TeaChat

As I mention here, we've got a new tea shop in the area, and a friend recently gifted me with some tea.

The blend was called Monk's Tea. I don't drink a lot of flavored tea, but I'm assuming this name is a creation of the tea shop, and not some sort of standard concoction?

In any case, it's a black tea flavored with vanilla and grenadine. I have to admit it's a pretty awesome combo!

I don't think they invented it because I remember finding a Monk's blend before at the cafe in the basement of my school's student center. It was from a company whose name I can't remember, but the cafe soon switched to new owners, they stopped carrying that kind of tea, and I've never been able to find it again.

I actually got a couple of Monk's Blend samples from New Mexico Tea Company a couple of years ago. One was much heavier on the grenadine. The other was pretty nice, as I recall.

Sarah

So it is standard black tea with those flavorings

Reading the New Mexico Tea Company page, it seems the Monk's Blend there is just black teas, and the Grenadine blend is the one with grenadine. If anyone here can link to a decaf grenadine and vanilla tea (preferably from a company you have ordered from before, I don't like ordering from unknown companies without someone to vouch for them), would you let me know?

Ahhh, well good to know that it's not just a local variety. I don't drink flavored teas too often, but this one was pretty nice.

They did also sell it in a decaf variety (odd, because it was one of the few teas marked with 'decaf available'), but unfortunately this shop is a local one and I don't believe they do orders...

I recognized pretty quickly from checking the menu on their site that Quintin's Tea is selling teas from Metropolitan Tea Company which is a very common wholesaler in North America, so it shouldn´t be especially difficult to find the same Monk´s blend elsewhere.

Though I can´t recommend any specific online retailer

That's good to know, ee, thanks!

I could tell when walking in not to expect anything out of the ordinary, but it was a nice enough place. The tea selection focused on black teas and lots of flavored teas. The few greens were pretty sad looking. I would have sworn the one sencha was a Chinese green -- but maybe I'm just spoiled from the recent OTTIs