Buddha's Blend

Peach and jasmine are two of my favorite things in tea. I saw all the reviews about how temperamental this blend can be though, and since I’m a chronic over-steeper, I decided to be very careful about both temperature and time. Unfortunately, it meant that I could still smell the peach/jasmine combo but could barely taste it. I’d like to play with this a little more and see if I can get the taste to get anywhere close to the smell another time, because this blend is screaming my name if I can!

DAVIDsTEA advent, day 9

This is honestly one of my favorites from David’s tea. I used to hate their teas until I tried this one. Ever since I did, I’ve been doing my best to find another one that is even half as good as this one, but so far, they have all been quite disappointing!
This tea is quite delicate in taste. They have another one, a green tea I think, with jasmine (jade something? I don’t remember) and it tasted quite strongly with harsh flavors of very artificial jasmine. Even though this one contains added artificial flavors as well, it’s quite mild and doesn’t overpower the green and white tea blend. There’s just a hint of hibiscus and peach, that comes and gives this overall taste a round finish. It’s very “complete”, if I may say. By that I mean that it hits all the nice spots: not too sweet, not too strong, I don’t need to add anything to it and it’s one of the few that tastes exactly as it smells!
I drink it sometimes in the morning but mostly in the afternoon for a quick pick me up. Lovely. I will buy it for as long as they keep selling it.
And with two babies, it’s easy for me to burn teas (especially if they’re low quality) but this one hasn’t burned easily so far.

This smells amazingly refreshing. Like juicy, fresh peach candy! So good.

However, be really careful when preparing this because it can go from mild to bitter in an instance. I prepared this at a low temperature, 16 oz of water, steeped this for a minute, and used only a tablespoon of tea. I find anything longer than that makes it go bitter.

Sadly, the taste just does not live up to its smell. It has a very mild flavour, like the leaves were just subtly touched by the water, which makes sense since this is a white tea. It is so subtle, I cannot even pick out prominent notes that are jumping out at me. Maybe this tastes like a mild white tea and peaches?

But when prepared properly, it is a smooth sip with minimal astringency.

I’m not sure why this tea has so many low ratings! I really like it, but I am a big fan of peach and jasmine in general so I might be biased. I’m surprised with how well they go together in this blend, actually – even though I love both flavours, they’re not ones I would usually pair together. But it works! I really like the blend of white and green tea, too. More body than a white tea usually has, but without the grassy/vegetal sharpness of a green. Bird and Blend’s ‘Nearly Nirvana’ uses a white and green mix with jasmine too, but that one has spearmint instead of peach, and that’s another one I’m a big fan of. I guess it’s a combo I like. A lot of the reviews of this tea mention an overwhelming floral, but that’s not what I’ve found. To me, the front of this is all juicy peach, with the jasmine coming up second as a sort of floral mist in a way that elevates the peach without taking over. The peach lingers longest after the sip, too. I would say that maybe it’s age, because I’ve had this for a good couple of years now, but I remember it being very peach-forward when I first tried it fresh, too. Maybe I just got a good batch.

I had pulled the sampler package I had received of this from Ost’s cupboard sale all the way back in August of 2018… and I have no idea the age of that sampler packet. I was going to make a warm cup of tea with it (we’ve been bombarded in rainy weather here) but since it was a foil-sealed package and I wanted to use all 5g up at once, I decided to cold brew the whole amount in a Mason jar for iced tea instead. And then it was just too cold for me to be in the mood to drink it. I noticed the pale yellow color of the tea started to look more orangy over the course of the week and thought… I better drink that tea. So now I’m trying to get through it, despite the fact it still feels really cold in my house…

I was expecting heavy jasmine (something I’m not especially a fan of) but mostly I’m just tasting peach. There is a strong peach note hitting the back of my tongue, with a bit of a juicy and pithy flavor. There is a floral note, but nothing I can pinpoint specifically… a bit sweet and honeysuckle like, if anything. Maybe a hint of hay beneath the strong peach flavoring. Very refreshing, but other than the peach, I am not picking out much other flavor (but that could be due to the age of the sample… or even how long I left it in the fridge, to be fair).

I love this tea, but I rarely drink it because it’s just so finicky. Since I’ve been drinking mostly cold brews over the last few days and I really enjoy this iced, I figured it would be a good time to revisit it. Unfortunately, I cold brewed it for a mere 2 hours, and it still came out incredibly bitter. So bitter. Once I get through this tin, I probably won’t repurchase because it’s such a hassle to prepare it.

I received this tea as a sample with my most recent DAVIDsTEA order. I have been curious to try it for two reasons. It is seemingly very popular, and it is supposed to be similar to Seaberry Spa, and I very much enjoy Seaberry Spa.

It is a quick steep at only about 2 and a half minutes. The aroma is beautiful I cannot tell if it is the jasmine or the hibiscus or maybe even the white tea itself. I love the smell even before it is brewed too.

The taste is light, a beautiful combination of white and green tea, with subtle floral flavors in the background. This is the perfect tea for relaxing evenings, for reading a book with or for just feeling good.
I have been having a lot of very sweet and dessert teas lately, and this was a refreshing difference. Definitely the kind of tea I could see myself sitting down to sip while I read a book on a daily basis.
This is hard to compare to Seaberry Spa because I think Seaberry Spa has a more complex flavor profile but the white and green tea blend in this tea is perfection.

I plan to purchase a larger supply of this tea on my next trip to DAVIDsTEA.

Here another tea review that I will publish on my blog next week.
The aroma is very delicate, florale and sweet inside my teapot. I like it. Then I decided to taste it and if it’s delicate, the aftertaste is acid. Normally, I don’t tolerate hisbiscus but this one is correct and I just try to forget it and continue my tea tasting.
So, it’s a good tea for the delicate and sweet aspect. A good tea for a quiet afternoon…

DAVIDsTEA Advent Calendar 2021 – Day 9

Ooh, this sounds like something I would like. Although my existing rating isn’t very high, so we’ll see…

Hmm, yeah. It’s a pleasant tea. The jasmine is more restrained that I would expect, but I suppose that makes sense since this is a blend of three teas and presumably only the pearls are jasmine-scented. It seems like an okay jasmine though, not perfumey at all. What I don’t enjoy as much is the peach. It’s very artificial-tasting, like peach gummy rings. And while I do like peach gummy rings, I wish it was a more natural peach to pair with the jasmine.

Plus I’m not sure I’m getting much from the other two base teas (white and green) other than a hint of hay and a touch of astringency.

Beautiful combination of white and green tea! Don’t steep for too long or it won’t taste as great. 3-5 Minutes tops!