Twining's US uses a less-health-hazardous method for extracting caffeine from tea. I commend them for that, in principle. In practice, this is a terrible way of extracting caffeine because it takes all of the flavor along with it. There is a better way of doing it that is both less health-hazardous and maintains flavor. Perhaps they don't utilize it because of costs. Whatever the reason, it isn't nearly enough of one, as far as I'm concerned. Because this isn't tea, this is a shadow of tea. If everything good in a teabag effectively died and you then decided to drop a bit of bergamot oil on it, this would be what it might taste like. It's so watered down and devoid of flavor that, at first, I thought I was drinking dirty dishwater. It wasn't a conscious thought, it just came to me as an instantaneous reaction, and I looked at the kettle to see if I'd done something wrong. All hyperbole aside, it really does taste like someone took some legitimate Earl Grey tea, brewed it several times, then dried out the exhausted leaves, stuck them in a brand new teabag and then marketed them as "decaffeinated." You'll be able to go to sleep after drinking this because this isn't a taste you'll want to be awake for. If you want to call that "decaffeination," be my guest.

I'm truly unsure whether I'd rather drink this liquid punishment or roll around like a rotisserie chicken in my bed all night, hopped up on caffeine from drinking tea with the flavor still in it.

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