Tetley Super Green Tea

Decided to try some Tetley's instead of the usual Twinnings Green Tea with Lemon. I'm trying to decrease my coffee intake and I don't like Green Tea by itself (unless it is super thick matcha or the good tea leaves).

Anyway, this costs around P500 for 2 boxes at Lazada so it's decently priced. Love the pineapple flavor/scent as a summery drink, even though it's getting cold. This tastes great both hot and on ice, so it has decently held off the temptation of buying those expensive da.u.de blends. Whew.

Might try a few more flavors here, as I want to taste the mango version... or Twinnings berries for fall. We'll see. Only problem with this is that it comes in non-individual tea rounds, which is better for the environment but means you need a dedicated tin to store.

Yays:
Healthy - 2 cals, some vitamin C content
Sweet and delicious
Ethical Tea Partnership

Nays:
Storage - needs dedicated tin, needs to be finished soon after opening (not a problem for me).

Will probably purchase this range again. Costs around 12.5 pesos/bag.  Use a large mug, not cup, to accomodate the rounds.

The Giving Tea Organic Green Tea

It's the little things that make life better, and one of the things that have made me happy is The Giving Tea's Organic Green Tea that R picked up for around 200 Baht (P260, $5). Its 100% certified organic status, is something that might draw people in, but there are other things that I like about it.

The Giving Tea Organic Green Tea

Qtea

Qtea is a milk tea place found in Jorge Bocobo St., Ermita Manila. It's a nice place to hang out since it's supposed to offer free wifi for a certain time (I think) for a drink purchased. I've never tried the Wifi here and I've only ordered a drink once. I asked a staff member and their tea all comes from Taiwan and it looks like tea leaves are actually used!

Qtea Bar area

 As seen below, the store occupies two stories. It's actually loft type and sunlight filters well through the front of the store. It's a bit darker and cozier near the back. The upper floor is significantly warmer than the ground floor and you'll be listening to chinese music while you chill or study. This place closes late.

Qtea

 The bar area is also pretty long and kept quite neatly. Unfortunately, I'd rather not buy from a place that charges extra for fresh milk, so I've only tried the earl grey tea once, and it was decent, though I'm not wowed by it (possibly too much ice).

Qtea Bar area 2

… But they make a pretty good waffle! For P95 (or is it 98), you get a drink sized waffle that's crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside. They, cool the whipped cream in an ice bath before serving, which is pretty nice. My only dislike was that couldn't really go crazy on the whipped cream: serving size was appropriate for light dipping…. you can't really slather it on :( I wonder if you can ask for extra cream XD

Qtea Waffle

I'll probably return here for the waffles :) It makes for a delicious light breakfast or heavy snack while studying.

Marks and Spencer's Luxy Gold Teabags

Marks & Spencer recently had a sale and I ended up picking up some digestives (again) as well as some tea.

Marks and Spencer's Luxury Gold Tea Bags and Dark Chocolate Digestives

I got some milk chocolate digestives as well, but nothing really beats the dark chocolate.  Directions and storage information are in the back, you can check this as well as the expiration date before deciding to buy.

Marks & Spencer's Luxury Gold Tea Bags

I got this at P198 (around $5) for 80 bags as an everyday tea. I didn't expect anything special from this, just an everyday tea I can drink.

Marks & Spencer Luxry Gold Tea Bags Foil Wrap

I  like the fact that they're foil wrapped and stamped with their expiration date. For its price, I don't expect a good dark, airtight container for them but it's very helpful when stuffing them into pre-existing ones: I can stuff 40 bags in a can - not 80 - and I don't have to worry about the other 40.

Marks & Spencer Luxury Gold Tea Bags Round

These tea bags are round - they might not diffuse as well as the polyhedral ones but I don't have a problem since I find this tea on the strong side. The lack of string would be annoying as well if I take it alone, but since I prefer this with milk, I use a teaspoon and it's not much of a minus.

Marks & Spencer Luxry Gold Tea Bags Brewed

I prefer to steep this at a bit less than 3 mins since I find it way too strong when steeped longer than that. It also leaves my mouth dry when used alone and is a bit bitter on its own - I find that adding some milk solves this problem. The color of the tea is on the red side but disappears with milk. It tastes better with sugar, but since I'm trying to cut it out of my hot drink intake, I usually take it with just milk.

I may try this iced in the future, but I have a powdered iced tea I'm really fond of right now. We'll see.

At this price point, I have no real complaints though I do still prefer the Lipton Yellow for the flavor and effort payoff for an everyday tea. While I can and will finish this as my everyday tea (averaging 2 bag a day right now), I wouldn't buy it again: too much effort for tea I'm just ok with.

