If you are looking for a refreshing and flavourful drink without additional sugars, fruit infusions are a perfect choice. There are hundreds of different fruit tea flavours, and raspberry is definitely among the most interesting ones. Basilur‘s Raspberry Infusion has an additional natural calorie-free sweetener, making it a splendid choice for cold brews and iced teas.
What’s in Basilur Raspberry Infusion?
Fruit teas are infusions made with dried fruit pieces and often some other herbal ingredients. They don’t contain any Camellia sinensis tea leaves, so they are technically not teas, but infusions. Some fruit teas are made only with fruit pieces, and many contain other herbal ingredients, too.
Basilur Raspberry Infusion contains hibiscus flower, orange peel, apple, stevia leaves, natural raspberry flavour and citric flavour. It comes in a classic, individually wrapped tea bags.
It smells sweet and deep, with a light, dusty note. Since hibiscus is the key ingredient, it’s also a dominant scent. Most fruity blends are made from one main ingredient, usually hibiscus or apple, secondary ingredients and flavourings. Although not a fruit, hibiscus is great for adding a deep crimson colour and unique deep and tart flavour. Another interesting ingredient in this tea is stevia, a natural sweetener with a distinctive sweet flavour and no calories. The first thought? This tea would be great for making iced or cold-brew tea.
What does it taste like?
To make a cup of fruit tea, use freshly boiled water and steep it for 5-10 minutes. Fruit teas will rarely get bitter, unless they contain lots of orange peel. This is mostly true for loose blends, rather than classic tea bags.
Once brewed, hibiscus gives it a pretty deep crimson colour. This tea smells like a rich hibiscus tea, with key notes of regular fruity teas that contain tart hibiscus. However, raspberry comes as an under flavour and really comes into a focus as an aftertaste. Raspberry scent is also pronounced, accompanied by an intense sweet note.
Basilur’s Raspberry infusion is a flavourful, strong and deep tea. It’s quite sweet but not sugary sweet. You can definitely feel that the sweetness is coming from an herbal ingredient rather than refined sugar. It has a light zesty note from hibiscus, and a light raspberry aftertaste. Raspberry is not an actual ingredient in this tea (which is often a case with raspberry flavoured teas, and the flavour is added with natural raspberry flavouring). This tea doesn’t need any sweeteners as it already contains stevia leaves. However, if you prefer very sweet teas, both honey and white sugar are a good choice.
Because of its strong flavour, this tea is a good choice for making iced teas. Steep it together with some fresh raspberries to give it a real raspberry punch.
Who would like this tea? If you enjoy strong and bold fruit teas with hibiscus, you’ll enjoy this tea too. If you are looking for a strong raspberry tea, this may not be the right infusion for you. That said, many raspberry teas are rather light in raspberry flavour, and mostly contain other ingredients including natural flavourings too.
Interestingly, the flavour is deep, and complex, even though it’s made with tiny particles. Because of its rich flavour, this tea is a great alternative to regular supermarket fruit teas.
Tea Recap
Water or milk? Water
Day or night? Day or night
Hot or iced? Hot or cold
Sweetened or pure? Pure as it already contains a calorie-free sweetener.
Caffeine? No
What’s the price? S$8.15
Where to buy? Get it from Basilur website