I’m happy to let you know that I now have a selection of flavoured teas available for purchasing online. We have a selection of teas made with a black tea base, and one tea with a green tea base. The teas are:
Cinnamon Black Tea: I personally enjoy the cinnamon flavour mixed with black tea. It is a warm mix of a spicy-sweet tea that is perfect for drinking when you feel like you need a bit of a lift. The cinnamon flavour is not too over-whelming, and the tea lends itself well to adding a little milk (or cream) if you like. A perfect after-dinner accompaniment to dessert. While some cinnamon tea blends can be a little over-powering, particularly if you’re not that fond of the spicy aromatic cinnamon taste, the cinnamon flavour in this tea is not strong. For an interesting combination, try blending it with the Apple Black tea — YUM.
Mint Green Tea: I love mint and I love herbal mint teas — and I love mint green tea. I do not drink a lot of green tea myself (I am more of an oolong tea drinker) however I found this combination great. The light taste of the green tea contrasts well with the cooling sensation of the mint. It is also a great after-dinner tea, mainly as it is a great palate cleanser, refreshing to drink after a heavy meal and it also aids in digestion. I would not suggest adding milk to this tea — but a dab of honey or a touch of sugar is fine. For a great mix, try brewing a strong mint green tea, cool it down with ice-cubes, add a touch of fresh lemon juice and enjoy on a hot day.
Apple Black Tea: The fresh apple flavour coupled with fresh black tea makes for a great combination also. Try varying your infusion times to get a different tasting tea. The apple flavour adds natural sweetness to the tea, and the tea itself smells fruity and earthy. It has more of a black tea taste than an actual apple taste — and it can be sweetened with a little honey or sugar if you like. You may want to add milk to the tea though I prefer it as a black tea without any milk. It’s a perfect tea to snuggle up in front of a fire with on a cold day, especially if you blend it with the cinnamon black tea. It also makes a great iced tea.
Vanilla Black Tea: If you like a sweet, fruity based tea this is the tea for you. This is a great stand-alone sweet tea, a perfect ‘comfort’ tea. However, it is also an amazing tea to use as a base for blending with other teas — try it with the Cinnamon Black tea for example. It is definitely sweeter than some of the other blended teas, again making it a great ‘after dinner’ choice. I would not recommend it as an iced tea, though when mixed with another blended tea–particularly a berry tea, it is excellent served either hot or cold. Great standalone tea for those who enjoy a sweet tea.
Bubble tea may be a new and novel idea for some people. While not common here in Australia, it can be found at many tea stands, especially those featuring Asian teas and drinks. Usually served cold, it contains rather large tapioca balls and is enjoyed through a very large, wide straw. Having spent many years in Taiwan, where Bubble tea originated, my kids and I enjoyed it on a regular basis—especially during the hot, muggy days of summer. It is a fairly new drink, having first been served in the 1980’s. Claims of who first made the tea are made by two different tea houses in Taiwan and to date I do not believe either has been successful in proving they came up with the original Bubble tea recipe.
Green, Red or Black Tea Base
As the name implies, it is usually made from freshly brewed tea –either green tea or black tea though these days there are quite a few variations on the original recipe. In fact, when first made it was served hot rather than cold. Milk and either tapioca balls or candied taro are added to the tea. You can also buy it with small, hard jelly cubes added. Fruit flavours are often added to the teas as well. Like I said, there are many different variations available and most tea houses will strive to come up with something unique to their particular shop.
A Bubble Tea By Any Other Name is Still Bubble Tea
You may find it called a number of different names including foam milk tea, pearl tea or Boba tea. Most people, at least here in Australia, simply ask for Bubble tea. Tea containing large sized tapioca balls is by far the most commonly served. Incidentally, it was not named Bubble Tea because of the tapioca balls; which is what I originally thought. The tea is usually made in a large disposable cup and sealed tightly over the top with plastic. Before serving, it is shaken quite vigorously which results in a thick top layer of foam – and that is why it is called ‘Bubble Tea’.
