Sakura Allure

I am surrounded by idiots.

If I have to read one more “critique” of my Lapsang poem that says nothing but “Great work” and “I really find no fault with this piece” I’m going to vomit. The point of a CRITIQUE is not to bleed rainbows. Tell me what needs work!

Shut up, Shell.

In other words, soothing tea time. This is really light and sweet green, and while I’m not entirely sure I’d call it perfectly cherry, it’s not disgustingly artificial. It’s fruity and calming and a really pretty pink and just what I need right now.

I still have lots of this, so I cold brewed it last night as an experiment. Another fruity tea that isn’t too strong on the hibiscus and has a nice cherry flavor. Still, I wont be too sad when it’s gone.

I really need to stop buying stupid tea that I’m pretty much guaranteed not to like. It’s really not entirely unlike walking into a clothing store, making a beeline to the ugliest sweater in a colour that makes you look washed out and happily buying it anyway. Because maybe this time it’ll be different. Maybe this time you’ll see what you’ve been missing. No. I keep going to bad tea like an abusive lover.

Like seriously. This tea has cherry in it. I don’t even like that. And I have no idea what the hell in this tea is so bitter that it makes my mouth curl into an instinctive snarl, despite adding two teaspoons of sugar. The hibiscus, perhaps? I felt like I was drinking lemon neo-citron after someone had dumped some cough syrup into it. I can’t really taste any of the other fruits/notes in this blend, and there’ll be no next time, because after a few sips and some very brief contemplation (if my primal reaction counts as such), I dumped it down the drain. The good news, though, if some can be gleaned from this situation, is that I don’t think anything was the green tea’s fault, so it’s still possible I could like other flavoured greens.

And that’s all I have to say about that.

This is not so much a review of this tea, though it is what I am drinking (see other tasting note), because I don’t feel like trying anything new or brewing gong fu style but I need to write this and it wouldn’t be right to do it under a tea for any other company. This is just to say that I will not be working at Teavana for the holidays or ever again, I’m not allowed.

I stopped by the store today while I was out, to check the schedule for next week since it wasn’t posted when I called on Saturday. There were guests in the store so I just headed to the back, looked at the schedule and just as I noticed there were no shifts for me, my manager came in behind me and told me I wasn’t on it and asked if anyone from corporate had given me a call, no…

Apparently Teavana has been monitoring Steepster.com and other social networking sites and noticed my activity on the message boards. Besides negativity there are issues with breaking confidentiality agreements and release the names of two teas. I’m fine with not working there, in fact I’m relieved. I tried to quit back in February, then again four months ago but my manager wanted to hang on to me and called me back a month ago to pick up a few shifts. I wanted to help, could use the extra cash and some time away from the toddler, so I agreed.

I felt more like a rouge agent at that point, but I did my job and was gracious to guests. It was during these three shifts that co-workers were telling me about these two new teas that Teavana let slip in some recommended pairing sheet they sent to all the stores. When I shared these two teas in a post about this year’s retiring teas, it was just as an interesting tidbit to generate discussion, I didn’t do it to sabotage the campaign, if anything it could only help create a buzz, just like my co-workers mentioning them to their guests, because their excited, even I was.

But that’s not really what its about, its about the negative things I’ve posted after I had “quit” and I completely agree with their decision, they shouldn’t have someone that feels the way I do working for them. I do hope they leave it at that and not try to pursue some sort of legal action, because really I’m not worth anything. But I also hope, really truly hope that they are not just monitoring Steepster to check up on their employees but to get a pulse on how tea lovers really feel about their company and how they can improve their customer service to stop driving away the very community they should be serving.

This tea is outta the Here’s Hoping Travelling Teabox!

Wow tart! I immediately thought after one sip I need to ice this, so I dumped it into my tumbler and steeped up a little more. With some honey, tasted not too bad. A little fruity cherry syrup, but mostly hibiscusy floral. I’m getting a bit of grassy flat flavor. I swear there’s bamboo leaves in this – looks like it but not listed as an ingredient.

