Smart Soak from Mandala Tea

Smart Soak

Soak away unsightly stains that tea can leave behind on your teawares. Simple, effective, and without harsh chemicals! It doesn’t get easier than this!

This product was developed exclusively for MandalaTea by one of our longtime tea customers (and friends). One day he visited our shop and found me lamenting about how stained my fine mesh filters were. He formulated Smart Soak and a week later we got to test is on those strainers. It amazed us! All our tea gear was made to look like brand new. It is now used frequently at our shop and home.

A tea lover’s new best friend!

See the photo to the left of a tea thermos strainer that had gotten very tea stained? The second pic is half the strainer submerged in Smart Soak (see the foaming action as the oxygen lifts the tea stains away). Photo three is the “after” photo. The difference is stark!

Recommended for use on: cups, pots, filters, pitchers, and gaiwans made of plastic, glass, porcelain, and ceramic. Avoid contact with adhesive stickers, unglazed paint, or screen printed decorations.

Common Sense Safety Precautions: As with all cleaning agents, keep out of reach of children, avoid contact with eyes and do not eat or drink. This product releases large amounts of oxygen during the cleaning process, never pressurize the solution or mix it in a sealed container.

Instructions: • Mix 2 teaspoons of cleaner per quart (32oz.) of HOT water • Soak tea wares for 10-20 minutes • Rinse tea wares with warm water • Heavily stained items may require more than one application, extended soak time, or more cleaner.

CAUTION: Keep out of reach of children

Edit info Last updated by Cameron B.

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18 Reviews View all

  • “Thanks so much for sending me some of this, Cameron B!!! I always wanted to try it, so thank you. It couldn’t possibly work better! I had a basket infuser so encrusted with tea barnacles there...” Read full review
    100
  • “Additional note on another way to use this stuff… Commercial begins: My sink gets stained due to all the tea leaves and stuff I put in it day in and day out. I hate cleaning it and it’s such a...” Read full review
    100
  • “You need this! 10 minute soak in warm water and my clear glass pitchers, cups, and travel mugs look brand new! Works great with stainless steel, glass, and ceramic products.” Read full review
    99
  • “This is such a lifesaver! As a frequent tea drinker, I’ve ended up staining many cups/pots/etc., and no cleaning method I had tried had been getting rid of the stains until I gave this a try. It...” Read full review
    100

18 Reviews

100
4164 tasting notes

Thanks so much for sending me some of this, Cameron B!!! I always wanted to try it, so thank you. It couldn’t possibly work better! I had a basket infuser so encrusted with tea barnacles there was no way it was steeping tea properly. Scrubbing with a (new) sponge hardly changed the barnacles. SO all I did was pour a tiny bit of Smart Soak over the basket infuser in a mug, fill it with hot water, and left it for a couple days. The infuser and mug looked completely brand new. I also like that it mentions that it’s fine if you ingest the Smart Soak, so I don’t have to worry about weird chemicals. I will be using this Smart Soak for life, that is for sure.

Leafhopper

I can definitely relate to your “tea barnacles!” I might have to check this product out if I ever order from Mandala.

tea-sipper

It’s a must-buy if you’re ever placing an order from Mandala.

ashmanra

I don’t mean to take business from Mandala, but Oxiclean seems to be nearly identical and does an awesome job for me!

tea-sipper

Is it safe to ingest Oxiclean though? I have no idea.

ashmanra

I tried Oxiclean because it seemed to be the same chemicals as I recall. I would ingest either personally! Ha ha! But hot water and a couple of hours are all it takes for my Kamjove baskets to sparkle. I rinse them well and then start using them.

tea-sipper

Good to know. :D

Kawaii433

tea-sipper, I love this stuff so much and I use it to clean my stainless sink as well. I just fill up my sink with warm water, add a few tablespoons and let it sit. It makes it sparkling.

gmathis

Thanks for the Oxi-clean tip!

Mastress Alita

I love this stuff! Whenever I do a tea kettle descaling I pull apart my gravity well infuser and soak the mesh, silicone ring, and silicone gasket and it makes them all sparkling clean! The leftover water will take tea stains out of the sink, too.

LuckyMe

@tea-sipper, I use denture cleaning tablets to dissolve tea stains and it works very similar to this. I wonder if this uses the same ingredients

gmathis

I’ve done the denture tablet trick as well; I’ll give it a B- grade for quality of the gunk removal. It does help!

