Caffeine Free Tea

[bluemoon4515]

I'm looking for some quality caffeine free teas to give to my dad as a gift. Anyone have any favorites or know a good source?

[megmosa]

I'm a fan of Numi's Dry Desert Lime tea. It's basically just dried lime. It's very limey...and good, I think. They have a rooibos tea too, I believe. Their mint tea is also excellent.

[chococat]

If you really want caffeine FREE tea, avoid "decaffeinated" teas-- they still contain ~5% of the caffeine since no extraction method is 100% effective.

[Full tummy]

Didn't know that, thanks. So, that would make rooibos a great option, since it never had caffeine to begin with...

[KaimukiMan]

if you want to open up the horizons a bit, and move away from tea leaf tea.... when i lived in korea they made tea (infusion) out of roasted barley, very tasty, very "tea-like", and very non-caffinated.

if you have a korean or asian grocery nearby, they will know about it.

mexican hibiscus teas can be very good too, but I don't know that much about them.

[Tripeler]

Roasted barley tea (mugicha) is a staple drink during Japanese summer. I have even had Korean corn tea. Quite good.

[travelmad478]

Hibiscus is great--you just take dried hibiscus flowers and pour boiling water over them. I put in a couple of drops of lemon juice and a spoonful of honey. Yum. I get the dried hibiscus in bulk from bulkfoods.com.

Rooibos is my absolute favorite. I have been drinking this for years, since I travel a lot to South Africa, where it is routinely offered alongside "English" (black) tea. The beauty part is that down there, you can get giant boxes of rooibos tea bags for the same price as regular tea--not like the insane prices they charge for a tiny 20-bag box here.

I also drink mint tea--but you have to be careful that you are drinking just mint leaves in boiling water, not black tea that is flavored with mint. In Israel, mint tea is very common--just a glass of boiling water with some sprigs of mint in it. Again, drink with a little lemon and some honey.

A recent vacation in Laos introduced me to lemon grass tea. Delicious!

A couple of years ago, Republic of Tea came out with several blends of "Jerry Garcia" branded teas. The "Magic Herb" was caffeine free and excellent. Sadly, it doesn't seem to be available anymore. I had three packages of it that I got half price from a supermarket going out of business, but now it's all gone...sniff!

[greygarious]

http://www.bigelowtea.com/Catalog/Cat...

This is a link to the gift sets of Bigelow teas, including decaf sets. I always have decaffeinated Constant Comment in the house (sold at supermarkets). Almost as good as the caffeinated. There's also a green tea version of CC, but it has caffeine.

[chowmel]

I buy decaf teas from upton tea co. I have in the house now their decaf Chai ( a touch of red pepper for a bite) decaf sweet orange, decaf premium Assam and decaf premium Darjeeling. You can buy them in tins. They put your name on the tin label but you can change it to your dad's. They ship quickly too.( On the site the decafs are under the Misc teas).

www.uptontea.com

[HillJ]

Rooibos or Honey tea get my vote too!

http://www.adagio.com/
Adagio offers a very affordable sampler set of both types.

[easily amused]

Having been Caffeine-free since 1986... I can attest the product lines have come along way.
I prefer tea in a bag for the convenience and portability. I also like non-flavored black teas.
Many grocery store chains carry their brands of Decaf tea...sometimes ,...it can be a lot of sampling to find one's individual preference for taste.
Trader Joe's have a number of choices, Target's Archer farms, Lipton, Typhoo, Bromley,
Usually one's town/city will have a local specialty tea shop ( Depending on your location) to help you build a "Tea Gift Basket" if that is what you had in mind.

[bluemoon4515]

I live in Birmingham, AL...near enough to Atlanta to make a trip there...and online stores are good, too.

[Full tummy]

Maybe you should post to your local Board asking where one can buy rooibos in Birmingham or Atlanta area...

[Emme]

i hope no one throws things at me, but i used to love Tazo teas - the passions flavor in the purple colored bags... a nice fruity (hibiscus IIRC) mild flavor... always my favorite when i go to Starbucks.

[bluemoon4515]

Thanks for the suggestions, I'll look into finding those around here.

[Full tummy]

Where do you live? I would highly recommend rooibos teas. Rooibos doesn't have caffeine in it, and it comes in a wide variety of flavours, depending on where you live, of course.

[Scrofula]

I'll second the recommendation for rooibos, though I'd recommend starting with the unflavored stuff. Flavored rooibos is actually a little harder to find than plain rooibos, but it's nice to know what it's supposed to taste like before getting all fancy.

[Full tummy]

I think it depends on where you're from, as to what's easier. I live in Toronto, and even my local grocery store sells it, but I'm pretty sure it's all of the flavoured variety. There may be a straight rooibos among the flavours, though.

I would probably try to get him both, depending on his preferences. Rooibos is a different flavour that some may not like at first, and so the flavours, often fruit, add an element of familiarity to an otherwise unusual (rooibos) flavour.

I have been drinking rooibos for a few years now and gravitated towards it because I smelled a blend in a tea shop that I just loved.

[Scrofula]

Doh, I meant plain rooibos is a little harder to find than the flavored stuff; not the other way around. At least, that's the case where I live.

[Full tummy]

Hahaha, that makes more sense.