Sip Of The Week: Rose Milk Tea From Teaus

The first thing you’ll realize at Teaus, the teahouse that just opened at 86 5th Avenue, is that you’re not dealing with just a simple bag of tea leaves and hot water. Depending on what you order, it’s so much more than that.

Though there are straightforward options like that on the menu, what you’re going to want to try are their special concoctions — flower, milk, and fruit teas and tea smoothies.

After you order, there’s a complicated recipe that’s getting mixed together behind the counter. Thankfully, there’s a handy guide to what’s going into those drinks, shown above. We ordered the rose milk tea ($4.25), their most popular drink, which is: 5% sugar, 15% ice, 30% “basic” tea, 30% green tea, and 20% milk. It gets poured together, shaken up, and is then served in a reusable glass bottle, which, if you bring it back to use again here, will get you 50 cents off that next drink.

Generally, we don’t love rose-flavored things — it’s just hard to separate the scent from the memories of soap in our grandmother’s bathroom — but we were promised the floral essence would not be too overwhelming. And that’s definitely true. With that first sip, the rose is present, but not aggressively so, enough to let you consider the drink as a whole — and it’s unusual. Creamy, herbaceous, and just sweet enough, it’s really unlike any drink we’ve ever tried.

And while at first it seemed a bit strange, by the time we’d taken the last sip, we were addicted. We’re looking forward to ordering it again, or taking a chance on one of the other drinks, and trying it out with one of the items on the food side of the operation — it’s the same space, but the food is by Kuma, and includes dishes like yakisoba, lamb chops, takoyaki, and more.

Teaus is located at 86 5th Avenue, between St Marks and Warren, 917-705-1115. They’ve got wifi, and they’re open daily from noon-midnight.