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Tea Tuesday: Coastal Tea Company Mango Green Tea

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Coastal Tea Company's Mango Green Tea

Coastal Tea Company’s Mango Green Tea

Here at Style Chicks, we drink lots of green tea. Green tea is a beauty powerhouse for youthful, glowing skin as well as a metabolism and energy booster. For example, studies indicate if you have a cup of green tea each day instead of your standard afternoon coffee for a year, that alone can result in up to a ten-pound weight loss. But to get the beauty benefits that green tea can offer, the brand of tea one chooses is critical in order to make sure it is the quality of tea to derive benefits. And, if you are not a fan of green tea, it helps if it is a tasty, flavorful tea. Coastal Tea Company makes a delicious Mango Green worth giving a try.

GREEN TEA
Green Tea has often been touted as the miracle drink for glowing skin, weight control, increased energy, improved immunity, and reducing inflammation. EGCG in doses of green tea shown to be effective in preliminary studies for cancer prevention. Multiple cups of green tea per day are associated with reduced risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and some cancers. But not all green teas are created equal when it comes to taste, quality, EGCG levels, freshness, and safety.

WHAT MAKES COASTAL TEA COMPANY MANGO GREEN TEA SPECIAL?

– Coastal Tea Company’s Mango Green Tea is a 100% leaf sencha green tea blend with dried mango pieces with hints of peach and mint. The chunks of mango are plentiful and big, how they appear in the pictures is how the tea looks poured directly out of the bag, they were not “arranged” for the photo. What you see is what you get.

– All natural. There are no artificial flavors, chemicals or additives for flavor.

– It is tasty. Green tea can taste somewhat vegetal and is something of an acquired taste. This mango tea has a sweet mango and peach flavor with a notable mint infusion.

– The tea is actual full leaves, not dust or remaindered tea. This is the freshest type of tea, the best of the batch, and it holds the most benefits. The batches are small batches to ensure freshness and quality.

– In addition to being an organic green tea that is tasty, low caffeine and healthy, Coastal Tea Company takes special efforts to avoid the risks associated with green tea: lead and radiation.

Coastal Tea Company's Mango Green Tea

Coastal Tea Company’s Mango Green Tea

 

LEAD
A concern with the otherwise incredible health benefits of green full leaf tea is the level of lead it can contain. This problem is inherent to green tea, as it is highly prone to absorb chemical pollution, especially so in leaves picked in China. This problem exists in many brands of tea. The cost of the tea is not necessarily always correlated to the probability of higher levels lead, but small batch, hand-picked teas had the least possibility of containing lead.

According to the New York Times Well Blog, an independent study analyzed the lead content of various brands of green tea leaves. The study stated that the leaves in the Lipton and Bigelow tea bags contained 1.25 to 2.5 micrograms of lead per serving. (What’s in Your Green Tea?, May 23, 1013)

Coastal Tea screens their tea leaves for lead and metal traces by running it through a metal detector, a sorting machine, and a heavy magnet to sort out any tea leaves that have absorbed any lead or metals. I haven’t heard of a company taking such efforts to screen their tea leaves, but it gives me much more confidence that Coastal Tea Co teas are safe.

RADIATION
Another risk for green tea leaves is it is susceptible to absorbing radiation. While this is chiefly a concern with matchas (because the leaf is actually consumed not just steeped), it is something to be aware of in the selection of tea. Coastal Tea tests tea for radiation levels, as well as only selects tea leaves from areas that are known as safe (Uju City) and have never had reports of radiated tea.

TASTE
Brewed for 2-5 minutes, the tea has a lovely, golden-yellow hue and tastes of peach, mango, and a crisp, fresh-tasting mint. I got a second brew out of the same leaves that were just a flavorful as the first.

Coastal Tea Company's Mango Green Tea

Coastal Tea Company’s Mango Green Tea

CONCLUSION: A tasty, natural tea that has all the benefits I look for in a green loose leaf tea without any of the risks associated with some loose leaf tea brands. I am impressed by the strict standards and precautions Coastal Tea Company undertakes to ensure their teas are fresh and safe.

