I love spearmint herbal tea, but it's usually only available as a blend with peppermint. The only pure spearmint that I've been able to find locally in tea bags is Traditional Medicinals and they've been out of stock at the store where I buy them. I normally don't buy bulk because it's often stale, but since I was ordering online, I decided to gamble on a one-pound, wholesale-sized bag for $14.48. I'm glad I did.

This is the best spearmint I've ever had. I'm sure it's at least partly because it's the freshest (the bulk bags are heat-sealed Mylar), but the herb is also visually higher quality than other brands I've had. I've even grown fresh spearmint before and this is better. The dry herb is pungent. It smells overpoweringly like spearmint oil with a light vegetal background, like grass or alfalfa. I examined the dry herb and saw no sign of the woody stems often present in bulk mints. The tea bags I'm used to are filled with 1.5g of herb, so I weighed 3g for my 16oz mug. The liquor steeps to a deep amber-green and once again, the scent is powerful.

The combination of flavor and aroma is perfect. The flavor of spearmint oil dominates, but in the background is the light vegetal or chlorophyll bitterness that I enjoy. I couldn't detect, even faintly, any of the catnip skunkiness often present in mint. After steeping, the hydrated leaves are recognizable as spearmint and look like fresh leaves that went through a lawnmower. There was also no sand or grit in the bottom of my mug after I finished drinking it.

Without hyperbole, this is the best spearmint herb I've ever had and at less than $1 per ounce, the least expensive. I've transferred the contents of the bag to airtight glass jars to hopefully preserve the freshness until I can drink 300 cups of it, but I'll have broken even compared to the price of my usual brand of tea bags if I can get through 50.

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