart, you will like this (although you’ll get less of a kick from the caffeine, as this is a green), and if you like actual cinnamon hearts OR Hot Lips (for my American viewers, they’re like cinnamon hearts except gummi and lip-shaped) you will like this.

Spicy! Good for what ails you, if you need help with chest or sinus issues.

Add a bit of agave and it’s like eating a damn candy.

This is my favourite tea!I love the smell and the little kick you get from the chili in it! It tastes like Cinnamon hearts candy.

This tea smells exactly like those little red heart candies that everyone seems to have around valentines day…probably why this was last years february tea of the month! I did enjoy this tea…I haven’t drank many cups but I will finish the pouch.

a nice amount of that cinnamon heat, lovely on a chilly february afternoon!
the green tea is a perfect base for that hot, sweet flavour

Was expecting it to taste more like cinnamon, especially with the smell the dry leaves give off. Good anyway though, just a little disappointed.

Ok, there isn’t many things in the world that smell better then cinnamon hearts and this tea is right on with taste.I enjoyed this tea, I don’t really re-steep tea but will try net time for sure.

Part of me thinks this tea is misnamed. It’s called “hot lips”, which I associate with a slightly spicy gummy candy. Lip-shaped, bright red. However, this reminds me more of the cinnamon hearts from valentines day than that particular dime store candy.

However, a tea by any other name should still taste as…. …tea-ish, right?

Steeped: 1.25tsp in tea ball. A splash of cold water in the bottom of the cup, then boiled water poured in.

First Cup: Steeped 3 minutes. Clear.
Without taking a sip, already I can really smell the cinnamon. Wow!
The spiciness is the most obvious thing about the flavour. The first few sips seemed hot in both senses of the word. As it cools, I’m noticing the slight sweetness to the tea itself, though the spiciness is still quite strongly coming through. I’d probably like a bit more of the cinnamon sweet, actually, to balance the spiciness, like in a cinnamon heart.

Second cup: Resteep. 4 minutes. Clear, then sugar added.
Again, the heat of both kinds is the first thing I notice about the tea, outside of the cinnamon scent. There is a bit of a dry taste, I think it’s from the cinnamon.
I tried adding a bit of sugar, and it brightens up the flavour for me. The spiciness isn’t really as strong as it was in the first steep, though it’s still there. The sugar adds a nice balance to the cinnamon flavour though, I quite enjoy it.

Third cup: Re-resteep. Approx 5 minutes. Clear, then sugar added.
The flavour seemed rather dull (mainly the cinnamon) until I added a bit of sugar. Again, it really brightened the steep up. Still, starting to fall a little flat. This will probably be my last cup.

Overall impression: I never really got a taste of the tea at all. I’m not sure if I consider this a good thing or not, as it’s the first ingredient. Still, the flavours that did come through were fairly enjoyable. I still would have liked a hint more sweetness in the tea itself to brighten up the spiciness.

My rating: 78. B+. Certainly not bad, but (again), the ideal tea, in my opinion, should need nothing added to be its best. By that standard, this needs to be a bit more sweet to get an A from me.

The obvious comparison (given that many reviewers have mentioned it, and it was my first thought as well) is to Harney’s Hot Cinnamon Spice black tea . Which personally, I find is like getting kicked in the face with cinnamon (which sometimes I am in the mood for…but usually not).

This one is slightly less cinnamony, and it does have a little kick to it, but from the chili peppers! I never imagined having a “hot,” in the chili peppers sense, tea but … I like it :) The heat comes right at the end, and it’s pretty mild. If you enjoy Mexican hot chocolate, which usually has cinnamon and some kind of chili, then you should try Hot Lips!

I should add that sometimes I find that green tea tastes like soap…this one doesn’t :)