 

Coastal Tea Company's Mango Green Tea

Coastal Tea Company’s Mango Green Tea

Find this tasty tea at Amazon.

 

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I received this product for testing and review purposes. If you have any questions about my experience with it, leave it in the comments section below, and I’ll do my best to answer it!

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club

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Here at StyleChicks, we consume lots of tea. And like clockwork, every six weeks we make a large loose leaf tea order. This order consists of our favorite greens; some whites and oolong, a matcha and a vanilla black. It would be easier to be on an auto-order to keep our favorites coming and try some new flavors, but to date, we haven’t found a tea of the month club that meets our needs. An issue we have experienced with monthly clubs is not having the option to select the kind of tea you want.

There is some potentially appealing Tea of The Month offers out there, but when it comes down to it, there are three factors we particularly value that are make or break for us choosing a tea club:

  1. The quality of the tea itself
  2. Being able to choose the type tea you like
  3. Terms of service that are acceptable to live with and not a hassle to change, pause or even cancel.

With these three criteria in mind, we examined the Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club. You may know them from their quaint Cafe in Troy, New York, or the Ballston Spa that serves their teas. Or Whistling Kettle may be new to you. When we had a chance to taste many of The Whistling Kettle teas, we were so excited to try them all, because all the teas smell truly knock your socks off fantastic! It was hard to decide which tea to brew first!

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club Endurance Flavor

THE QUALITY OF THE TEA

Whistling Kettle Teas are loose teas. The inclusions such as nuts, berries, dried fruit, or other petals are large or at times, even whole pieces. The tea leaves fresh are the full leaf or larger leaf pieces, not dust or remnants. The close up photos show the teas as they came out of the package: colorful, full and fresh quality. And as soon as you open the tea container, the first thing you notice it smells absolutely delicious. As we tried each flavor, one was better than the next. Even the black teas smelled delicious. For example, one black tea, the flavor “SnowFlake” had wonderful scents of cinnamon, vanilla, and almond. And the almonds pieces in the black tea were full almond slivers or larger chunks of almond, not ground up almond powder or just an almond flavoring. The color of the brewed tea as a lovely dark golden amber hue and the tea tasted delicious, even on a second brew. That is another nice feature of these teas, most of them can do a second brew as tasty as the first.

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club Snowflake Flavor

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club Snowflake Flavor

THE WHISTLING KETTLE TEA FLAVOR OVERVIEWS

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club

In addition to the Snowflake black tea described above, we tried several varieties of The Whistling Kettle teas to assess the quality of their products. Some of these teas included:

BANANA DULCE: I am not a fan of the scent of banana, but the aroma of the Banana Dulce in the container reminded me of these tasty candied banana chips I ate as a child and the brewed tea both smells and tastes like fresh baked banana bread, with flavors of coconut and graham cracker. It is a testament to a tea product that even a not well-liked flavor can be tasty if done right. Whistling Kettle Banana Dulce is an organic decaf blend and brews to a lovely pale shade of gold.

VANILLA SILK OOLONG: I am particularly fond of Oolongs, sort of a bitter but sweet champagne kind of taste. This Oolong has a delicate orange cream scent and has a mild sweetness to it that is not too sticky or overpowering.

SCOTTISH CARAMEL TOFFEE PU-REB: This is unlike other teas I have had, it has a pleasant toffee aroma and good sized toffee chunks that balance out the earthy tones of the pu-erh. It is sweet, but not overpoweringly so. Pu-erh is an aged, fermented red tea that is sometimes mistaken for a black tea. This one smells like a bakery or candy store; the aroma is fantastic. It is an energizing tea and a good alternative to coffee or colas for an afternoon energy boost.

EAST FRISIAN BROKEN TEA: This is a breakfast tea, it is malty, not sweet or flavored. It brews to a wonderful, dark color.