Leafhopper

I looked at Mandala’s website and shipping to Canada is $15, so I might have to go the Oxiclean route. How dare that so many good tea companies are in the U.S.! :D

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100
379 tasting notes

Additional note on another way to use this stuff…

Commercial begins:

My sink gets stained due to all the tea leaves and stuff I put in it day in and day out. I hate cleaning it and it’s such a pain. Well, I thought I’ll try this stuff on it. I put a couple of tablespoons in each of the sinks (double sink stainless steel type), filled them with hot water, walked away for 30 min+ and after I drained it…

It was sparkling clean especially the area entering the garbage disposal that sometimes the tea leaves would sit in and stain.

End of commercial.

Cameron B.

Agreed, Smart Soak is amazing! :D

Kawaii433

It really is! lol

I was wondering, it says just rinse with hot water after… But do you wash your teaware with soap and water before using it? It works so well, I’m kind of paranoid that I’ll poison myself if I don’t. lol

Cameron B.

No, I generally don’t. But that doesn’t mean it’s not a good idea to! :P

Kawaii433

lol kk :)

derk

I’m curious, are the ingredients listed? It sounds like a product I used when home brewing to clean bottles and carboys.

Kawaii433

Nope. Not on their website nor on the package that I saw. Although my USPS guy decided to use my box as a soccer ball and the container had a crack in it, so I admit I took it out the minute I got it and transferred it into a mason jar.

Mastress Alita

My sink looks hideous. Considering it is only tea I’m on hiatus from getting at the moment, I really, really should just buckle down and buy some of this stuff already. I don’t think it ever occured to me to clean my sink the same way I clean my infusers…

Kawaii433

Mastress Alita, I really hate scrubbing the darn thing. I tried white vinegar before, and baking soda and it just wouldn’t get the tea/coffee stains out. It’s amazing what the mind comes up with to get out of using elbow grease. lol

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99
21 tasting notes

You need this! 10 minute soak in warm water and my clear glass pitchers, cups, and travel mugs look brand new! Works great with stainless steel, glass, and ceramic products.

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100
4 tasting notes

This is such a lifesaver! As a frequent tea drinker, I’ve ended up staining many cups/pots/etc., and no cleaning method I had tried had been getting rid of the stains until I gave this a try. It has gotten out every tea stain I have thrown at it, and since a little goes a long way, I won’t need to replace it for a while. I can’t recommend this highly enough to the avid tea drinker.

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100
2145 tasting notes

Every time I’ve complained on Steepster about how hard it is to remove scents and stains from my ingenuiTEA and Mason Jar Drinking Mugs I’ve been told that Smart Soak Tea Stain Dissolver is the product I need. The people who told me this weren’t kidding about how well it worked and I wish I hadn’t wasted so much time scrubbing everything down with baking soda and a baby bottle brush. That method may work, but it is anything but efficient.

Overall, I was suitably impressed with Smart Soak Tea Stain Dissolver from Mandala Tea. I was skeptical at first, but it cleaned everything that I threw at it. I didn’t have to scrub a thing, saving me a tremendous amount of time. Now I understand why so many people recommended this product to me.

You can read the full review on my blog, complete with before and after photos:
http://www.notstarvingyet.com/index/2015/5/12/tuesday-tea-smart-soak-tea-stain-dissolver-mandala-tea-midwestteafestival

scribbles

I have got to get some of this stuff

Short Sorceress

I wish I hadn’t waited so long to try it, it’s pretty amazing.

Garret

I truly enjoyed your review of the product, my dear! So very happy that you are enjoying the Smart Soak. I am grateful.

Short Sorceress

I loved it! My teaware hasn’t looked this good in years :) Thanks again for sending me the samples.

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1711 tasting notes

Whoa! Get ready to witness some stain miracles! This stuff totally works. If you love tea stained patina on your cups, stay away. If you have items you want clean, especially those with hard to scrub areas, this is the soak you want! David’s glass perfect mugs with those lids that have those impossible to clean under lips, Aladin travel mug with that lever basket mechanism, metal steepers, David’s travel mugs, super old Teavana gravity steeper, old steel thermos… all amazingly clean! I was able to get quite a few things cleaned with one quart and reheated it a couple of times to soak more items in it. It finally gave out on the gravity steeper and I had to make a fresh batch of soak. I wish I could post the before and after pictures because it’s such a drastic difference from dirty to clean!

