- - Teacup Tuesday | Week 2 - -

Hey everyone!

My sincere apologies for missing last week's Teacup Tuesday post. I had actually only tried one new tea that week, so I figured it wasn't worth a whole blog post. However, this past week I tried so many teas that I hope you're ready for a lengthy post.

Let's check out all the new teas right after the jump!

*Click on the photos to enlarge them.*

1 || Watermelon Mint | DAVIDsTEA || Herbal

Caffeine: none (aka less than 1 mg of caffeine per cup) 

How to prepare: 1.25 tsp | 96° C/205° F | 4-7 min

Ingredients: apple, honeydew melon, peppermint, carrot, watermelon, wild strawberry leaves, beetroot | artifical watermelon-mint flavouring 

A couple of weeks ago I ordered a few things from DAVIDsTEA (see photo at the end of this post) and since you get three tea samples with every order, I ended up getting: Watermelon Mint, Toasted Walnut (which I gave to a friend), and Main Squeeze. The first sample I tried was Watermelon Mint, which is part of the 2014 summer collection. I'm typically not a fan of watermelon, but the added peppermint is prominent enough to shift the focus to it. I find that the red-ish colouring of the tea is fairly typical for herbal teas (which my parents teasingly call "kompot" instead of tea).

2 || Main Squeeze | DAVIDsTEA || Maté

Type: stimulant (aka medium caffeine) 

How to prepare: 1.25 tsp | 85° C/185° F | 4-7 min

Ingredients: green yerba maté, candied papaya, pineapple, safflower | natural flavouring
Note: contains sulfites 

I was reading up about this tea online and saw that it contains something called "sulfites." What are sulfites? A quick Google search led me to discover that sulfites are "inorganic salts that have antioxidant and preservative properties." The reason why it's important to announce the presence of sulfites is because many people are sensitive to them. One thing I really like about DAVIDsTEA is that they clearly state whether a tea of theirs contains an allergen. If you would like to read more about sulfites, you can find an excellent online source here.

In terms of the tea itself, it's quite pleasantly citrusy!

3 || Cold 911 (Organic) | DAVIDsTEA || Herbal

Caffeine: none (aka less than 1 mg of caffeine per cup) 

How to prepare: 1.25 tsp | 96° C/205° F | 4-7 min

Ingredients: peppermint, juniper berries, orange peel | natural eucalyptus and orange flavouring 

This is the best tea that DAVIDsTEA has for combating a cold - honestly! All of my co-workers run during their breaks to grab this tea if they're sick. I drank a bit of this tea last week when I was feeling pretty sick. I actually try to avoid drinking Cold 911 leisurely because the strong presence of peppermint and juniper berries reminds me a lot of medicine. The scent of this tea may make you cringe because of the ingredients, but it will definitely help fight your cold.

4 || Coconut Oolong | DAVIDsTEA || Oolong

Caffeine: medium 

How to prepare: 1.25 tsp | 85° C/185° F | 4-7 min

Ingredients: oolong tea, organic coconut flakes, organic lemongrass | artificial coconut flavouring
Note: contains coconut

Being a fan of coconut, I just had to pick up this tea the last time I went to DAVIDsTEA. This is actually their "Tea of the Month" for April 2014. The texture is slightly creamy (which is sort of strange to say when talking about tea), and this is probably one of my favourite teas to have some sort of dessert with (muffins or chocolate). If you would like to know more about oolong teas, you can quickly check out the Wikipedia article about the topic here.

5 || Chocolate Macaroon | DAVIDsTEA || Black

Caffeine: medium 

How to prepare: 1.25 tsp | 96° C/205° F | 4-7 min

Ingredients: black tea, toasted coconut, coconut, pecans, cacao nibs, rock cane sugar | natural flavouring
Note: contains coconut & pecans

This is another one of my favourite teas. Since I dislike the Chocolate Rocket tea with a passion, I didn't think I would like having chocolate in a tea again. Strangely enough, I do. The combination of chocolate with coconut is quite pleasant and successfully makes the tea smell like a chocolate macaroon. In fact, the only thing I can think of to make this tea taste even better is to add sugar and milk, which I think is what I'm going to try out right now. :)

I would say this tea is very similar to Buttered Rum tea, which is an old favourite of mine.

6 || Some Velvet Morning (Organic) | DAVIDsTEA || Green 

Caffeine: medium 

How to prepare: 1.25 tsp | 85° C/185° F | 3-4 min

Ingredients: chinese green tea, dandelion root, lemongrass, orange peel, schizandra berries | natural flavouring

Although I talked about quite a few green teas two weeks ago, I can't say that I'm over the moon about this one. I'll have to keep trying it, but for now I'm finding that this tea is just okay. On the other hand, my mom loves this tea because she says it's the perfect pick-me-up for the mornings when she's tired. I'll have to try this tea when I'm super tired one morning to see if what she says is true!

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For next week's post I'm going to try to branch out and try other kinds of tea on my 'tea shelf.' Stick tuned for that!

Do you have a favourite kind of tea?

Thank you for reading! -A.~

My David's Tea haul from last week!