Social media, work emails, noisy family members… if you’re ready for some peace of mind, Twinings has a cup of tea for you. Today I’m reviewing Twinings Quiet Mind to find out if this tea blend of rooibos, vanilla and figs is as calming as it sounds.
This is a caffeine-free tea that’s part of the Soulful Blends range at Twinings. It’s not commonly found in supermarkets like other Twinings teas, so you’ll need to hunt it down on Amazon or buy it directly from Twinings (don’t worry, I’ve added links below).
P.S. in the US, this tea is called Adaptogens Calm and is part of the Superblends range. The ingredients are the same as the UK version, Quiet Mind, listed below.
Twinings Quiet Mind Rooibos Tea at a Glance
Izzy’s Rating
- Blend: Rooibos with chicory root, ashwagandha root, and flavourings
- Flavour: Medicinal rooibos with hints of artificial honey
This tea is a huge let-down. The aroma is sickly sweet like vanilla Yankee Candles or soap bars, and the flavour is totally overpowered by rooibos.
Full Review – Twinings Quiet Mind Caffeine-Free Tea
- Type: Tagged paper filter teabag (biodegradable)
- Ingredients: Rooibos, roasted chicory root, ashwagandha root, natural fig flavouring, natural vanilla flavouring, other natural flavourings
- Flavour Notes: Medicinal rooibos, artificial honey
- Aroma: Fake vanilla, Yankee candles, soap, nutty rooibos
- Milk or Lemon: Neither
- Where to Buy: Twinings Official Teashop or Amazon UK
Opening the packet, you’ll wonder if you’ve accidently stepping into a candle shop. The aroma from the teabag is of fake vanilla – overly sweet, slightly chemically, and a little bit soapy. There’s no hint of the fig and rooibos ingredients promised on the teabag wrapper.
Let’s brew it to see if adding water will help.
Nope.
The brewed tea has a luscious amber-red colour which is typical of rooibos. And rooibos does shine through in the aroma with nutty honeyed notes. But then it goes downhill. The flavour of Twinings Quiet Mind tea is pure rooibos with typical notes of nuttiness and medicine.
Honey? Non-existent. Figs? Never heard of them. This tea just tastes of rooibos through and through. You can brew it for longer or shorter than recommended but the results are the same.
It’s basically rooibos tea with a slightly thick texture.
How to Brew Twinings Soulful Blends
This tea uses rooibos as the base and a range of herbal ingredients, so you’re free to brew for as long as you’d like (not that it makes much of an impact on the flavour). Twinings recommend brewing for at least three minutes and giving the teabag a gentle squeeze at the end.
For this tea review, I followed the instructions and brewed for three minutes. Make sure you use boiling water – there’s no need to fuss around with specific water temperatures for this one.
Twinings Quiet Mind is flavoured with vanilla and fig for natural sweetness, but if you’d like to actually taste the sweetness, opt for a teaspoon of honey over sugar. I always recommend that for any rooibos tea blends I review (like Offblak Down Time), as it pairs so well with the natural nuttiness of the tea.
Why Twinings Soulful Blends?
Twinings Quiet Mind is part of the Soulful Blends line of teas. They’re inspired by Ayurveda and use herbal ingredients to balance the mind, body and spirit. However, I sense that they’ve been quite flexible with the idea of Ayurveda. Rooibos is native to South Africa, for example, and doesn’t grow in India. So, while Ayurveda dates back 3,000 years… Twinings Quiet Mind most definitely does not.
Ripping open the teabag, you’ll see that the rooibos and herbal elements are mixed up with white flecks. You’ll see the same if you rip open their Earl Grey or Lady Grey blends. These white flecks are the flavouring that Twinings use. I like that these flavourings are natural, but I always prefer to see real ingredient pieces if I can.
Other ingredients in this tea besides fig, honey and rooibos include chicory (a common caffeine-free coffee alternative with a roasty flavour) and ashwagandha (an ayurvedic herb that’s also known as Indian ginseng).
Summary
Should you buy Twinings Quiet Mind tea? Well, you’ll find an average rating of five stars on Twinings’ official website. So, perhaps it’s just me that doesn’t like this one! Find it on Twinings using the button below or search for it on Amazon using the link above.
Don’t forget to come back and leave a comment on this blog article letting me know what you think!
Tea Recommendation
If you’re looking for delicious herbal teas that are inspired by different cultures, then my recommendation for you is Himmelbauer Organic Alpine Hut Tea. This tea hails from Bavaria and is full of interesting ingredients like peppermint, ribwort, and nettle with various alpine herbs. Read the full tea review here at Immortal Wordsmith.