The only thing that disappoints me about this product is that I can’t put it in my mouth and soak the tea stains off my teeth. Work on that, would ya Mandala? ;)

I should add that this came to me as a sample with one of their puerh sample specials. Thanks for that!

Kittenna

My travel mugs really need a good cleaning, as do my infusers. One day I’ll get some of this!

Dustin

I didn’t realize how dirty my stuff was until I cleaned it! Looks like I can add photos! Just added a before and after.

Garret

I’m working on one for the teeth :) Thanks for writing it up and for the photos, too!

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100
1758 tasting notes

This is an incredible product. I bought it a while ago but just tried it out today. I heated water to prime the thermos to be cleaned and poured out the water. I then heated water again and poured it in the 64 oz thermos. I put 4 tsp of smartsoak in initially but some of this bubbled off so I added two more teaspoons. In only seconds I could see my tea stained thermos interior was white colored again. I let it soak for twenty minutes as suggested. I then decided to try the same solution on a glazed teapot and strainer. I let that soak for 30 minutes. It did a pretty good job on this reusing the solution, making it sparkle too. The only thing it did not do was get all the tiny bits of encrusted tea off the strainer. It did make it sparkle though. I am glad I bought the large size of this and will definitely buy more when I run out. This stuff is worth every penny it costs.

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100
1186 tasting notes

The amazing Garret at Mandala kindly sent me a small packet of this in place of my free sample with my last tea order!! I had meant to add it to my order and completely forgot to, and mentioned it on a thread on this site, and it shows up with my order!!! I am so thankful and CANNOT SPEAK HIGHLY enough of this superb act of customer service! Thank you thank you thank you!!!

Now, this product. WOWZA. I cannot believe what this does to my teaware! It is literally like brand new. Brand. Spanking. New. If you have ever used baking soda or vinegar or other methods of cleaning, STOP. Buy this! I should post before and after pics, seriously. I took them too haha. My old timolino was so horribly stained I actually bought a new one to replace it, it was far too stained it looked black inside. Now I have cleaned them both, and they both look like new!!! The old one actually looks better than the new! OMG. This stuff. My gravity steeper is squeaky clean, was going to replace it as well. THIS STUFF WILL SAVE YOU MONEY. Lol, now, like a madwoman, I am cleaning ALL THE TEAWARES. Haha, unfortunately, I am going through my packet pretty quickly. But you can guarantee I will be reorder this. In a very large quantity. Thank you a million million times Garret for this as my sample!!

Nicole

Doh. I totally forgot about wanting to try this with my last order. There’s always the next! :)

Kittenna

NEED. My older Timolinos are pretty black inside.

mrs.stenhouse12

This stuff is the best. I might even order a pound with my next order lol. It is just that good!! @ Nicole, hopefully you remember it, or get a sample of it :)

@ Kittenna – It is like a super cleaner for timolinos! I can never reach the bottom to clean mine ever, but with this no scrubbing, no angry baking soda mess, I even bought those test tube-like scrubbers and it also failed but I should have just bought this lol. It works wonders!

Garret

YAHOOOOOOOO!!!!! This review has us grinning from ear to ear here in the tea shop! Clean tea gear is the best!

mrs.stenhouse12

Happy it made you smile :) thank you for such an amazing product!!

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100
318 tasting notes
For the past couple of months my stainless steel mesh tea strainer had hardly been letting any tea through (it would take about a minute to let 150ml through, on a good day). I’d tried boiling it in water, boiling it in vinegar, and scrubbing it to death with baking soda and NOTHING would help. I had already given up on it and ordered a new one. After soaking for about 20 minutes in the tea soak and then swishing it around it was like brand new! This stuff really is magical.
Dexter

“This stuff really is magical.” – Yep – not sure how I lived without it…

Kirkoneill1988

is it sold in stores?

tperez

I think only from Mandala, but the main active ingredient is sodium percarbonate which can probably be bought elsewhere

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100
687 tasting notes

Today, I finally got around to using this. It works so well. I got tea stains off of two mugs, and two travel mugs. In fact, the only stains left were those where the smart soak didn’t reach. Very glad this works so well.

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