Friends With Benefits – Whittard Teas

You’ll know by now that I’m a bit lot of a tea addict. I love all kinds of teas, hot and iced, and even had a tea advent calendar last year.

I’m known as the ‘tea drinker’ by friends and family, never going many hours without a brew. Christmases and birthdays never fail to pass without a quirky tea gift or afternoon tea.

Oh and remember that time I was sent tea by a fan?!

Anyway, I’ve realised recently that tea seems to be a bit of a love hate thing. There are those of us that can’t get enough of the stuff, and other (fools) that can’t even sniff tea without feeling queasy. Why is that?

The good thing about having a friend that doesn’t drink tea is that they give you their free samples!

A friend of mine recently bought some hot chocolate in the Whittard store, and when signing up with them you are offered a few samples as a welcome gift. Unlucky for her, those samples are tea. Lucky me!

Although I often wander around Whittard browsing the beautiful packaging and tasting the samples they have out to lure you in (it works, kinda), bizarrely I don’t think I’ve purchased tea there. No reason why.

Whittard is somewhere I associate more with hot chocolate, they do some amazing flavours that are rich and chocolaty. I’ve not come across one I don’t like yet.

Back to my friend with tea benefits, she was given 3 different flavours of individuality packaged tea bags.

As a kind of passing on of the tea goodness, I thought I’d share with you my thoughts on the flavours I tried.

Marrakech Mint No.212

I’m not generally a fan of mint tea, or many mint flavoured things to be honest. I can find the taste strong and overpowering. Like eating something just after brushing your teeth. Yuk.

This ones a green tea. I’ve not had a minty green tea before. A few years ago I went through a phase of drinking green teas, reading about the health benefits and fancying a bit of variety in life (whoop!). I generally drank the flavoured ones as I found the plain could be quite bitter. That’s until my heart rate got a little high (not due to the tea), and I decided to go decaf MOST of the time.

I was nervous trying this tea as I wasn’t sure it would be to my liking, the minty-ness I mean.

It surprised me. Being both fresh and warming, a bit of a contradiction but I know what I mean! It had an earthy taste with underlying notes of that familiar green tea flavour. The mint sweetening and crisping it a little, rather than overpowering it.

I would definitely drink this tea again. I doubt I would buy a box, as it’s not something I’d drink regular. But having the odd sachets in a mixed box for when I fancied one would be good.

Super Fruits No.25

Well this is delicious!

The title made me think healthy, which then made me think it may not taste great. But it does!

The rising steam was rich and fruity, hot Ribena came to mind, like when you’re young and not well. That soothing, reminiscent smell.

Smells can often be deceiving I think when it comes to fruit teas. Sometimes the strongest fragranced teas can end up tasting quite dull and like cardboard. (Not that I eat much cardboard). Many of them leaving that same aftertaste for me. They can smell much fruitier than they taste. The flavour of this however equalled the smell. It was deep and fruity.

There’s not really much more to say, other than I’ll definitely be trying more fruit teas from Whittard.

English Rose No.12

Floral. I like floral flavours, well parma violets and Turkish delight.

I’m imagining this as similar to an earl grey maybe. Unlike the previous two, this sachet states it can be made with or without milk. I decided to add just a splash of milk as this is how I would usually drink an earl grey cuppa.

So much sweeter than I was expecting, it tastes quite like a milkshake. A hot milkshake. Sweet and creamy. Maybe I shouldn’t have added milk, I’m not sure. You can add but you can’t take away! As I only have the one sample I can’t try this minus the milk, maybe I will sometime.

I’m not selling it very well am I!? It’s rather soothing though. I drank it all, it’s weirdly moreish, just not what I expected. I couldn’t find much tea flavour within, there were floral notes, it was somewhat fruity too. I don’t think I hate it.

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If there are any tea haters out there with unwanted tea, or you just feel like sending me tea. You know where I am. Here.