Cranberry Tea — Organic black tea with cranberry pieces, natural flavor, and safflowers*.

Day 8 — Black Cherry Tea

I am not going to lie; I am slightly hesitant to try this tea. I love cranberries. I love everything about them, from the tartness with a hint of sweet to the crunchy pop they sometimes make when you chew them. This time of year I tend to eat them raw. On Day 8 of this Advent Calendar, they had a Black Cherry Tea, which I did not like at all. And basically, if you swap out the ‘natural flavor’ of the cranberries, for ‘natural flavor’ of cherries, it appears that you would have the same tea. They even look extremely similar, same black teas leaves with the pink safflowers. There is one redeeming aspect of this tea though, unlike the Black Cherry Tea, this tea actually has pieces of the fruit to flavor it. Hopefully this tea will be bearable.

Day 13 — Black Cranberry Tea

As this is a black tea, I steeped it for 5 minutes in boiling water. As I feared, I am not impressed with this tea. Even with the addition of cranberries in this tea, it still, like the Black Cherry tea, has that medicinal flavoring to it. Tea, while can be used for medicinal purpose should not taste like medicine, especially the artificial fruit flavors used to mask the taste of the actually medicine. I am not sure if it is the addition of safflowers (honestly before this calendar I don’t think I ever heard of safflowers before) or their choice of ‘natural flavor’ or black tea, but this just isn’t cutting it.

Overall Rating: 1 1/2 cups

*Once again, individuals who are pregnant or breast-feeding might not want to consume safflowers. See my Tea Advent Calendar — Day 6 for more details.