Stress Reliever

BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN

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BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAN HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIP

BEAN HIP!

I was really tempted to just leave this review at that, but I guess I’ll say more. I am, by nature, prone to stressing out about things. The month before I first went to Japan I developed a rash out of stress. While IN Japan and applying for graduate school, I developed ulcers. This past year, in anticipation of my first conference paper, I actually had bouts of unexplained nausea starting FOUR MONTHS before. So yeah, a good stress reliever tea would be…helpful.

Today, I tested the Stress Reliever tea by drinking it while having a phone conversation with my mum who was describing her heart attack like symptoms to me but categorically refusing to go get checked out. I am not sure if the tea helped, but I AM feeling very sleepy right at the moment so it may be…TOO GOOD. Or I may just be sleepy. I DID feel remarkably calm about the whole heart attack thing so…let’s go with it working!

The taste of the tea is your pretty standard herby set up in terms of both smell and taste, although thankfully without anise which seems to be in a lot of these homeopathic type teas and which I am just not that big a fan of. Interestingly, I do feel like I can taste some sort of beanness about it.

Reading the other reviews I begin to wonder if I didn’t steep it for too long, I wasn’t getting much out of the lemongrass at all. Second try is clearly called for!

Second steep: Oh my! What a lovely light lemony taste! There’s a slight herby undertone still, but the lemon is definitely dominating this time. I really must have oversteeped on the first go around. THIS tisane really stands out among tisanes I’ve drunk. I could definitely see getting more of it for destressing in the afternoon.

The ordering of my first run of TeaFrog samples coincided with a pretty stressful period at work, so I added this to the samples order. Of course, then I didn’t get to it until things were much less stressful. But so it goes.

The mixture of herbs in this one is pretty eclectic, and I’m sure I haven’t knowingly had a tisane with any of these ingredients except lemongrass before. I took St. John’s Wort in capsule form for a while a long time ago, but never had it in a drink. Makes me wonder what this is going to taste like. I fear it will be unbearably medicinal.

The smell of the herbs, though, is pleasing enough. It’s savory and sweet at the same time, which is interesting. Herbal mixtures don’t usually come down on the sweet side for me unless they contain fruit or mint, but neither is present here to explain the sweet note to the fragrance.

It makes a light yellow liquor that smells mostly of lemon, but has a savory (thyme? sage?) aroma underneath. And it tastes…. not bad! Not medicinal, mostly a very light lemon flavor with some cooking spice flavor around the sides. Not as strongly savory as either verbena or the Sleep Tight from TeaGschwendner. In fact, there are some sweet, non-lemon flavors that pop every now and then on the tongue.

In general, this is a class of tisane that I’m finding I’m not strongly attracted to flavor wise. I like the idea of them, how they sound in theory. But in practice I’m almost always left scratching my head and wondering why I didn’t have something with a chamomile base instead if I want to be calmed or made sleepy. As these go, though, this one gets points for being reasonably tasty and non-medicinal.

Most herbal stress busters lean on a lemony base, and TeaFrog’s Stress Reliever fits the stereotype. It’s pleasantly lemongrass-heavy when you examine the dry blend and when you drink a steeped cup.

(Reviewed and rated for medicinal value for an upcoming www.itsallabouttheleaf.com post.)

This is a nice,pleasant, and mild tisane. Subtle lemon flavor. Perfect for those who do not like Chamomile as it is very relaxing. Although this is loaded with medicinal herbs only the lemon taste comes thru. But the best part this really does make me sleepy…..

This tisane had a light lemongrass taste, but not even a shining lemongrass taste. For me the taste fell flat.
I still have some sample left, so I will give it one more shot in the future though.

Lovely, mellow tisane =) Perfect for a Sunday or for a late afternoon pick me up.