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Flavour: Mint & Fennel

Ingredients: Peppermint (41%), spearmint, ginger root, sweet cinnamon, fennel (9%), aniseed, liquorice root, cardamom (3%)

Caffeine Factor: Caffeine-free

Organic Ingredients: 100%

Price Range: £2

Bags Per Box: 20

Review: Despite the name, it smells overwhelmingly of liquorice, threatening to be intensely sweet. Thankfully, it doesn’t taste as strong. In fact, it hardly tastes of anything. It’s water, with a mild gingery kick…and that’s about it. We left the bag in for ages, but we never got any mint, and the fennel was swallowed up by other ingredients. It’s not bad, but we didn’t see the point. It certainly didn’t deliver what the name promises.

Best time of year to drink this: Summer?

Best time of day to drink this: After meals, for digestion

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Flavour: Fresh Inspiration (formerly Pure Freshness)

Ingredients: Spearmint, peppermint, ginger, anise, cinnamon, lime, black pepper, cardamom, lemongrass, fennel, cocoa shells, liquorice, peppermint oil, dried lemon juice, cloves, spearmint oil, ginger oil

Caffeine Factor: Caffeine-free

Organic Ingredients: 100%

Price Range: £2-3

Bags Per Box: 17

Review: It quite literally smells like toothpaste. The flavour is initially very startling (no one expects to drink toothpaste!)…but then it gets better. It’s just so minty fresh…then bitter…then spicy (the black pepper KICKS at the back of the throat)…with a lingering feeling of coolness. It’s a highly confusing drinking experience. It’s definitely wakeful, and it would clear your breath after a meal out. The oils are just so strong that we wouldn’t personally drink this casually.

Best time of year to drink this: Whenever

Best time of day to drink this: After a meal

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Flavour: Alkaline Herbs

Ingredients: Lemongrass, lemon balm, dandelion (11%), nettle (7%), spearmint, lavender flowers (4%), fennel, carrot, linden flowers, alfalfa, parsley

Caffeine Factor: Caffeine-free

Organic Ingredients: 100%

Price Range: £2-3

Bags Per Box: 17

Review: We were very excited to try this one, when we saw uncommon tea ingredients like alfalfa and carrot on the list. Unfortunately, it wasn’t that interesting to drink. As you might expect, it smells and tastes quite grassy, but with a touch of citrus…and that’s about it. We couldn’t identify any of the other ingredients. But it’s very good for you, particularly if you struggle with acid reflux. This one’s designed to cool that down and make you feel more comfortable after a big meal. Just don’t expect it to wow you with flavour – that’s not why you’ll pick this one up.

Best time of year to drink this: Anytime

Best time of day to drink this: After a big meal

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Flavour: Detox

Ingredients: Fennel (20%), lemon peel (16%), lemongrass, burdock root (10%), ginger (10%), spearmint, natural lemon flavour with other natural flavours (7%), rooibos (1%), natural lemongrass flavour, verbena, selenium (1%), natural basil flavour with other natural flavours

Caffeine Factor: Caffeine-free

Organic Ingredients: Unknown

Price Range: £3

Bags Per Box: 20

Review: If you’re like us, you’re probably looking at that ingredients list and thinking that’s a lot of ‘natural flavours’. Yes, this means oils and other essences from the plant used. However, in this case, we don’t see the point. Natural basil flavour?? Why not just stick dried basil directly into the blend? And what purpose does the 1% addition of rooibos serve? We also highly doubt that 1% selenium is going to do anyone any good compared to taking a selenium supplement or eating selenium-rich nuts. This is just something to stick on the box to make the tea sound like it has extra health benefits, to make you buy it.

As you can tell, we don’t like this – at all. It smells disgusting, like lemony kitchen cleaner. Tulsi’s son said, ‘No no no no no – if you drink that tea, you are wrong.’ It tastes just as bad as it smells: foul. It’s painfully sour with that artificial-tasting edge to it that lemongrass and verbena always gives a tea, despite it being a natural plant – and there are just too many other flavours in there, competing for attention, none of them balancing each other out. Being total nerds with day jobs in the financial services industry, we couldn’t help but look at all those ingredients and declare this tea over-diversified. Even in the tea world, you really do need a more concentrated portfolio than this.

We’re marking this one an AVOID.

Best time of year to drink this: Never

Best time of day to drink this: Never

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Flavour: Turmeric Chai

Ingredients: Turmeric root (55%), cinnamon (14%), liquorice, ginger (7%), cardamom (3%), black pepper, apple, fennel, mace, cocoa shells, cloves

Caffeine Factor: Caffeine-free

Organic Ingredients: 100%

Price Range: £2-3

Bags Per Box: 17

Review: Another turmeric blend, but we aren’t fans of this one.

The ingredients list is a little bizarre. When you hit ‘cocoa shells’ near the end, your eyebrows go up automatically.

Although 55% is turmeric, you can’t smell it much over the spices. That set flavour expectations. Disappointingly, it didn’t taste much of spice. The liquorice overpowers just about everything. Then, long after we’ve drunk it, there’s a lingering turmeric aftertaste. That’s it – no cardamom or pepper or apple, and certainly no coca flavour! We’re not sure why Yogi thought this needed sweetness. It would be so much nicer without it. Some might like it, but we don’t see the point. It’s like turmeric chai for people who don’t like turmeric or chai.

Best time of year to drink this: Autumn

Best time of day to drink this: After dinner, if it’s your thing

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Flavour: Echinacea

Ingredients: Cinnamon, echinacea (14%), ginger, fennel, rooibos (10%), roasted chicory, carob, cardamom (4%), basil, burdock root, turmeric root, black pepper, astragalus, vanilla beans

Caffeine Factor: Caffeine-free

Organic Ingredients: 100%

Price Range: £2-3

Bags Per Box: 17

Review: A most confusingly delicious blend! Bewilderingly, it smells like apple, although there is no apple in the ingredients list – not just apple, but warm, hearty things, with a mildly spicy edge and a hint of sweetness.

