HEYTEA Gardenia 3.6

The HEYTEA Gardenia 3.6 is $11.90 and 280 calories. Gardenia tea with milk and a pistachio Viennese style cloud on top, and one of four drinks on the Tea Lab board built the same way.

The 3.6 is the milk. Whole milk is sold at 3.6% fat across most of Asia and the figure is printed on the carton, so the number tells you what went in rather than describing a flavour. Every 3.6 drink on this menu is the same idea applied to a different leaf.

What separates this one is the gardenia. Scented green tea against dairy is a harder pairing than black tea against dairy, because the perfume is delicate and milk buries delicate things. HEYTEA handles it by brewing the tea heavy, so what reaches the cup is concentrated enough to push back.

The pistachio cloud is the third element and it is not a garnish. Viennese style means whipped cream folded through rather than spooned on, so it sits as a soft cap that thins into the drink as you go. Pistachio brings a savoury, nutty edge that keeps the floral note from turning perfumed and sweet.

Sugar sits at 22g, which is moderate for a drink this rich. Most of the 280 calories come from the 15g of fat in the milk and the cloud rather than from syrup, which is why it tastes less sweet than the number suggests.

Protein comes in at 7g. That is dairy again, and it makes this a genuinely filling drink rather than a light one. People who order it as an afternoon pickup often skip whatever they were going to eat with it.

Drink through the cloud rather than stirring it in. The first third of the cup is cream-forward and the last third is tea-forward, and both are worth having. Stir it flat at the start and you lose that entirely.

Against the Gardenia 1 at $7.90, this is a different drink built from the same brew. Against the Gongfu 3.6 at $11.90, it is the same build with a floral leaf instead of a black one.

For the coconut water version of this tea, the Gardenia 5 is also $11.90 and runs lighter at 190 calories.