DAVIDsTEA

DAVIDsTEA Advent Calendar 2021 – Day 1

First day of sipping on DT with Tea with Jann! Jann always does a video for each day of the DT advent, and I loved her videos so much last year that I was inspired to buy this advent! Highly recommend checking her out on YouTube if you haven’t already – she’s such a kind, funny, and genuine person.

Anyway, the tea! This is supposedly a white tea, but really it’s mostly a fruit tisane. I still steeped it as a white tea, just to be safe and avoid bitterness. I used the entire little tinful of leaf, partially because there’s so much fruit in here and partially because I don’t want any leftovers heh heh…

It’s a sort of generic red fruit-like tisane. I definitely don’t taste the white tea at all, and I question the point of it being included at all. It’s not too tart even though there’s hibiscus here, which is nice. I can taste the stevia, but it’s not awful. It does give it a somewhat artificial taste though. Hint of spices but quite subtle – I actually get the spices more in the aroma than the taste.

Anyway, it’s fine. I would like it much better without the stevia though…

Day 1 of 24 Days of Matcha
It wasn’t awful but definitely not a flavor I loved because I don’t like a lot of plain teas

Apparently I’ve forgotten to log this tea every time I drank it. It’s become the new favourite in my family. Recently bought 200g for me and 200g for my mom. It’s also the first tea I’ll reach for when serving guests in my home. May it continue to be sold forever!

I am always disappointed by teas that smell great and taste nothing like advertised. So imagine my surprise when this tasted exactly like lemon pound cake. Actually, I was most reminded of the lemon poppyseed loaf that Starbucks sells—the only thing missing from each mouthful was the poppyseeds.

Although the flavour was accurate, it seems strange to be drinking this instead of eating an actual cake. It just means that I have to be in the right mood to enjoy this. This won’t be an everyday tea for me, which is just as well, because I only stocked 100g.

Yummy, yummy latte that I steeped up this afternoon! It was just a delicious chocolate and hint of mint kind of afternoon and this indulgent cuppa fit the bill perfectly. I especially love that fleeting cooling sensation after that sip of chocolate and cocoa goodness.

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

So this is absolutely my favourite of the three superfood hot chocolate blends.

I kind of waxed on about the actual hot chocolate mouthfeel/texture and taste in my other notes for Loco Lucuma and Shroom Boom earlier tonight so I’ll save the repetition here and just say it’s the exact same rich cocoa flavour that is so bomb. This is the flavour, of the three, that has to most distinct and clear additional flavour though – it’s really that very decadent mint chocolate flavour you would expect it to be – and even just a tinnnyyyy bit cooling, too! Probably the flavour of the three where you’re tasting the tea addition the least – which is I guess a little bit of a con but I like the idea that I’m getting this awesome mint chocolate profile with the caffeine bump of both the cocoa and the matcha.

They’re all amazing lattes because they’re developed specifically to be made as a latte but I think this is the best one – it tastes so amazing with virtually any milk alternative but with coconut milk!? Ooh boy! That’s the alt milk I’d recommend trying this one with. So much yum! Also very good as an iced latte!

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

So if you’re new around here then you probably don’t know that I am allergic to mushrooms of really all kinds. You also wouldn’t know that this is the fourth tea that DT has ever released with mushrooms in it and I have tried all of them.

Once.

Because I am the type of person that just needs to know what a tea is like and, because I find it very important to have an intimate understanding of the taste of every tea that DT sells (because, well, it’s my job!) I will try the teas I am allergic to exactly one time and then do my best to memorize that flavour to stash away in my own internal flavour memory bank. Just to be clear, no one at work is asking me to drink tea I’m allergic to – but it’s something I feel strongly about doing sooooo… it just happens.

So obviously this hot chocolate has mushrooms in it. In general, mushrooms like chaga and reishi (and to a lesser extent a few others) have been massively trendy in recent years for their purported wellness benefits. In fact, this isn’t even the first or second or even third mushroom infused hot chocolate powder I’ve seen before. Now, I have tasted none of the others I’ve seen so I really cannot compare at all – but the one thing I can say is that if you’re worried about this tea tasting like mushrooms I don’t think you need to be. I genuinely cannot taste mushroom at all in this tea.

Instead I get the same rich semi-sweet cocoa notes of both the other superfood hot chocolate powders and the same luxe and very smooth mouthfeel. In terms of differentiating flavours the main ones here are cinnamon and chili with a bit of a malty kind of undertone from the black tea powder in this blend. It reminds me a lot of Mexican Hot Chocolate with that cinnamon/cocoa combination but with the kick of heat from the chili. Definitely noticeable heat, though I don’t personally think it’s excessive.

It’s actually a bit of a shame personally because, were it not for the allergy factor, I think I would really enjoy the taste of this flavour. It was a good once in a lifetime latte for me, though.

