Blood Citrus Smoothie

I tried this catalog tea years ago under the name “Blood-Orange Smoothie” from Spice and Tea Exchange, and sort of fell in love with it and then out of love with it. I think it was on sale at the time I made this particular Tealyra order so I figured I’d give it a try again, but mostly my opinion has stayed the same. I don’t dislike it, but I feel kinda meh about it… It has an amazing creamsicle aroma to the dry leaf, but that just doesn’t translate to the flavor. The blood orange comes out but there just isn’t enough of a sweet cream/vanilla flavor present for me. Plus, I feel the blood orange falls into the right flavor profile to bring out some of the medicinal notes in the rooibos that I don’t care for much. So to finish off the bag, I started brewing this cold brew… and it actually is pretty good that way. In general I tend to not cold brew red rooibos because in the past it has come out really cough syrupy to me that way, and despite getting a bit of that when I brew this hot, I’m not really getting that when its cold, and the orange feels particularly refreshing with this preparation method. So, I probably won’t grab this tea again in the future since it lacks that creamsicle vibe I’m looking for, but it also wasn’t really a chore to finish off this bag making cold brew pitchers.

Day 2 of the advent calender. Theme: fruity herbals

I took this out of the TTB and forgot to mention it on the thread. It only had enough for two cups and now I can’t remember if I finished it off or now. It was my morning cup and I was in a hurry.

It definitely reminds me of blood orange rooibos from Granville Island teas. It could very well be the same blend. I get blood orange, bitter orange zest (not a fan of the bitter), but also some sweet woody rooibos. I’m not sure why they say smoothie in the name because there is nothing smooth or creamy about this blend.