Tried Yellow Tea at Teavana

Teavana is a high end tea store and mail order company owned by Starbucks. Where I live it occupies a space in the designer wing of a large mall. It is a sleek, upscale store where price, quantity, and ingredient information may be displayed subtly, or not at all. They exclusively sell loose tea by weight; no tea bags. You can try any tea for about $3.00 to $5.00 a cup.

Teavana sells a wide variety of teas, some flavored blends, some herbal, some pure black and green teas. When I first went there I got a pamphlet that I found useful. I remember having to call the 800 number later for ingredients information, however.

Some teas are reasonably priced, some are really pricey. They also sell tea pots, and devices to heat water in.

Teavana puts out teas to be sampled. All of these are sweetened with brown rock sugar. Although this sugar is subtle and delicious, people that really like tea, like me, frown on that. They tend to put out cold flavored teas for sampling. People who really like teas have at best an ambivalent relationship with flavored teas. Some flavored teas contain artificial ingredients and citric acid. I would at least like to know all of the ingredients in a flavored tea and what they are made from. Apparently "natural flavors" often aren't. Chemical flavoring agents carried by propylene glycol are also undesirable.

I find tea bags convenient. I'm not going to clean up the mess from loose tea. At present, for me Teavana is an interesting place where I can sample new teas. I've been there four times but never bought anything. I've looked at their pots and cups but they are never quite what I'm looking for. To be fair, I've had that problem elsewhere. If you're going you might want to look at their website first as there is not a lot of signage or guidance, and the store is unique. Maybe reading this will do.

Teavana is an odd combination of an Apple store and a 7-11. it's sleek and snobby to the point where I could not find what I wanted, but the tea that was being promoted was flavored, sweetened cold white tea where you only taste the sugar and flavors. Since I wrote this they have fewer classic black teas. They no longer carry Keemun. They seem to have more flavored white teas.

I tried yellow tea at Teavana. Like there is black and green tea, there is also yellow tea, but it is little known in the West. Teavana made me a cup to sample for $5.00. Here's their description:

"We are proud to offer one of the rarest teas in the world; our limited edition yellow tea direct from China. The name ‘yellow’ tea refers not only to the unique processing and the lovely, bright golden infusion color, but due to its rarity it is also associated with the imperial yellow worn exclusively by emperors for centuries. Unlike any tea you have tasted before, at first sip it evokes the exquisite pleasure of everyday luxuries. Captivating high floral notes mingle with a smooth honeyed body and a subtle creamy, buttery finish. A perfectly balanced tea curated just for you."

Unfortunately, I tasted it after tasting the "candy teas," flavored, sweetened teas they put out for samples. In color their yellow tea looked like Genmai tea, a translucent light blackish brown. It tasted most like Genmai tea but without the malty tones. It's mild. I kept tasting peaches but I'm pretty sure it was the candy teas from before. I've been wanting to do this for over a year and I !@#$ed it up. I'm an incompetent tea taster.

I went to the high end boutique next door and asked what was the largest size the lacy dresses in the window came in. Extra large. Depending on what they meant by that, that might even be possible for me to wear. I asked what they cost and was told about $700. The clerk seemed to know I wasn't a customer. I thought she was looking down on purpose when I went in there. It's easy to get disgruntled in the designer wing of the mall.