Redstraw Tea Bar

We’ve visited countless tea and coffee shops over the past several years, many of which haven’t merited a second visit or naturally persisted in our memories. Redstraw Tea Bar is a different story: It was fantastic the first time we visited, and we’ve returned multiple times since then. Year after year, it remains consistent in delivering powerfully flavored and often gorgeous cups from a mocktail-like list of named drinks, rather than a me-too collection of teas. Between the Watermelon Rose Mojito, the herbal cherry and pineapple Honest Guy, the French Daisy with lemon and butterfly pea, we couldn’t pick a favorite. Everything we’ve ordered has been worth experiencing again.

Beyond their nice selection of unique fruit teas, there are milk teas including a vanilla cream-topped Einspanner black tea, a Dalgona milk tea, and BMB (black sugar milk boba) with fresh boba. Matcha makes an appearence in mojitos and milk teas, and a small collection of coffee drinks includes sea salt cream, Dalgona, mojito, and Einspanner varieties. Our single complaint is that a single drink per person never feels like enough at Redstraw – sometimes because their cups have plenty of ice, sometimes because they’re just so great – and it takes restraint not to order a second one on the spot. That’s all the more reason to return for additional tastings.

Note: Redstraw’s exclusive Orange County location is in Irvine; the small chain also has shops in Portland, Dallas, and Los Angeles as of when this was written.