Home Made Bubble Tea
If you like to experiment with making different teas, you may find it fun to make your own Bubble tea. It is really not very difficult to do, and in order to make it even easier, it is possible to buy “Bubble tea” kits online that are shipped complete with the right kind of tapioca and even a specific tea mix.
With a little ingenuity and shopping around you can also find the ingredients here in Australia fairly easily. While using a kit to make it may be simple, you will find that you can experiment much more if you search out the ingredients and make it yourself. Whether you purchase an online kit or buy the separate ingredients yourself, your main challenge will be cooking the tapioca so it is just right. (“Just right” can be somewhat subjective, though most Bubble Tea enthusiasts agree that the tapioca should not be overcooked, nor should it be too chewy! As I said, while it is very subjective, people will often return to the same tea shop or tea stand time after time in order to buy tea with tapioca that is, to their taste, perfect.)
Bubble Tea Ingredients
First off, track down a local Asian store of which there are usually one or two in most of larger shopping centres, and look for some large tapioca balls (1/4 inch tapioca). If you do not see them on the shelves you should ask if they are available. If not, they will probably be able to tell you where you can find them. You may also find some stores stock a tea mix or tea blend that is specifically made for Bubble tea. You may want to try it, but it is not essential. You should also buy the large sized straws as well – remember the straws need to be large enough for those ¼ inch tapioca balls to fit through.
It is possible to buy these ingredients online, on eBay for example, however I could only see white tapioca balls and not the usual black coloured tapioca. Other online stores sell it also, but you need to buy quite a large quantity – something you may not want to do if you simply want to try it out first.
The other ingredients can be bought in any supermarket. You will need:
– Sugar or fructose syrup
– Tea – preferably loose leaf tea. As mentioned above you can use green tea, read tea, black tea or even oolong tea. If you can’t find loose leaf tea a teabag will suffice.
– Dairy creamer, milk or cream
– A cocktail shaker
Now, Onto the Bubble Tea Recipe
Here is a very basic Bubble tea recipe you can start off with. Once you are more adept at making it and you know exactly how long to cook the tapioca balls for, you may have fun experimenting with different recipes.
¾ cup of tea for each Bubble tea you serve
milk, cream or dairy creamer
ice cubes
¼ cup of cooked tapioca per serving
syrup—either fructose syrup or syrup made from dissolving sugar in boiling water.
Using the cocktail shaker, first of all shake together the brewed tea, milk and syrup till it is all mixed together.
Add your ice cubes to the shaker and shake until you see froth on top.
Add the tapioca balls into the tall serving glass and pour the tea into the glass.
Place the large straw in each glass, and serve.
Variations to the Bubble Tea Recipe
As mentioned above, there are quite a few variations to this recipe.
* First, try using different teas. You may find fruit teas are quite tasty. Some people enjoy Bubble tea made with ginger tea or with ginger flavoured loose leaf tea.
* For a slightly different taste, try using evaporated milk instead of regular milk or creamer.
* Finally, see if you can find some candied taro balls or small cubes as a substitute or make agar-agar squares.
Footnote: Cooking Perfect Tapioca
This is the most important step in making Bubble tea—properly cooked tapioca! While hard to explain the texture it should be, in essence it should not be too hard and chewy but not too soft or jelly like either. Of course, it will take longer to cook the larger sized balls of tapioca than it does regular minute dessert tapioca.
You should generally allow 8 cups of water per cup of tapioca balls and make sure the pot you use for cooking the tapioca is large as the tapioca expands quite a lot while cooking. Boil the water first and then add the tapioca to the boiling water. If the balls seem to be stuck together you may want to stir the mix to separate them. One way to tell that they are separated is if the tapioca begins to rise to the top of the boiling water. Boil for 20 to 25 minutes, turn off the hot plate and let the pot sit for twenty minutes more.
