Bigelow Vanilla Chai Tea – A Yummy Treat for a Cold Day.

I bought this tea on the recommendation of my wonderful friend Jenny.  Jenny and I go way back, so far back that I tend to think of her, and her sister Maureen, as the sisters of my heart.  Jenny knows how much I love tea, and passed it on. This is the first chai tea I’ve ever had in teabag form.  Usually I’m a loose leaf drinker when it comes to chai, and I don’t drink all that much because I usually find chai teas a little stronger than I prefer.  However, Bigelow Vanilla Chai is nicely mild, although I’m sure you could double bag and make it as strong as a loose leaf chai.

Each tea bag is in it’s own individual package, sealed for freshness, which is great if you like to throw tea bags in your carryon for trips like I do.  As soon as you open the individual package, the lovely smell of spices drifts up and wafts through your senses.  I easily noted cloves, cardamom, and cinnamon, with the notes of the black tea quietly supporting them.  The vanilla nicely rounds out the aromatic scent of the tea.   Because I wanted to see how good the tea tasted via the “quick” method, I chose to just do the pour water over the tea bag thing this first time.  For a quick cup of chai, I thought this did the trick.  The tea wasn’t as flavorful as I’m used to, but it was adequate.

Per the box, the preferred directions are to combine water with some milk, and then bring to boil with the tea bag in the pot.  I did this for my second cup and I have to say that this method definitely yields a more flavorful, creamy cup of tea. I guess there’s a reason it’s the preferred method!  But then, I think in general this is probably the difference between drinking tea from the leaf as opposed to tea bags, so I can’t say I was surprised the preferred method produced a superior cup of tea.  Although, neither was as good as chai from loose leaf.

But then, I’ve yet to find a case where bagged tea is superior to loose.

Oh, and, if you’re a coffee drinker looking for a tea to try, chai might be a good place for you to start.  The spices and strong black tea that make up chai give it a much more robust flavor that I think coffee drinkers might enjoy.

If I were to rate this tea, I’d give the quick method 3 out of 5 cups, and the preferred method 4 out of 5 cups.  Either way, it’s nice tea for a cold winter day!

P.S. – for some reason wordpress won’t let me upload some images of the box and when I prepared the tea in the preferred method. I’ll upload them as soon as I figure out what the problem is!