SoccerMom

Okay another one I am getting to try courtesy of Ricky (Thanks Ricky!) This one is so reminiscent of coffee it is undeniable. I set the Breville and walked in to pour me a cup and the smell in my kitchen took me back to 1992 when I still lived at home and my mom had just discovered flavored/gourmet coffee’s. I felt my hair to make sure I didn’t have that wave that I use to create with my bangs like I did in the early 90’s nope no wave (thank god).

On to the coffee uh I mean tea yeah tea! It is a nice chocolaty tasting tea with strong hints of yep you guessed it coffee I feel the need to add milk and sugar but that’s not my style so I’m drinking it straight it’s not bad it’s quite good but I don’t appreciate the fact that it makes me want to add milk/sugar that’s exactly why I don’t do coffee!

I would drink this tea again but not order it by the pound or anything. It would be great tea for guests (or my mom) who usually drink coffee which happens quite often around my house. Oh and it must have good amounts of caffeine because I am typing like 3 times faster than usual. Thanks again Ricky!

Much like Morgana in her tasting note from this tea I also work from home and needed something to get me up and going. I took a Zyrtec allergy pill last night and then went to bed and did not wake up till 10:00am OMG! I am so glad I made my husband a good meal last night because it put him in a good mood and I was going to owe him one for pushing my 14 year old out of bed and to his summer events this am and they did it all without waking me. Well I will secretly admit I did hear them but I was too tired to move!!

Anyway on to the tea I have had this one before from Lena and I loved it so Ricky sent me some more along with lots of other goodies! Thanks Ricky I really appreciate all the tea and the thought you put into it by researching what I liked and sending out a custom sampler to me it was very thoughtful and I love it!! The tea is just the right kick I need to get me going it’s strong but not so strong that it requires milk and sugar which is a good thing as I don’t like to ever add milk or sugar to tea. It is a slightly brisk tea and I believe it was Auggy who said that this tea states “I AM TEA” and I would have to agree it does.

A great morning or brunch time tea!!

I got this one as a free sample from Chicago tea garden. I have been hanging on to it for awhile and boy am I glad I decided to try it this morning. First off the dry leaf look like little snails and I marvel and adore them every time I look at the bag. The are so cute!!

I didn’t get much off the dry leaf but I am a little stuffy from allergies so this may be why. I am also glad (whew) I read the steeping parameters as I usually go five minutes on black tea and the note said 212 for 1 minute!! Brewed up it is a dark amber, brownish color and the flavor is light and malty a little earthy with no hints of astringency. I really like it and would definitely order this. I appreciate the free sample as it will lead to me purchasing more Bi Lo Chun and others from Chicago Tea Garden.

AmazonV was kind enough to send me a sample of this one (Thanks AmazonV). While I don’t normally care for Earl Grey’s, this one is light on the Bergamot compared to the others I have tried and nice very easy to sip and enjoy without having to add cream and sugar.

It is a beautiful orangy brown in color and tastes of black tea a very smooth and enjoyable cup. I am not sure if my palate is refined enough to give a good description of it’s flavor but it’s good (lol).

I had a very bad experience with Teavana’s Earl Grey Creme and decided to give up on Earl Grey’s and along came this one and I quite enjoy it. Hmmm this may need to go on my to order list for when I am off my tea freeze! Thanks AmazonV!!!

I just got in some tea samples from MeghannM (Thanks Meghann!) and so I thought I would start my day off with some black tea. I selected this one and boy am I glad that I did it is buttery and nutty a very nice blend from 52Teas.

I was a little worried about what the black tea in the background would taste like but I was pleasantly surprised when I tasted it to find that it is a very smooth cup and I don’t have to add sugar or milk. It is nice all on it’s own! Thanks again Meghann!!

I am finally getting to try this tea courtesy of JacquelineM (Thanks Jackie!). It is such a deep dark tea with a true coconut smell and flavor! The dry leaf smelled phenomenal (if you like coconut that is) and so I was just praying that once steeped it tasted in accordance with the smell and my prayers were answered it does taste like coconut black tea!!