Ehhh, I prefer Steep City’s Blushing Geisha for a green hibiscus tea. Better floral, less flat of a tea and less muddled sugar flavor, but I’m happy to of tried more Teavana stuff.

Originally I wasn’t going to order anything from Teavana, but then I made the mistake of looking at their sale and seeing their awesome prices. And then I caved. My order is still in processing (and I’m still waiting on an e-mail from them). This tea is not from this order.

I thought I had ordered this tea, but I looked at my receipt and saw that I didn’t. I was NOT going to go to the mall, but I really wanted this tea, and customer service was not answering. So, I called up my local Teavana to ask if they still had this tea in stock. Sure enough, they did (and lots of it), so hi-ho to Teavana I go. I probably could have picked up some other teas had I just waited, but eh. Here’s hoping my order ships all right because a few of the teas aren’t even showing up anymore.

I also wanted to go to Teavana because I bought a Yixing mug on black friday at 40%. It was discounted to 50% the day after Christmas, and I wanted to get a price adjustment since I was in my return window. Well, I learned that you can’t return sale items (boo). But the manager took pity on me and gave me free tea (yay!).

I almost didn’t pick this tea up at all. So many of this on sale teas had mixed reviews. This one got not so bad reviews. I was warned that this does not have a strong green tea flavor and I will repeat – it does NOT have a strong green tea flavor. I can’t taste any tea at all. The hibiscus is strong with this one, and it’s definitely a fruity tea. It’s a good tea for people who don’t like tea, but from reading the other reviews it also appears kinda finicky. I bet this would be a really good iced tea. I hot brewed this, but maybe next time I should cold brew it.

It’s not overly tart, though, which is nice. I’ll give it a somewhat higher score and cold brew it and see what I think later..

Thanks to Nicole for this one! The name alone sounds very tasty, and I do love a good sakura tea. Or cherry, which is what most sakura teas really are since it’s hard to find sakura outside of Japan.

I didn’t know how much was going on in this blend until I looked at the listing—mango, pineapple, what? Teavana seems to put pineapple in EVERYTHING. Also… hibiscus. I thought there would be none here but I cold brewed this and opened the fridge in the morning to a bright red brew. Oh nooo!

There is a nice cherry flavor here, but there are just so many competing flavors. I was hoping for a simple blend—cherry, bamboo, green tea. But there are tropical notes, a bit of sourness from the hibiscus, floral from the rose, and then a bit citrusy from the lemon peel. It’s just… so much, my tastebuds are a bit overwhelmed! I think this is a great idea for a blend but it’s bogged down by a lot of extra stuff that doesn’t need to be there.

Tea #1 from HHTTB2

It absolutely looked like there were bamboo leaves in here, but they’re not in the ingredient list and I don’t necessarily taste them. So I’m not sure. There’s a little cherry flavor. It isn’t medicinal, but more of a cherry syrupy kind of flavor. The primary flavor is definitely hibiscus. And the aftertaste definitely has that metallic hibiscus-twang.

Also the flavor is really light, so I couldn’t imagine steeping this for the recommended 2 minutes and expect to get anything out of it. Though that could be more related to its travels in the box than the tea itself.

Received this one from babble

This has a slight medicinal smell.
This brewed up a dark red, it’s got a nice cherry flavour, with just to say a bit of a medicinal taste. I’m getting the green tea base at the end.

I’m also getting a slight tobacco aftertaste?

Hmmm very interesting this one. Thank you Tamm for sending me a sample. I’ve had green teas with cherry in them and they are OK to say the least. The dry leaves smell quite nice. You can’t really taste the pinnaple or the cherry but I feel like I’m drinking a rose garden with this one….and I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing. I didn’t find it to be nasty but I don’t know if I would keep this one on hand on a regular basis. Glad to try it though.