Sweet Desert Delight (formerly Desert Blend)

I thought I had tried this one before! I received a sample today and it was packaged differently than I remember. I went back and read my previous review and scored it quite low! (59) – As I am drinking this THIS time around it’s soooooo different! Not sure if I was logging the wrong tea before or had a bad or old batch…hum…

Anyhow…on to this review…

The dry blend scent is somewhere between a chocolate chai smell I have in recent memory AND a Chocolate Coconut Cinnamon Cookie of sorts. It has a sort of a plastic smell but that could very well be from the packaging.

The color is a deep red-brown. The aroma of the liquid is Cinnamon, Coconut, and almost a little bit of a cream scent.

The taste is sweet but also spicy…a natural cinnamon spice…not Fire Ball type cinnamon. I have a HONKIN’ HUGE Anise Star In there so I was a little afraid of the results but as I sip I am pleasantly surprised. This is pretty good. The sip starts as a contradicting sweet and spice but they are working ok with each other and morphs into a flatter taste towards the end of the sip – just before the swallow.

This isn’t bad at all and I am certainly changing my rating!

The end of my sample. Sadness. This is the perfect evening tea for me. Think I’m gonna get a full size.

Backlog: I like this best when it has had plenty of time to steep (I steeped it for 10 minutes this time) and when I add just a pinch of sugar it helps offset the weird aftertaste from the stevia. I am not a fan of stevia … I’d rather not have sweetener at all than have the stevia, but because it’s in there, I wanted something to alter that aftertaste a bit.

Tasty, but certainly not my favorite from Zhi Tea.

Had a small sample of this in the Zhi Tea shop today. Very sweet – I love sweet teas & I think this is the first tea I’ve ever come across that I didn’t want to add sugar or honey to. Very, very good; a medley of sweet & spicy flavors. Recommended!

Steep Information:
~12oz boiling water 2tsp
5+ minutes
Metal basket strainer

Tasting Notes:
Dry Leaf Smell: sweet, coconut, anise
Steeped Tea Smell: Anise and wood, Hint coconut
Flavor: Sweet coconut anise
Aftertaste: Woody
Liquor: Color translucent orange red

Resteep: very weak

https://amazonv.blogspot.com/2021/01/zhi-tea-company-loose-leaf-rooibos.html

I disliked this at first. I don’t eat much sugar, so really notice “sweet”. For me, when I drank this on it’s own, the taste was overwhelmingly that powdery, coldness of stevia, which I don’t like. I didn’t finish the cup. Not wanting to waste it though, I tried adding a small amount to a pot of black tea. Yum! Chocolate liqueur tea. I may buy this again after all.