PassionFruit Papaya Black Tea(bags) by The Republic of Tea

I didn't know this until I did this tea review, but now I do: the Republic of Tea is owned by the people who also make clothing at Banana Republic. Makes sense, right? I guess it's true, you learn something new every day! Well, I learned more than that fun fact today, considering I had class today, but still. For those of you who don't know, I'm doing my masters currently right now.  Anyways, let's get to the tea review! Below is my set up. Glass mug, the tea and some sugar. The milk will come later.

Boil the water and pour it over the teabag in the cup. Allow the teabag to sit for roughly 3 minutes. Then, add sugar (or sugar substitute). With black tea I always add two bags of Splenda, and that would equate to 2 sugar cubes (as seen above) or 2 teaspoons of sugar. The color of this tea after brewing it is so gorgeous. I would describe it as auburn. Check it out:

I put it against the white paint in my kitchen so you could see the full effect of the coloring. Gorgeous. If you like to drink your tea black (meaning without milk) then by all means, enjoy it. However I feel that the sugar or sweetener enhances the flavor. Black tea can be quite bitter without adding milk or sugar.

Notice how the color changes drastically after adding milk. Now it looks kind of like dirty sewage water. Ha, I had to say that. Not exactly appetizing, but it's the truth! By the way, my nail polish is deep purple, but it looks black. Just for the record. Now, let's get down to business, shall we? I picked this tea because it's easily accessible. Most of the things I've tried thus far are more of the artisan teas. This is in tea bags and you can find it at any health food store, or even Safeway or Kroger. Basically any chain grocery store in the United States will have this tea.

At first taste you only really taste what you'd get if you brewed English Breakfast tea, which is the bog standard over here in the UK. For those of you who don't know, I'm an American that lives in Wales. Anyways, After tasting the initial English Breakfast, suddenly a citrusy flavor enters the mix and completely changes the game. It's quite nice. Honestly, it's like if I were to mix an herbal tea with a black tea. Or if black tea and a citrusy herbal tea had a baby. It would be this blend of tea. Now, I like this, but I don't do black tea a lot. However this doesn't mean I won't drink it time to time to humor my boyfriend and of course so my readers who love black tea will still be in the loop.  However, this tea would be great if you like herbal tea but are looking for a kick of caffeine in your day, because it tastes of citrus and has caffeine. I'd give this tea 3.5 stars out of five due to my distaste of black tea however I love the fact it has Papaya and passion fruit.