The taste is most identifiably rooibos, despite this only forming 10% of the blend. There is then the flavour of spiced apple – again, we can’t tell you why. Perhaps it’s the carob. Whatever it is, the overall effect is warming, sweet, smokey and flavoursome. It’s a great one to have in the evening and quickly became one of Tulsi’s husband’s favourites on the shelf. We doubt you’ll be able to pick out any one ingredient as you drink it – or work out why it’s named Ecihinacea – but it’s a good bet that you’ll love it.

Best time of year to drink this: Autumn

Best time of day to drink this: Evening

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Flavour: Lemon & Ginger

Ingredients: Ginger root (37%), natural lemon flavouring with other natural flavours (25%), lemongrass, blackberry leaves, lemon peel, sweet fennel, natural ginger flavouring with other natural flavours (3.5%)

Caffeine Factor: Caffeine-free

Organic Ingredients: Unknown

Price Range: £1.69

Bags Per Box: 20

Review: Twinings have a few variations on this same blend. This isn’t our favourite of them, but it’s okay. It smells lemon-scented cleaner (that’ll be the lemongrass), and the ginger makes your nose sting – but at least that means it’s lived up to its name!

Drinking it, you get quite a gingery kick…but otherwise, not a lot of flavour. Despite the aroma, it’s weirdly lacking in lemon flavour (apart from a bit of a ‘soapy’ taste). We brewed it a long time and it never seemed to develop. You feel it more than taste it.

So, it’s not bad. It’s good for digestion, too (although steer clear of it if you’re pregnant, because of the fennel). It’s just that as a drink, we think Twinings have done better versions of this, like their Spiced Ginger or Ginger & Lime. Unfortunately, those seem to be harder to find in the shops – Ginger & Lime has even been taken off the market, and we can’t understand why. After you’ve had that, these lemon blends can only disappoint.

Best time of year to drink this: Summer

Best time of day to drink this: Morning / Afternoon, after meals (to aid digestion)

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Flavour: Fennel & Liquorice

Ingredients: Fennel (80%), liquorice root (20%)

Caffeine Factor: Caffeine-free

Organic Ingredients: Unknown

Price Range: £3.95

Bags Per Box: 15

Our Review: Fennel tastes somewhat like liquorice (albeit a bit more ‘planty’), so this isn’t much of a ‘blend’. Instead, it’s like taking fennel tea and ruining it.

It is extremely sweet – not quite as intense as their Liquorice & Peppermint blend, but definitely headed there. We have no idea why but the smell is like cheap, fake maple syrup, and long after you’ve drunk it, a similar aftertaste lingers in your mouth. It’s like fake toffee, or squeezy-bottle artificially flavoured maple syrup – the kind you’d put on cheap Mr Whippy ice cream. It’s just bizarre.

Maybe that’s your thing – but it’s not ours. We aren’t big liquorice fans anyway, but these combinations are just too much. They’re infusions for people with a sugar addiction, trying to be healthy about it. That’s not our idea of what tea is meant to be. It’s not relaxing; it’s a sure way to make your teeth ache.

Best time of year to drink this: Any time, if you have insane sweet cravings

Best time of day to drink this: After lunch, if you’re desperate for dessert and trying to avoid calories

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Flavour: Sweet Chili

Ingredients: Liquorice, Cocoa Shells, Spearmint, Fennel, Anise, Ginger, Peppermint, Nettle, Chili pepper, Cinnamon, Cardamom, Cloves, Black Pepper

Caffeine Factor: Caffeine-free

Organic Ingredients: 100%

Price Range: £2-3

Bags Per Box: 17

Review: The smell is like chilis and earth (possibly from the nettle), mixed with cocoa shells. The combination is very, very odd indeed.

The taste, as you would hope from a tea of this name, is very fiery, particularly from the ginger. Happily, the inclusion of spearmint keeps the fire from overwhelming your mouth.

The flavour is also initially quite sweet (fennel and anise), but it’s toned down by the other flavours. It’s an unusual blend that grows on you with each sip. If you can allow the taste to settle in your mouth and make sense, it turns out to be a lovely wintry evening drink to have after a meal.

We also expect it would be a good one to drink if you had a cold (the fire would clear your sinuses) or a toothache (because of the cloves).

Best time of year to drink this: Winter

Best time of day to drink this: Evening

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Flavour: Himalaya

Ingredients: Ginger, fennel, cinnamon, anise, coriander, cinnamon oil, ginger oil, licorice

Caffeine Factor: Caffeine-free

Organic Ingredients: 100%

Price Range: £2-3

Bags Per Box: 17

Review: The smell is very spicy and somewhat unpleasant. You can definitely pick up the cardamom, the ginger, the licorice…and something else. Something you might cook with, rather than drink – coriander seed, perhaps. We’re not sure where that scent comes from – the ginger oil, maybe? Whatever it is, it smells a bit like someone put a vegetable biriyani in a liquidiser and served it out as tea.

It tastes a bit like curry, too, but with a hint of sweetness. It makes for a highly confusing first sip – sweet and savoury – but then…it sort of grows on you. It’s spicy and warming. If you came in from the evening rain on a cold winter’s day, drinking this would be a bit like a warm hug. If you want it sweeter, we also found it goes quite well with a drop of agave syrup. It’s also bound to be good if you have a cold.

Best time of year to drink this:  Winter

Best time of day to drink this: Evening

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