Apple

Hello Steepsterites! Yes, it has been a while since I’ve been on. Honestly, Steepster loads so slowly for me that it just takes too long for me to get on here and play, so I haven’t been. But I figured I needed to bite the bullet and do some clean up to my cupboard as well as check in with folks so I’m doing that today. Hopefully slow load times won’t tick me off too much and I’ll even be able to get some backlogs in.

But enough hoping about backlogs – I’m here to log a tea that’s actually in my cup right now! This one was a teabag included in with my Lupicia Happy Bag that I bought. I can’t help it – I love their surprise grab bags! I certainly don’t need more tea, much less surprise tea, but I still buy it anyway. I’m trying to be good though, and not break open too many of the new packages of tea before I do away with some older teas. So this one, being a single teabag, is a nice burst of new that doubles as a decupboard. So win all around!

First off, the smell. Holy mother of goodness does this teabag smell apple-y. It’s like a just bit into a fresh, crispy, juicy Gala or Pinata apple. I can almost feel the crunch in my teeth! As I kept smelling the teabag wrapper while my tea was brewing (everyone does this, right?) a little note of apple-flavored hard candy started to come out on the edges of the smell which took away a bit of the I-am-eating-a-fresh-apple feeling, but it still smells delicious. Post-brewing, the actual liquid tea smells almost bake-y but not quite. Maybe like an unsweetened version of a chocolate graham cracker topped with a large dollop of tart green apple preserves. I say tart mostly because it doesn’t smell super sugared and cinnamon-y like most apple flavored things seem to. I will admit, while unusual, it is nice to have something apple that isn’t apple cinnamon.

The taste is mild compared to the smell, but that’s pretty typical with Lupicia. I taste a tea base but I can’t really identify it – Ceylon probably. The apple taste is a bit more green apple than anything but I think that has to do mostly with the end note. The initial taste of the sip seems to be fairly evenly split between tea and sweet red apple. It’s very mild but summer-time pleasant. Then the swallow which edges a bit towards the tea side – making me think a bit of a Nilgiri but without the feeling that I’m eating rose bush leaves (the texture/flavor I always seem to associate with Nilgiri teas) – with only a hint of apple sweetness. Then post-swallow, the green apple flavor expands to fill my mouth, making me feel a bit like I just took a lick of an apple Jolly Rancher, but without the sticky, icky aftertaste a lot of candies can leave. It’s not a tart green apple flavor though. There’s no sourness or pucker to it. It’s just not as sweet as the red apple portion of the program.

As almost always seems to be the case with Lupicia, the flavor is very true to the name. This is an apple tea. Quite honestly, it’s a really good apple tea. I can’t say for sure if I’d ever buy this – I rarely find myself craving apple flavored things unless they are an actual apple and even that doesn’t happen too often – but the flavor is so tasty and makes me feel like I’m walking through an apple orchard so I really can’t dislike this tea. I’d say anyone that tends to crave apple things (or just wants to experience the novelty of something apple-flavored without also being cinnamon-flavored or sour/tart) would greatly enjoy having this tea around. Honestly, I wish I had more than one bag so I could see if this made me start craving apple things. I think it might. Because now my cup is empty and I think I want more.

Finally, getting to some of my samples and starting with this one. I found the black tea base to be standard lacking any sort of distinguishing markers thus making it an alright choice for a flavored tea. The apple was accurate and even fresh in flavor. It was remenisant of a Red Delicious Apple. Overall, not a bad tea cuppa at all.

I had this during work yesterday. The brew is a light brown almost honey colored liquor. It smells faintly of apples, but this is what I expect from an apple tea! DELICIOUS! Crispy tasting as well. I love apples. It is naturally sweet as well. Good tea overall! I don’t think I’d buy it, but its a great and fairly accurate apple flavor!

I went through 10 Apple teabags and I think this is a good tea. It has a sweet apple flavor but I can still taste the black tea. I believe I steeped it too long a few times because I was getting a very slight astringency.

I don’t know if my tastebuds are off lately, but I am not enjoying this Lupicia Apple. (It is not the Tsugaru Green Apple blend, it’s just standard Apple).

The black tea base is fine, if uninspired, but the apple taste is rather artificial and has an unpleasant ashy note. It smells pleasantly of ripe red apples, but the taste is odd- a bit metallic, almost like how pavement smells.

I like their other fruit blends but this one is just not very good. I’d almost question if it’s gone off, but I got it from the 2023 Book of Tea, so it should be quite fresh.