It’s a great tasting tea the first steep was a little strong and I thought maybe it could have used some milk but that’s not how I roll so I just went with it. The second steep has no astringency and is perfect without milk. I like it and will definitely order some that is when I run out of some black teas that I already have.

Thanks again Jackie! It is the black tea version of my coconut custard rooibos that I also love!

Thanks to Lena for sending me this yummy breakfast tea! I would add my own tasting note but as I read through the notes Carolyn’s note was pretty much to the TEA (lol at my own corny joke). So on this I have to say DITTO CAROLYN!!!!!!

HInts of chocolate puerh and a great black tea I really like it.

Finally getting around to trying this one Thanks to Lena, Thanks Lena! I have been drinking my morning black teas but mostly drinking iced teas during the day as it has been so hot here. Anyway I needed something to get me up and rolling this morning so that I could start my tomato sauce early and make the rest of dinner later this way I could work while tomato sauce was simmering.

Anyway did I tell you I love the Breville One Touch it is awesome and I do love it. While I was food processing tomatoes Breville made me tea Yay! On first sip I thought woah this is strong and bitter I think I over steeped it and maybe went too hot with the water temp I did 212 for 5 min. Next time I’ll try lower on both temp and steep times. Anyway after the initial shock to the tastebuds which made me think I might have really screwed up and have to through this pot of tea out I bravely took another sip and it wasn’t bad at all!

I don’t know what was up with my first sip but glad I continued on as it wasn’t bad I get a very faint cinnamony taste and faint hints of floral. I cannot wait to try this tea when prepared properly it is on my list for tomorrow morning. Thanks to Lena for the generous sample I get a second (third and fourth) chance with fresh leaves. Thanks again Lena!

Update: Much smoother at 3 minutes! I like it. It also gives me that caffeine kick which I need.

I got in a beautiful package of teas from Lena today. She even typed me notes on her thoughts of each tea it was a really nice surprise (Thanks Lena you ROCK). In the samples was this one and I’ve been dying to try it and she mentioned she was curious of what my thoughts would be on this one.

First off I have to say I am majorly over steeping it as per all of yall’s reviews I decided to follow suit. The first taste that hits me is angel food while I don’t really taste any strawberry at all! Hmmm I wonder what’s up with that? I like it and it leaves me with a sweet cakey taste I miss the strawberries though I want my strawberries with my angel food cake you know what I mean?? It still tastes good though! Thanks again Lena!! :)

So I finally got the Breville One Touch Tea Maker for Mother’s Day! All I can say is Thanks guys (to my hubby and son) you finally listened to all my hints and did the right thing. The reason I say this is because usually I am given a card (which I love and cherish) and told to go buy myself something. While this sounds like a good deal (and I admit it’s not SO bad) it’s just kinda become boring I wanted a gift and I knew what I wanted and to their credit I sometimes do not know what I want.

So on to the tasting note I am in a constant search of black teas that will taste good to me and kick my butt into gear in the mornings. So in come’s this one Imperial Red by Silk Road Teas I have to start out by saying that it doesn’t have much smell to the dry leaf. In my search of the perfect black wake up tea I need little to NO astringency I don’t like astringency and certainly do not want to taste astringency upon waking up.

I preset the Breville and when I walked in from dropping my son off from school there sat my tea ready and waiting gosh was that nice. So I pour my tea into a teapot (note to self need to buy a two cup teapot) and here I sit looking over email and posting tasting notes. This tea is very good while I hate to compare it to the Simple Leaf’s Dawn it’s the only thing I can think of that may somewhat compare so here’s what I taste I taste black tea with NO astringency YES! I get a very light whisper of smoke and cocoa but I can see where one may not it does not have the natural flavors of a tea like Dawn but it is an excellent morning to mid afternoon tea in that it is a great black tea you can just tell it is a high quality tea from the taste and from the lack of bitter black tea taste. It is a good tea I will happily finish my 1 ounce bag not sure if I will order more but if I don’t find anything I like more I could see me reordering.

I’m not sure if I have done this tea justice in this tasting note but I do want to make it clear that black tea lovers would probably really enjoy this tea. I could see someone like tea=bliss loving this hmmm maybe I should send her some so she could give it a review.