ENDURANCE: As the name implies, this organic tea is energizing and is intended to increase stamina. It is also a Pu-Erh tea and has fruity inclusions such as Organic Cinnamon, Organic Goji Berries, Organic Schizandra Berries, and Organic Nettle Leaf. The berries are whole, and the tea blend makes for a lovely looking brewing process, especially if you brew them in a glass teapot. Medium caffeine content and it smells absolutely delicious.

GOLDEN STARFRUIT: This green tea was one of my favorite of the bunch, with a notable aroma that is worthy of serving guests when you want to spoil them a bit with a delightful treat. There are big chunks of starfruit, and it has a wonderful tropical taste without being sugary sweet. If you want the benefits of green tea but you dislike the taste of green tea, this is a delicious way to enjoy the benefits of green tea. Lovely light golden hue upon brewing smells delicious to the last drop.

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club Golden Starfruit Flavor

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club Golden Starfruit Flavor

LEMON SOUFFLE HONEYBUSH: A caffeine-free creamy Rooibos blend suitable for drinking at night and winding down and relaxing. A beautiful yellow-gold with a mildly tart lemon flavor that has lovely bright blue and yellow inclusions in the tea. If you are avoiding caffeine at night but want to drink tea, this is also tasty as a cold iced tea beverage.

I liked every tea I tried, and some of them such as Snowflake, Golden Starfruit, and Endurance I loved! These teas were amongst the best we have tasted, and after years of loyalty drinking the same brand, we were convinced to drinking The Whistling Tea Kettle teas.

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club

THE WHISTLING KETTLE TEA CLUB TERMS
While these teas and other flavors are sold individually on their website, there are 15 types of Tea of the Month Clubs available.

Something that sets this tea club apart from the others:

  1. You select the types of tea you want, not a variety or mystery pack selections – unless you ask for a variety selection.
  2. Amongst the 15 types of Tea Clubs, choose all green, all black, all chocolate, Endurance teas, Herbal teas, Discovery packs, amongst others. The Tea Tasting Club is a club for tea lovers who want to try as many types of tea as possible.
  3. Get 2-4 oz of each of the Loose teas with big pieces of inclusions of nuts berries, and petals, not pre-bagged tea dust or remnants with artificial flavoring instead of the real thing.
    FLEXIBLE TERMS:
  4. Choose 3 or 6 months and your shipment dates.
  5. You can cancel at any point
  6. You can change the type of club whenever you wish. Drink Green Tea in the summer and switch to the endurance and stamina teas during the cold, dark winter months.
  7. Free shipping
  8. You won’t be billed on signup, rather just before shipment.
  9. Reasonable prices without hidden fees

SUMMARY:
I enjoyed all The Whistling Kettle teas I tried, and The Whistling Kettle offers several rare, hard-to-find, and exotic teas within their subscriptions. It ‘s hard to locate an organic, fresh, tasty tea brand with lots of variety amongst their loose leaf teas. I also love seeing when a tea has a generous inclusion of berries, nuts, petals, and other flavorings. The teas look so attractive, smell divine and brew to beautiful golden hues. There was no “dust” or remaindered teas, everything was fresh, not an overstock. They have tea flavors I have never tried before, and the Endurance teas are surprisingly energizing. We would recommend giving them a try; the Tea Clubs offer a great way to drink your favorites or try some new teas!

Find the Tea of the Month Club at The Whistling Kettle.

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I received this product in exchange for my unbiased review and received compensation for my time and effort. However, my experience with the product and the opinions expressed in this review are 100% mine.

Teabook Premium Tea Gift Box

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Teabook Premium Tea Gift Set

Teabook Premium Tea Gift Set

THE SET
This Teabook Premium Teas set is a tea tumbler with a boxed set of pre-portioned loose tea pouches that come as four each of rare Greens, Whites, Oolongs, and Reds plus a Special Collection bonus pouch of a rare tea, in this case, a specialty Red. The sampler provides a taste of some of the loose teas available from the Teabook Premium Tea service; a discount subscription card comes with the box for 20% off.

The teas are pesticide free. The tea flavors are:

WHITE: Silver Needle white tea is a delicate tea that tastes of melon, blackberries, and a warm bread sort of aroma.