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

It’s been such a busy time at work lately that I haven’t had the brain power to really sit down and write the notes that I’ve wanted to for DT’s new hot chocolate/tea powder blends but my goal tonight was to clear ALL the tasting notes from my outstanding queue, so here we are…

If you missed it (which is fair – so much going on it the world right now) DAVIDsTEA recently released three new tea infused hot chocolate powders. These were fun to work on the development of and, in particular, I’m really proud of the fact that we managed to create something so rich and flavourful that’s both organic while also not being too sweet and that has such a pleasant texture too!

If you’re looking for the flavour out of the three options that’s the closest to being a “neutral” hot chocolate then I think this would be the one. It has the same very rich and smooth cocoa flavour that they all do, but combined with the subtle sweetness and slight fruity flavour of lucuma and then a honeyed rooibos taste that’s distinct in the undertones and finish.

You absolutely can make these hot chocolates just in water but however they were really designed and developed with the intention for them to be prepared in milk or a milk alternative. The mouthfeel is just so lush and thick that way and it’s a good balance of sweetness with the fattiness of the milk kind of helping carry that flavour without the use of heavy sugars.

Like, I know I’m hella biased here but I’m just so proud of the work we did on these teas! I’ve tasted the hot chocolate powders from companies like Blume and over the years I’ve had a lot of cocoa powder tisanes and usually they’re just rough and gritty and these are sooooo smooth!

Yeah – that’s my general rant for the Superfood Hot Chocolates. Just amazing tea infused hot chocolates that are DIVINE lattes.

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

This one is definitely getting a bit on the old side in my cupboard.
I thought I would try this one just straight up after the overly sweet one I just had. I like this one much better as it’s not nearly as sweet. There is a touch of sweetness from the fruit, but there isn’t any stevia in this one (that I’m aware of?) and it makes such a difference. There’s a bit of fruit and nuts coming through. Again, this one is getting old so I know the flavours aren’t as nice as they once were, but as I near the bottom of the cup, I have to say, it does still have some good flavour. I think maybe my tastebuds were just on overdrive after the first tea I had today and couldn’t see how subtle, but pleasant this one is.

I’ve decided I’m not going to let teas get past a certain time old from now on. I need to drink the tons of tea I have and try and keep only fresh stuff in the cupboard. Drinking old tea is always a bit disappointing.

There was someone else here that mentioned they did this one as a hot latte. I might try that! It sounds good and it uses tea up fast too.

Oh stevia, how I hate you. I know it’s a natural sweetner but it’s so so sweet that it tastes fake to me…

anyways, I forgot this morning that this tea had it in it. I added milk, fully expecting it to curdle, but it didn’t and I added some sugar, which I shouldn’t have done because it is just SO sweet now that I am honestly not even enjoying it at all. I think I’m going to try again without the sugar and see how bad the stevia is. If it’s super bad, I might not keep this one. It’s got a great fruit flavour to it, but it’s just so darn sweet. OR I might try it iced. I like my iced teas sweet, so maybe that’ll work in my favour?

I have mixed feelings toward this blend. I’ve had it a few times, several months apart each time. It’s definitely best for a morning where you feel like having dessert for breakfast because it is all caps SWEET. The smell is overwhelming and the flavor can quickly get there; I’ve had more balanced and less balanced cups. I won’t shy away from it if it comes in a pack (as it did in this case) but I don’t think I’d purchase it on its own.

Happy National French Toast Day! Today the prompt is to drink a tea with flavor notes of a French Toast topping! I just decided to go with this tea that has “French Toast” in the title, which has been in my stash since 2018. I bought it on vacation to the Bay Area in California, which, back then, had several physical DAVIDsTEA locations. Now, all the physical DAVIDsTEAs in the US are closed. So… old tea, as per usual!

Still smells nice in the bag, though… like sweet lemon, and definitely cardamom. Brewed, it smells even sweeter, giving off a sort of honey graham cracker sort of aroma, as well as the citrus and cardamom.

Base has a malty/baked bread quality. The sip has a sweet cinnamon-sugar flavor, with a strong pop of cardamom that takes hold mid-sip and lingers on the tongue, but not in a spicy-hot way. There is a lemony note to the tea, which is amplified a bit by the citrusy taste of the cardamom.

It’s nice. The spice of the cardamom is smoothed by the sweetness leaving a nice cardamom flavor that doesn’t burn. I still enjoy the elusive 52Teas’ “Coconut French Toast with Cardamom Maple Syrup” more, though.

It’s fine with a gentle fruity/sweet taste, but kinda boring and WNRP

A pleasant surprise to find a hit from the subscription box back again already to start the month. I still enjoyed the hibiscus/spice blend, though the spices were more mellow (or is it mellower?) in this particular tin than the pouch.

[I learned nothing from last year and so I have too many advent calendars again, including ones I swore I wouldn’t do this year.]

DAVIDsTEA advent, day 1

A fruity, hibiscus-forward tea with warm spices like clove and cinnamon. I discovered a couple years ago that I love the combination of hibiscus and clove; this was no exception. Pleasantly tart and spicy at the same time, and with enough other flavor that I don’t notice the stevia. I’m curious about this iced, but will have to wait to get through some of my other hibiscus/spice blends first.

