For peppermint, it's hard to top CS' version. As noted in some of my other peppermint tea reviews, this is an herb that is difficult to ruin anyway, and I love the flavor, whether stand-alone or mixed with other products (teas, candies, cookies, etc.). Some tea companies do use stems as cheap filler, or unadvertised spearmint (not hard to tell by taste). Others let the product sit on the shelf too long and essential oils start to evaporate. Not this one!

Both aroma and flavor are about as full as can be, which I expected given the lack of fillers apparent in the dry bag. Moreover, since CS uses pouches instead of small fold-over bags, and packs them with plenty of chopped leaves, the quantity is greater than most bagged peppermint teas as well, contributing to a rich brew. [Oddly, tiny leaf pieces are pressed into the sealed edges of the pouches, indicating a fast and somewhat sloppy mechanical bagging process. However, I deduct no points for that, since it's just a curiosity and doesn't affect tea flavor or aroma.] The liquid in cup starts a green-brown color and quickly changes to a remarkably dense brown, such that the bottom of the cup is not visible after just a couple of minutes (especially when stirring bag-in-cup, as I often to do maximize flavor release). A speckly sheen of essential-oil droplets also appears atop the tea; this is a good thing!

Another testament to the quality of this peppermint is the wet-bag aroma after several minutes of steeping, then squeezing the remainder into the cup. This is something I do with most teas once. With great mint teas, I'll do it over and over: fluff up the squeezed but still damp bag, wrap it around the bottom of the nose, and breathe deeply. There's still plenty of rich peppermint smell left over for this, and it's a quite soothing and relaxing endeavor. The value was great too, in this instance, given a price of just $2/box on sale at Sprouts.

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