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A while back there was a fairly polarizing trend on Reddit of infusing bottled Sprite with black tea bags via overnight cold brewing. As you can imagine given the tea community on reddit, this was a contentious experiment with people having very extreme feelings on it.

Well, queue the announcement/commercialization of this new tea flavoured Sprite which seems to at least in part have been inspired by this trend of mixing Sprite and grocery store style/quality black tea blends. From the perspective of someone who works in product development, I think this is actually a really brilliant product offering from Coca Cola and smart line addition. But as a tea drinker myself, I am of course skeptical about the execution. To start, it’s not actually made with tea but “tea flavoured” and there’s no caffeine in the drink at all. So, really, this is “tea” under the loosest definition.

But I still needed to give it a try because, ultimately, taste trumps all else and if it tastes good (relative for the type/style of product) then that’s the most important thing. I’ve had a couple cans of this now, trying to decide what I think, and ultimately I think I just find the flavour underwhelming. Not bad. Not offensive. But just too light. It’s like they put more focus into getting the colour of the soda correct for what they were trying to emulate, but it doesn’t really remind me of black tea or any other type of tea all too much when I’m drinking it. In fact, if I was drinking this blind without the placebo of seeing the more golden amber liquor I might actually think it’s just regular Sprite with a slightly weird aftertaste.

To me, it’s a shame because I think the potential was strong here. But ultimately it’s not going to be the “tea drinkers” that dictate the success of this product – it will be the soda drinkers who are regular consumers of Sprite. Is it enough tea flavour from them? Do they even like the concept of combining the two drinks? Appealing to their palate and sensibilities is definitely the more commercially viable path…

Cold Brew!

Fairly mellow with a gentle and floral-leaning raspberry note reminiscent of early season raspberries picked off the bush, but without any tartness/astringency. The watermelon is fresh and thirst quenching, albeit light. It mostly comes in on the backend of the sip after the more grassy and straw or bamboo-like notes of the green tea and the delicate berry, with a clean sweetness to close the sip.

A mid afternoon hot cuppa while working yesterday. Very malty and brisk with a pleasantly light astringency and notes of cocoa, baked bread, walnuts, and honey. Pretty perfect for the mood I was in, and to break up some of the other fruity and sweet teas I’d been sipping on during the rest of the day.

Full rolling boil with just a minute or two steep, AKA my usual “trick” for getting more roast out of a genmaicha and less of the green tea. I was curious how that would work with this tea given the rose in the blend. The rose still hangs on and isn’t totally lost, but this definitely ups the toastiness and makes it a bit harder to taste it. Still yummy, but maybe a trick better left for other genmaicha since part of what makes this one so nice is that rose inclusion.

Drank this tea with a little spoonful of my own homemade caramel (with a touch of cinnamon) for a little extra richness. Only added after enjoying a few sips on their own first, of course. Even though a teacup of Earl Grey is rarely the first tea I’m going to reach for, I do deeply enjoying trying all of many variations on this classic profile, and Bird & Blend certainly has a lot of fun ones. Plus, I certainly have a sweet tooth, so caramel immediately caught my eye.

I was skeptical about the cardamom in the blend, and it took a taste or two for me to really get on board with it. But I’m starting to see how the very fragrant, warming spice notes with their citrusy undertones are actually really good at marrying the buttery caramel and bold bergamot together. The final piece in a smaller puzzle of flavours. I could personally use more caramel and a bit of a thicker mouthfeel, but I think that’s just me being greedy as someone who adores anything toffee-like but is a bit more passive towards bergamot’s more heady citrus notes…

Tea Photo: https://www.instagram.com/p/DKkuZ-vSJuV/

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbkLFwOmPBk&ab_channel=Coco

Sipped on this over the weekend, as a bit of a lazy Sunday morning tea. It was perfect because it was still on the lighter end of the flavoured tea spectrum but not so light as to feel especially delicate. Just the right balance of floral, fresh blueberry and ever-so-slightly underripe banana (y’know, that slight “green” note) with a hint of silky, smooth vanilla and a really fragrant, orchid-like greener oolong tea base. It always reads as so sophisticated.

Last time I made this I found it a bit disconnected because of how bright and apple-forward it was, but this time around I found it much better balanced. Still had a bit of a baked apple note, but mellower and in a way that better complimented the smooth, buttery caramel and butterscotch flavours.

I was not sure what to expect from this teabag, but I liked it a lot. It’s actually much more of an orange tea that turmeric, in my opinion. Very fresh and sweet with a flavour that reminds me a little bit of Tazo’s “Wild Sweet Orange” blend. Not overly tangy, but just a little bit of that element. The star anise is also quite present (again, I’d say more than the turmeric) and that only adds to the overall sweetness of the blend, but I think it creates a nice depth that gives need weight to what would otherwise be a very bright, surface level sweetness from the orange.

There is a bit of a grounding, earthier taste present here and the slightest little bit of spice, but it’s so in the background compared to the other two flavours. It makes me wonder why Twinings decided to focus in on the turmeric with the positioning for this tea. But, regardless, I think it’s actually very nice (if you like anise, anyway).

Cold Brew!

I thought I was going to adore this tea cold brewed, but I actually came out of this infusion thinking how much more I appreciated the tea steeped hot. At first I felt like I wasn’t getting as much of the silky, smooth creamy sweet lemon notes I enjoyed so much the first time I tasted this tea. Just a lot of grassier green tea and a bit of a pithy note. It got better as the tea got closer to room temp, and the green tea seemed to step into the background letting more of that limoncello note come through. Totally fine brew overall, just not as consistently delicious as the first time I made it…

So I lied and I actually have one more tasting note from Vancouver.

I wasn’t sure if I was going to write one for this or not because I kind of just want the experience to be mine and to not put pressure on myself to have to go into full description for each of the teas, but essentially on one of the evenings I was in Vancouver I had the pleasure and privilege of meeting up with someone I’ve been following on IG for some time who lives in the area. He was very kind and hosted me at his apartment, where we brewed quite a few different teas while having a really pleasant conversation.

I think I still want to keep the details of that just mine because it was a really amazing experience where the focus was just so much on the teas without any expectations or weight of documenting anything on IG or here on Steepster. But, just for me, I did want to record what I drank somewhere. So these are the teas that were brewed:

Oriental Beauty
Red Rhyme #21
Wuyi Oolong
Hand Foraged Nookta Rose
Red Taiwanese Oolong

I kind of love that I don’t know the vendors for anything – it just added to that feeling of being in the moment. Everything was delicious, but my favourites were actually the freshly foraged roses and the Oriental Beauty.