Perhaps it would be better with sugar? Sadly, this one is sadly a tosser for me. Hurrah for tea assortments that allow us to try loads of teas with reckless abandon.

I’d been hoping for a crisp apple tea, but it’s more like apple pulp.
I think next time I’ll need to steep it for a shorter time, and see if it brightens it up.

Another of the impulse buys in my last Lupicia order. I have one more caffeinated black after this, and then I’ll be back to having all the black teas in the cupboard tasted and with initial notes.

This is another tea that hasn’t gotten huge ratings here, but that I think is awesome. It might have something to do with the fact that I really love apples. It’s not just the flavor, it’s the way they’ve been part of my life since I was a little kid. Almost every day at school, the lunch my mother packed for me contained an apple. Apples represent mother’s love in my personal symbolism.

This has a strong apple aroma in the packet, which is somewhere between fresh apples and green apple hard candy. After steeping, the aroma loses its candy-like aspect and takes on a more baked one. Sometimes the aroma tends more toward fresh apple, sometimes more toward baked, but both are quite nice. The tea’s aroma comes through as well, adding a bit of heft to the smell and some malty qualities. The tea is clear, though it has some sediment at the bottom of the cup, and it is chestnut colored.

The flavor is more subtle than the aroma, but it’s still definitely apple. I rather like the subtlety. It gives the tea breathing room that allows the base to come through in a nicely balanced way.

What I also love about this is that it isn’t just a vehicle for apple pie flavors (cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, etc.) as so many “apple” black teas are. This one is pure apple and tea, which is a nice foil to the pure apple fruit tisanes that I love — for when I want the apple to be the flavor of the tea, not the tea itself.

Really glad I decided to buy this one even though it wasn’t a favorite here.

Autumn Harvest! I picked this one up from Ost’s cupboard sale, so thank you Ost! The leaf of this is a CTC black composed of dark little pellets of tea, dried apples, and a strong, sweet apple aroma. It smells like green apple skins.

I gave the tea a brisk two minute steep, given the CTC nature of the leaf and the fact I don’t like my blacks on the heady side. Brewed, the tea smells much sweeter, more like the sweeter red apple variety. I was surprised how mellow the cuppa was, since whenever I see a CTC base I’m expecting a really strong, brisk cuppa, and this steeped up a very dark color! But the short steep must have been just right (at least for my tastes!) as I have a very smooth and mellow base, that is a bit malty, with some subtle honey and citrus notes, but mostly the tea has a very juicy apple flavor. It’s sweet, but against the black tea, it doesn’t feel overly sweet, and it doesn’t taste strangely artificial, either. I think I’d prefer a tangier green apple flavor than the soft and sweet red apple flavor here, but it’s definitely nice, regardless (you know me, I like my hibi teas, of course I prefer green apples over red, I just like a little more tang on my fruit… I prefer green grapes, too!) It’s definitely different than the strong apple herbals I’m used to, that are simply packed with apple flavor… this is a very subtle sweet apple touch on a black base that is so lacking of bitterness and smooth it is really hitting the spot on an autumn morning. It is also a great accompaniment to my peanut butter toast breakfast.

Well I found my “one” apple tea. I’m kinda sad that it turned out to be from a non Canadian vendor. Darn you Cdn dollar. and shipping!
I’ve seen other notes that say it tastes artificial, and I suppose it does a little but to be honest this is the best apple tea I’ve ever had. Any of those which have no fake notes either don’t taste like apple at all or they do, just not in the way I was looking for.
I added no sugar and it was quite sweet, though not overly so like the David’s Tea version. The base is a bit astringent, which suits the “apple”-ness quite well. Definitely getting some mouth puckering!
You know, I’m a little worried about my rating. It’s the highest of the bunch. Perhaps I’m just easily swayed by unrealistic fruit flavours? Bah.
Sadly though, I only had the one bag as this was from the Lupicia sampler box I bought. Oh well. Hello goodbye wonderful!

A nice black tea with notes of apple. For me, the apple reminds me of the Fuji variety (sweet yet refreshing and crisp). While this isn’t a tea that Lupicia suggests serving cold, I think it this tea would be amazing served straight on ice.

I have to say I think I prefer the Harrod’s Apple and Elderflower black tea over this Lupicia flavor but would still recommend for those who want to try something different. Just be careful to not over steep. The apple flavor can get easily lost by the bitterness in an over-steeped brew.