Trader Joe’s Relax Organic Tea

A good cup of tea can be very soothing – but relaxing? Not for everyone. For some people, the caffeine content of their favorite tea can keep them up for hours. For others, it’s just the fact that they took a break to rest and collect their thoughts that gets the re-energized. Trader Joe’s Relax Organic Tea is a tea that is actually supposed to be relaxing. It contains no caffeine and is made with a blend of herbs designed to calm and help you to unwind. These herbs include fennel seed, licorice, rooibos, anise, cinnamon, ginger, cardamom, cloves, peppermint and strawberry leaf.

With so much stuff going on inside the triangular tea bags, I expected the flavors of the tea to be a bit overwhelming. Surprisingly, it had a nice medium body and a great, smooth flavor. Plus, it seemed to live up to the promise of its name – at least, it did for me.  The fennel, licorice and peppermint seemed to come through more than the other elements, with the fennel and licorice definitely having a soothing effect, but the mint adds a nice palate-cleansing finish that left me feeling pretty refreshed.

New Caledonia Coffee, reviewed

New Caledonia coffee comes from – you guessed it – New Caledonia, in Island in the South Pacific. These beans came from the Domaine de Kouandji estate. Like some other pacific island coffees, this one is fairly rare, with production of just 1000 kg per year, and it has some very unique qualities to it. The first thing you’ll notice is that the beans are very small, almost half or 1/3 of the size of your average coffee bean. Another distinctive feature (one that you might not notice) is that this coffee is very low in caffeine content, less than half of the average for other Arabica varieties at about .6%.

The coffee itself is very interesting. It has a creamy, hazelnut note to both the smell of the beans and to the body of the coffee, reminiscent of very milky chocolate or gianduja. There is also a little bit of an herbal note to its finish, and since the coffee is very smooth and light bodied, it comes close to a mellow, lingering black tea finish. It also has some sweet notes in it, like dried fruit. It’s extremely drinkable black and seems like a good choice for a breakfast coffee, where it won’t be paired with foods that may overpower it.

(STARBUCKS)RED Whole Bean Coffee, reviewed

(Starbucks)RED is a whole bean coffee that Starbucks introduced to support the (PRODUCT) RED charity, a charity that partners with various retailers to raise money through the sale of special products that goes towards providing treatment for children and adults living with HIV in Africa. In the case of (Starbucks)RED, $1 per pound of this blend goes towards the charity, so you get good coffee and support a good cause all in one cup.

The coffee itself is a blend of Rwandan and Ethiopian coffees that is supposed to evoke some of the classic characteristics of African coffees. It is bold and smooth, with fairly low acidity, and notes of citrus and a sweet spiciness. The spiciness actually seemed to hint at the sweet-spicy combination of fruitcake, which is not too sweet but fairly rich tasting from all the dried fruit in it. The coffee also had a slight bitterness to it, like the pith of a citrus fruit, but it was subtle and made the coffee a little more interesting.

Coffee Bean Tiramisu Ice Blended, reviewed

I immediately liked the idea of a Tiramisu Ice Blended when I saw it appear as a “possible” new menu item a few weeks ago at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf.  Tiramisu is a dessert that has a lot of great espresso flavor to it in its own right, and actually seemed like a fairly natural extension to a cold, blended drink (I wouldn’t want it hot, though).  Fortunately, the drink did the dessert justice. It was very creamy, with a little bit of extra dairy flavor that you might get from the mascarpone or whipped cream in a tiramisu, and seemed to have hints of butter cookie and sweet marsala in it, too. The best thing about the whole drink was that it had a really nice flavor of espresso to it. As a coffee fan, I’d say it was even better with an extra shot of espresso blended in to bring of the coffee flavor more

Sea Island Coffee Royal Tonga Coffee, reviewed

As you might suspect, Royal Tonga Coffee comes from the Kingdom of Tonga in the South Pacific. The coffee is a rare one and there is only one company, South Seas Coffee, that commercially produces and sells Tongan coffee. Just over 2 tons of coffee is produced and exported every year  – a figure that might sound like a lot until you compare it to the more than 55,000 tons exported from Kenya annually.

Tongan coffee is grown close to sea level and, as a result, has a unique element to its flavor profile: a hint of the sea. The coffee has a hint of a salty, woodsy element to it that reminded me of the small of driftwood at the beach. It has a very full, medium-bodied flavor with distinct notes of leather and a bit of spice as you finish. The coffee has a very round flavor, with only a bit of mild acidity to it. It’s very unusual, but also very drinkable and tasty. I think this is a great breakfast coffee that needs no sweetener or cream to complement it.

You can buy it online from Sea Islands Coffee.