GREEN: Green Bud Green tea is mild and buttery tasting, more of a mint leaf leaning than a vegetable leaf one. This tea is an authentic green, which if one is unaccustomed to greens may seem bitter. I am a hardcore loose green tea drinker, and I like this blend. I got two brews out of the same leaves. If you are a seasoned green tea drinker, you will find this to be a pure green but not bitter, slightly sweet without any added flavorings. If you are new to green teas, you may wish to add some sweetener to the first brew, or you may prefer the less beneficial but still tasty second brew.

OOLONG: Bai Hao Oolong tea (Oriental Beauty) from China is a sweet tea with dark chocolate and raspberry overtones. To me, this Oolong has a bit of a liquor taste while still being delicate and this is my favorite of the four with a very pale golden color when brewed.

RED: Sunset Red (Hunan Hong) from China, it tastes like caramel and chocolate. I am personally not much of a fan of red teas, but this one does have a certain appeal with unexpected flavors that are tasty on a red tea base.

A concern I had about these teas, especially the White and the Oolong, is would they overbrew in the tumbler since most delicate teas should only be brewed for a minute or two? These teas do not seem too bitter to me; Teabook says this is because they chose only high-quality teas. Even when I drink the tea over the course of a few hours, it does not get bitter. I can also get a second brew off of the same pouch, not as strong as the first but still tasty.

PRESENTATION
This set could make a lovely gift although the outside of the box that the teas come in does not seem very gift-like. There are tea-related quotes and sayings inside the box itself, and it does keep the tea pouches in good condition. I, however, would be happy to get this as a gift or give it as a gift for a tea lover, and it is probably something I would not have noticed if I wasn’t for examining the item for review purposes.

This set contains a quality twelve-ounce tumbler. I like this tumbler because it has a double wall so it is heat insulated and I don’t burn my hands holding it. It is relatively easy to clean considering the infusing filter that is used to keep the loose tea away from the drinking area of the tumbler. The filter is sturdy and keeps any tea “floaters” away from the brewing area with a well-designed drinking compartment underneath the stainless steel cap. The tumbler can also be used for fruit infused waters and cold tea, but it should not be put in the microwave. It is sturdy.

I especially like how beautiful it is to watch loose teas unfurl, especially the green, as they infuse in the water like a slow motion dance! Having such a well-designed filter compartment keeps even tiny tea leaves strained away from the drinking area, and makes it easy to drink loose teas.

Recommended item because it is a well-designed tumbler that doubles as a fruit water infuser, tasty tea choices, and coupon code for discounts on future tea purchases at TeaBook.

Teabook Premium Tea Gift Set

Teabook Premium Tea Gift Set

Natures Nectar Ultra Premium Natural Organic Matcha Green Tea

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The Style Chicks have long enjoyed a good cup of green tea: a tasty warm treat that does wonders for the skin, metabolism, and energy. Green Tea aids in hair growth. Green Tea contains Vitamin B, and its’ anti-inflammatory properties are significant. To get skin glowing the day before an event, we started drinking a minimum of 2-3 cups of green tea per day as was recommended in Dr. Nicholas Perricone’s 3-day “Anti-inflammatory Diet.” When you drink 3 cups of green tea in a day, your skin is luminous, dewy and glowing.

But sometimes it is tough to consume 3 cups of green tea a day when I really feel like I just want a double espresso with whip to get over my afternoon energy slump. An easy fix for this problem is to drink Matcha. Matcha tea has about half the caffeine of an espresso shot. AND it makes you extra pretty.

WHAT IS MATCHA & WHY SHOULD I DRINK IT?
Matcha is ground tea leaves which make for an intensely concentrated tea, something of a super tea, which has more than 100 times as much Polyphenols as regular green tea. One cup of matcha tea per day is enough for a jitter-free time released energy boost, glowing skin, weight management, increased metabolism and maximum health benefits. Matcha has highly concentrated green tea benefits, but you can get too much of a good thing. Drinking too much of any green, white or black tea can deplete iron in the blood, and all natural tea leaves, like anything else grown in soil, can have minuscule traces of lead. After one cup of matcha per day, you have gained all the Polyphenols, Amino Acids, and metabolism boost that you need.