When ready, you can pour the tapioca balls into a strainer and then rinse them with barely warm water. Stir in some fructose or syrup—this helps to keep the tapioca balls separate. It is recommended that you cook only what you are planning on using as cooked tapioca should not be stored in the refrigerator – this ruins the consistency of the balls. You can apparently store them in a Ziploc bag, flatten them out and freeze them. When unfreezing, you simply put the frozen tapioca balls into already boiling water and boil for a few minutes.
Is it Worth The Effort?
Yes, it does take a bit of effort to make Bubble tea. First you have to track down the ingredients and then it takes time to boil the tapioca. The main advantage to making it yourself is that you can tailor your recipe to your particular taste, you can experiment with different ingredients and you don’t have to go out to enjoy it. It also is a fantastic drink to serve to visitors on a hot day and quite a good conversation starter especially if served to people who have never tried it before.
While green tea is not totally caffeine free, it has much less caffeine in it than black tea for example. Still, it does have some caffeine.
Black tea, green tea and oolong tea all come from the same plant. The difference between the teas is the amount of oxidation they undergo and the type of processing the tea leaves undergo. Black tea is the most oxidized, green tea the least oxidized. How does this affect the caffeine levels in tea? The more oxidation the tea leaves receive, the greater the amount of caffeine they produce. Thus, out of all of the different types of teas made from the Camellia sinensis plant, green tea has the least amount of caffeine. Oolong has slightly more, but not as much as regular black tea has.
One regular sized cup of green tea has between fifteen to forty mg. of caffeine. A comparable cup of drip coffee contains over one hundreg mg. of caffeine.
Photo By: Mariela M.
Unless you have no tolerance at all to caffeine or you have a medical condition which precludes your having any caffeine, you may find that a little caffeine such as exists in green tea is actually beneficial to your body. Recent studies have shown that not only does a small amount of caffeine help increase a person’s alertness and energy levels. There also may be some links between caffeine content and the anti-cancer polyphenols present in green tea. If you are trying to lose weight and are thinking about including green tea in your diet program, you may want to consider the fact that the combination of caffeine (remember, caffeine levels in green tea are very minimal) and catechins in green tea help reduce abdominal fat.
Decaffeinated Green Tea
If you really do not want any caffeine at all, you could opt for drinking Decaffeinated Green Tea. There are many different types available, however did you know that decaffeinated drinks may not be that good for you because of the processes they go through?
First of all, it strips out a lot of the good antioxidants found in natural green and oolong teas. In fact, some studies have shown that decaffeinated Green Tea has only around half the amount of antioxidants that regular green tea has. There are different methods for decaffeinating tea. The carbon dioxide process is the best method of decaffeination in that tea undergoing this process retains higher levels of antioxidants. Another natural method of decaffeination using Ethylene acetate, strips both antioxidants and lessens the flavor of the tea. Another method which uses Methylene chloride during the process is actually restricted in some countries and it may be damaging to your health to drink teas decaffeinated using this process.
It’s All In The Brewing
You can lessen the amount of caffeine in your green tea by:
using less leaves when brewing your tea
letting it steep for a shorter amount of time
tipping out the first brewed cup without drinking it (whole leaf teas can be steeped several times using the same leaves.)
In Summary
So, does green tea have caffeine? Yes. Green tea is not caffeine free unless you specifically buy decaffeinated green tea. However, even though it does contain small amounts of caffeine it is much less than you will find in coffee, black or even oolong tea. You can lessen the amount of caffeine by changing the way you brew your tea. It is thought, too, that the small amount of caffeine in green tea actually aids the antioxidants contained naturally in green tea. In contrast, decaffeinated green tea may not be as healthy for you as regular green tea. Will you experience any green tea side effects relating to the amount of caffeine in a cup of green tea? Probably not, unless you have an intolerance towards caffeine in general.
If you are looking for specialty teas such as organic loose leaf tea or some of the beautiful blooming teas you may want to start your search online — and Robyn Lee Tea is as good a place as any to start! In most supermarkets you will find a selection of teas on the shelves; however for the most part these are not usually what would be considered top quality teas and while there is usually a fairly good selection it is nowhere near as complete as you would find online.