Adventaggedon Day 9: Tea 1/7

I’ve been loving how overall balanced all my daily advent selections have been, but if I’m being honest the one thing I’ve felt has been missing is more overtly winter or Christmas themed tea selections. So, it was a really nice surprise this morning to see this tea. I probably could have gone for something even more holiday-ish but I’ll take it!

As I said last time I wrote a note for this tea, I really do prefer it chilled so I ended up making it iced today and then kind of nursing that refreshing iced tea in between drinking my other advent teas earlier this afternoon. I got a lot more of the orange than mint in this go around, but it was still refreshing and not too sweet.

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

Cold Brew Sipdown (1543)!

So I have tried this tea a ton of different ways now and not just as a cold brew but I did take exactly a cold brew’s worth of the tea home from work on the day it launched so that I could steep it that way since it was the last method on my list. So, I suppose this is a cold brew sipdown even though it’ll be a note about the tea in general…

There’s kind of a lot going on in this blend – it’s got the cute white star sprinkles that I suppose (combined with the name) are meant to make you think of, like, the North Pole? And the mint is one of those sort of ubiquitous “wintery” flavours because of the chilling/frost sort of aspects. However, then you also have orange and… spinach!? Yes, there is spinach in the blend. Why? Well, it adds a really nice lush green colour to the dry leaf visual of the tea. That’s sort of the primary reason which, truthfully, I find a little silly. Aside from that it does help offset some of the overall sweetness in the cup – which I guess is beneficial.

Orange and mint is always a weird sounding combination on paper. Makes me think of drinking orange juice after brushing your teeth. However, the taste doesn’t make me think of that at all and it’s honestly not so weird. I’d say it’s close to an even split between sweet orange and cooling peppermint, but perhaps just a little bit more orange and then a lot of emphasis on the menthol/crispness of the mint in the finish in particular. Especially when you drink this tea cold.

If I had to make a comparison, I’d say it reminds me a fair amount of Midsummer Night’s Dream but peppermint instead of spearmint and a little more mint/less tang that Midsummer Night’s Dream. You could maybe think of this as a wintery version of that tea. Maybe.

I feel like I’m not ‘selling’ it very well, but it’s important to me personally to make sure it’s clear that I do actually like this tea! It’s not overly rich but it’s also not weak and I thought it was a REALLY refreshing cold brew/iced tea. A good break up from all the spice/chocolate blends of the season. I have a lot of orange teas though, and when it comes to citrus/mint combinations my weak spot is for lemon/mint. I dig this though – I’ll likely not grab more for at home but I’ll likely take advantage of having it accessible at work.

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

Nothing special about it. It’s good but i have better on my tea wall right now

Y’know, I’m not necessarily usually one to get excited about teas with fun sprinkles in them or that shimmer/glitter when steeped. However, this is one of the most fun teas I’ve gotten to work on developing and I feel like I now have a whole new appreciation for all the other tea companies out there with glittery sprinkle filled teas or the people who’s jaw hits the floor when they see those sparkles…

This tea came out late last week and I’m really excited that I get to talk about it now! It’s just sooooo incredibly fun looking. The visual of the dry matcha powder does have a bit of a sparkle to it but the magic reaaalllyyyy happens when you whisk it up because it is super glittery! If you’re familiar with luster dust or products that use luster dust, it’s the same idea – this is a gold glitter/luster that when stirred in the whisked tea creates these mesmerizing clouds and swirls. It’s been a long time since I’ve wanted to physically play with my tea so much.

The flavour is sweet and a little bit creamy vanilla – similar to DT’s Vanilla Matcha but without the distinct taste of the coconut nectar used in that blend. It’s not bad tasting but if I’m being honest I could probably care less about the flavour because all I want to do when I drink this matcha is look at it! I’m glad we went with something sort of neutral though – it really allows the glitter to be the star and it also means you can cut/mix this with other flavoured matchas without drastically affecting their taste. There’s more than enough glitter in this matcha to go around, so I really encourage experimenting with using it alongside other matchas to get a really cool effect on top of the taste of your preference.

Photo: https://www.instagram.com/p/CWl2ucJr669/

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7GWoX5e66M&ab_channel=DavidDeanBurkhart

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

Iced Latte Sipdown (204)

Didn’t love this one. I should have known because I don’t love Earl Grey unless they’re flavoured and I don’t love matchas unless they’re flavoured. So flavouring them as each other wasn’t really for me.

(DavidsTea 196)

Eh, yuck. I really wanted to like this but I am very averse to something in this tea, and even as a sweetened latte (!!), it was drinkable but not particularly enjoyable. Looking at the ingredient list, I was expecting to see chicory or something along those lines, but the only ingredient flagging to me is the roasted yerba mate… which I actually typically don’t mind? So it may be a combo of that and the spicing. Aside from that… elusive flavour I’m having trouble pinpointing, I thought it might have been decent…

I should really start a “giveaway” box…

A pleasant, light blend that contrasts well with some of the heavier seasonal flavors I usually enjoy this time of year. The jasmine stands out, with a creamy element that was surprising for a tea I was drinking on its own. I enjoyed this, but wouldn’t go out of my way to purchase it again.