A cup of Matcha in the afternoon can be an easy alternative to drinking multiple cups of green tea or a coffee substitute when you need some energy. Personally, I can use as much caffeine as I can get, but I do enjoy the energy boost from a good cup of Matcha because there is no “crash” from it like I get from some other caffeinated drinks.

HOW TO MAKE MATCHA TEA
To make Matcha tea, add 1 gram (just shy of a 1/4 teaspoon, .20 of a teaspoon to be exact) of Matcha powder to 6-8 ounces of hot but not boiling water and whisk until the powder dissolves. If you don’t have a matcha whisk, use the smallest whisk you have. Whisk the tea until you have a light froth, probably 30 seconds to a minute. To froth, quickly move your whisk in an M motion (remember: “M” for Matcha!)

A RECOMMENDED MATCHA TEA FOR DRINKING
Nature’s Nectar Ultra Premium Natural Matcha Green Tea is a ceremonial grade Matcha that is delicate and sweet without tasting artificially sweet. If you already drink green tea, you will notice it has a superior flavor of not tasting ‘vegetable-y’ or bitter, just a warm and delicate flavoring. The intensity can be richer depending on the amount of powder and water used, but this tin is a 30 day supply, 1 gram a day. Some brands are an entire teaspoon of Matcha per cup; that is too much powder for a fine grade Matcha such as this one. There is no need to over-do it with this Matcha as it has 137 times more Polyphenols than regular green tea, so you don’t need more any powder than suggested to optimize your green tea benefits. Nature’s Nectar Matcha is also organic and gluten free.

Something else I noticed about Nature’s Nectar Matcha is it is a much brighter green than the other Matcha’s I have. When I select a Matcha, I look for the most vivid green I can get not just because it makes for a prettier cup of Matcha but the colorful green means it is also packed with Amino Acids.

While this Matcha can be added to smoothies and drinks, but since it is such a high-grade matcha, I only drink it straight as a tea and use my less tasty Matchas for including in Matcha-based beverages.

DRINKING GRADE VERSES BAKING GRADE
Here is where Matcha can get tricky: a Matcha powder suitable for drinking as a tea should be a pure and high-quality matcha powder with an intentional blend of green tea leaf varieties. These Nature’s Nectar Matcha leaves are the preferred “first harvest” leaves which make the freshest tea and the highest levels of green tea benefits. A quality Matcha is often labeled as “ceremonial grade”. These Matcha powders often come packaged in a relatively smaller tin than those sold in bulk or bagged. They are also more expensive than those intended for making beverages featuring Matcha. For example, Trader Joe’s Matcha Green Tea Latte Mix is a larger container of powder best suited for use in lattes and recipes because the Matcha is pre-mixed with sugar cane, coconut and milk powders. Good in a DIY latte but not suitable as a matcha powder for tea. A pure matcha suited for drinking as a Matcha tea can be pricey but costs far less per cup than an afternoon run to a coffeehouse for a double espresso. And it is super simple to make.

Matcha TIPS and HACKS:

Once opened, store matcha in the refrigerator to maintain its fresh taste and vibrant green color.

Is your Matcha tea too bitter? Bring water to only a near boil, or wait for one to two minutes after boiling before pouring the water into your cup. Water at 194 degrees Fahrenheit (90 Celsius) and below will produce sweeter Matcha tea than when mixed with boiling water.

Need an extra brain power boost? The lower the temperature of the hot water, the more Theanine that brews. Theanine is the part of green tea that causes brain focusing and mental alertness. Can you tolerate a little extra bitterness for the sake of beauty? Then brew up a nice extra hot cup.

Matcha makes for a great pre-workout caffeine boost that will give you sustained energy without the mid-workout crash.

Natures Nectar Ultra Premium Natural Organic Matcha Green Tea

Natures Nectar Ultra Premium Natural Organic Matcha Green Tea

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