Update: We apologize that we no longer sell teas online here. We do however have some of the popular Robyn Lee teas available on Amazon Australia. Feel free to take a look at our teas and order directly from our Amazon Australia Tea Store Free shipping available when you start an Amazon Prime membership
US and Canada customers can buy our teas here: Zi Chun Teas
Buy Tea Online From Local Stores or International Sellers?
There are pros and cons to buying tea online from a local online retailer and from going directly to the source and buying your teas internationally. In some instances you may be looking for a tea that is not commonly sold locally. For instance, it can be difficult to locate some of the very high quality teas online as they are usually not stocked by local retailers. However, if you look a little further afield you may find that some international online tea stores do stock the teas you are looking for and while you may have to pay additional for shipping it could well be the only way you will be able to buy them.
If you prefer to buy from an online retailers residing in your country, look for a retailer who stocks fresh teas. If cost is not such an issue and if you are looking for the freshest teas available, be prepared to pay a little more than if you bought them from the supermarket. It will usually be well worth doing so though as the quality is far superior.
What Type Of Online Stores Stock The Best Teas?
Many online tea stores will specialize in a specific type of tea. For example, some online stores sell mainly herbal teas whereas others sell Chinese and Asian teas. Still other stores will have a fine selection of British teas or black teas. The best thing to do is to look for an online tea store that seems to carry the type of tea that you are interested in buying.
Generally speaking, I would recommend buying your teas from online tea shops — looking for one that sells tea and tea ware, as opposed to a store that sells a little bit of everything. For example, while you can find organic teas on Amazon or eBay you will more than likely find a larger selection of better quality teas available if you shop from an online store that is dedicated to selling tea. These stores will not only stock a great selection of tea but you will usually also find a lot of very useful and informative information on the sites including what the teas are beneficial for, how to properly brew the teas and what type of tea accessories you may need.
Oftentimes they will also have a great selection of teaware available online and they will recommend choosing one type of tea pot or infuser for a specific type of tea. Obviously, that type of information is not as readily available on other larger sites that sell many different kinds of items.
In summary, if you really are looking for a great tea experience, buy from an online store that deals mainly with tea and tea ware. Don’t be afraid to buy from an online store, especially if you are shopping for premium teas. Finally, once you have found a great tea shop online that sells fresh teas at good prices, remember to bookmark them so you can continue to buy your teas from them.
Update: We apologize that we no longer sell teas online here. We do however have some of the popular Robyn Lee teas available on Amazon Australia. Feel free to take a look at our teas and order directly from our Amazon Australia Tea Store Free shipping available when you start an Amazon Prime membership
US and Canada customers can buy our teas here: Zi Chun Teas
Cinnamon Black Tea: I personally enjoy the cinnamon flavour mixed with black tea. It is a warm mix of a spicy-sweet tea that is perfect for drinking when you feel like you need a bit of a lift. The cinnamon flavour is not too over-whelming, and the tea lends itself well to adding a little milk (or cream) if you like. A perfect after-dinner accompaniment to dessert. While some cinnamon tea blends can be a little over-powering, particularly if you’re not that fond of the spicy aromatic cinnamon taste, the cinnamon flavour in this tea is not strong. For an interesting combination, try blending it with the Apple Black tea — YUM.
Mint Green Tea: I love mint and I love herbal mint teas — and I love mint green tea. I do not drink a lot of green tea myself (I am more of an oolong tea drinker) however I found this combination great. The light taste of the green tea contrasts well with the cooling sensation of the mint. It is also a great after-dinner tea, mainly as it is a great palate cleanser, refreshing to drink after a heavy meal and it also aids in digestion. I would not suggest adding milk to this tea — but a dab of honey or a touch of sugar is fine. For a great mix, try brewing a strong mint green tea, cool it down with ice-cubes, add a touch of fresh lemon juice and enjoy on a hot day.
. There are many different types available, however did you know that decaffeinated drinks may not be that good for you because of the processes they go through?