Tea Rock at UP Town Center

Tea Rock is probably the only place at the UP Town Center where you can hang out and study - most of the places there are actually for eating. I originally wanted to go somewhere else (to try a certain girardelli drink), but it was full to the brim.

Tea Rock

Tea Rock has a giant menu, including dinner items. It's very difficult to read it from the wall, but the prices are standard milk tea shop prices (unlike most shops in that area, which I find cray-cray for something with UP in it).

It doesn't use the more common (nowadays) coaster buzzer.

 A drink each for my friend and I. Tiramisu M (P90) on the left and Raspberry Cocoa L (P100) for me. It tasted fine, not spectacular, but not bad either. The pearls were chewy in a good way but were relatively tasteless, so it's kind of meh.

Physically, the store was well lit and decorated, but the music was a bit loud (tea ROCK?) so it wasn't a great study spot. However, this is probably one of the best places for students to hang out (since most other places here aren't really student friendly).

I probably wouldn't go back here soon simply because both traffic and parking at this area is insane. :(

Review: TWG at Greenbelt

Hi M! This post today is care of my friend M who treated me out to a wonderful girl's day out at TWG in Greenbelt 5! Since we were trying to be poshy-posh (and succeeded) in the restaurant, we did not take any pictures. Because pictures are for tooles and we ARE LADIES!! :D

We got there at 4 pm wherein we were told that reservations were only accepted from 12 to 1 so we decided to walk around until 5 pm. When we came back we were seated relatively quickly (because time for low tea was over) and spent 30 minutes deciding what teas to get.

M's impression of TWG: "Gold and Gilded."


What we ordered:
1. Chic Set Menu - P500
Includes:
2 Scones with clotted cream and jam (apricot?)
3 Assorted sandwiches (cucumber, turkey ham and shrimp)
Snow Mountain Tea +100 (not a normal tea)

2. Imperial Set Menu - P650
Includes:
Creme Brulee Tea
Pastry (we had a strawberry tart)
3 Croque Royale (salmon cheese thingies)
3 Macarons

3. Christmas Lights Tea - P195

Very obviously, we decided to have high tea instead ^^ We spent several hours eating. Let me tell you, even with the small, dainty servings, we were able to stuff ourselves mostly because of the teas!

Snow Mountain Tea: neither of us liked this very much. Needed to commit to sugar (a lot of it) in order to be palatable. They say this was a citrus but tasted like the "floweriest of flower teas."

Creme Brulee Tea: when they poured it into our cups, you could smell the scent of strawberries wafting in the air. The first sip was a disappointment tough, but it got better with the second sip. M discovered the sugar on this and made it really good. Half a teaspoon would work.

BTW, the sugar in this establishment/tea house was not in real cube format - aka lumps! M says they could still be considered cubed because of their shape but I do not consider them valid sugar cubes (Sorry M!). So no lumps of sugar for us.

Christmas Lights Tea: M's favorite because it matched the desserts we had perfectly. Didn't really need sugar but tasted good with it. The Creme Brulee tea didn't complement the food while the first tea was horrible.

Morrocan Mint Macaron: Yummy! Tasted like mint. Enough said.

Bain de Roses Macaron: Flowery and ok.

Blackcurrant: Sweet. "Too fruity, lacking substance."

The Macarons cost P50 per piece. I would definitely consider buying the Morrocan Mint Macaron again, though maybe not the other two. I could see myself buying their other flavors to try. While the macaron's were not very elegant, missing the cookie to filling 1:1 ratio, they were sufficiently crumbly and chewy.

I really enjoyed my time there with M. Unfortunately, financial incapabilities prevent something like this from happening as often as I wish.

If you want to have a girly day enjoying high or low tea, then this is the place for you. If you're on a budget, just buy two pots of tea (one per person - it's a rule they have) and enjoy. Expect to spend at least P200 per person, excluding tipping if you don't want to get any food.  While one tea set may be sufficient for a group of two if you just want to experience low tea (I'd recommend the Royal set as it seems more appropriate for low tea), you won't be satisfied if you don't buy at least one dessert per person.

The only negative point of the experience: the servers, while being very nice, polite and helpful, did not seem to be trained to pronounce the names of their products properly. Also, M would prefer that they be capable of recommending teas for your palate/preferences - or give a basic tea test (like you do wine). Hmm... that's an idea, a tea tasting event for TWG! (HEHE, MY IDEA ^^).

Unfortunately, the teas in TWG seem to be VERY EXPENSIVE and the list is overwhelming. I wouldn't trust the tea guide they gave because we found Snow Mountain to be misleading (or was it just us).

THANK YOU M FOR THE MOST WONDERFUL DAY EVER! I LOVE YOU!!

TWG is at Greenbelt 5. Their tea sets are available from 3-6 pm.