At the Store: Sweet Leaf Tea

by Ethan Johnson
May 28, 2007

Sweet Leaf tea

Note: Please refer to the ethmar.com Food and Drink Ethics Statement regarding food and drink reviews on this site.

I love me some tea. But as our weather in Texas gets progressively hotter, my desire to drink it wanes down to nothing. Who wants to heat up water on the stove when you're sweltering as it is? I absolutely loathe iced tea, so my tea-drinking options are to tough out the hot stuff or wait until our two months of "winter". How about some of this:

  • Price: About $1.50 USD.
  • Selection: Original, Diet, Peach, Raspberry, Hibiscus, and more.
  • Processing: The selling point is that they use pure cane sugar instead of HFCS or similarly annoying Crystaline Fructose.

Off to the fridge!

Buzz: I'm seeing these slowly filling more and more store shelves, especially at stores that want to convey a certain folksy charm, or granola/hippie crunchiness. No print or TV advertising to my knowledge.

Packaging: 16oz glass bottles.

Taste: I tried Peach and Raspberry. Both are identical in quality. Namely, a nice smooth tea drink without the nastiness of iced tea. The peach tea is my reigning favorite.

When it comes to this product, I would, and you may:

  • Make this a staple item on your shopping list
  • Pick a few of these up from time to time
  • Buy one if you see it
  • Buy one out of desperation if your preference is not available
  • Move along, nothing to see here

Drinks like this one are a fun treat, but nothing I'd load up on by the caseload unless the price fell (unlikely - although apparently I'm getting soaked at the "crunchy" stores) or I thought it wasn't going to reverse my hard-won weight loss progress. Like Cookie Monster™ says, it's a "sometimes" food. But after a long session of walking and cycling, I'm finding this drink to be really refreshing. Nice alternative to water one time a day.

Note: "Diet" means "made with Splenda®." If you are opposed to consuming this sort of sweetener, you may want to skip that offering. I personally try to avoid artificial sweeteners wherever possible.

If you try this yourself, please let me know how your experience compared with mine. Thanks! <EM>

(The full At the Store archive may be perused here.)

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