It’s no secret that I love Rishi’s peach blossom which is a white tea base and it contains orange while I don’t taste peach so much I mostly taste orange I still LOVE it. So when I looked through the Rishi website I thought I HAVE to try orange blossom which has a green tea base.

Dry leaf on this one smells very orange and delicious. I can see that there is a lot of lemon grass in the mix but it still smells orange to me. So steeped for 4 mins and I get a lemony scent no more orange scent. The lemongrass is mostly what I get and the more it begins to cool the more I get notes of floral in the smell and the taste.

It’s funny in that in the Rishi Peach Blossom I tasted orange in the Rishi Orange Blossom I mostly taste lemon there maybe be subtle hints of orange but I really have to strain to think I taste it in there! It’s a good tea I really enjoy it in that it tastes nice and the aftertaste leaves my breath feeling fresh.

This is my 100th tasting note!!! Anyway after an exhausting weekend seriously I am ready for the work week to start so I can recover from this whirlwind of a weekend. Soccer game for teen about 100 miles away on Saturday morning rush back so he can dress for 8th grade dance then off to olive garden to drop him and friends, then on to dance but not before taking lots of pics. Hubby insistent on going to the Dynamo’s soccer game while son is at dance so then rush to get to game watch game rush home to pick son up from dance wait in long carrider line and well it’s just getting boring so I’ll spare you but you get the point right? I’m not called “soccermom” just for grins! :)

Anyway on Friday night I got in two orders one from Rishi one from Silk Road and it was like having a personal Christmas if at Christmas you got all teas. Well I’ve been waiting for awhile to order this one it’s been on my shopping list from pretty much my first week here. I couldn’t wait to steep it up and so I popped the top tonight and to my surprise it smelled like homemade cinnamon bread yes you know the kind with lots of cinnamon and sugary icing YUM! So I couldn’t wait to taste it but I did I waited the five minutes (rather impatiently but waited all the same) it turned into this bright red liquor and I kinda started to freak out because it does have hibiscus in the ingredients and I don’t know if I like hibiscus yet or not I know people tend to have strong opinions on hibiscus around here so this made me nervous. That and the smell changed to a tarty smell (I am guess the hibiscus?).

So on to the taste the taste is like this it starts out slightly tart and cinnamony and then it seems to get a little more tart but ends up going down smooth and sweet. This is a nice one I really like the tarty smoothness for all those in your face fans out there if you like hibiscus and cinnamon this one is dynamite! I like it I don’t know how often I will find myself drinking it but I do quite like it!

I have been quite excited to get my order in from Silk road teas and it finally came in yesterday! It was to late to have it last night so immediately after making bacon, egg and cheese bagel sandwiches I went for it and opened the Dragon Balls. When I peeked in the pouch I was surprised to find huge balls (no joke). The dry scent was just like tea and the balls were black not greenish like the ones in the picture.

I was surprised by the light color of the liquor being that the dry leaf was so dark. It taste quite nice like a smooth slightly sweet black tea. I’m not picking up on much else I don’t know if it’s because I just finished the bagel sandwich or what hmm.

I do like it and will definitely drink it again I’m not sure if I’d reorder but if I decide that I need to drink this more as things tend to grow on me slowly and I find myself needing teas that I didn’t think I was crazy about to begin with such as Dawn if this happens I will up the rating! :)

I am so glad after a long day a successfully cooked dinner and a movie I am able to relax with a cup of tea. Did I mention my Rishi order came in today Yay! So I decided to start out with this one since it seems fairly light and I would like to be able to go to sleep at a decent hour (not the party animal I use to be).

Anyway on to tea this smells not blatantly apply but I could kinda smell apple in the dry leaf. The dry leaf or bud is beautiful not unlike silver needle as the description suggests and I do agree with them.

I have to agree with my pal Lena on this one I don’t dislike it I don’t get much taste out of it but it’s subtle and I like it for some reason. Usually I like in your face but I wasn’t expecting that out of this tea so I wasn’t disappointed. It’s nice not something I would serve to someone who doesn’t normally drink tea because as I already stated it’s very light. I like it and I don’t know if I would reorder at this time but if I find myself craving it I will up the rating a bit or if second steep totally rocks.

I’m having a green tea type of day. Not really I just got in my adagio sample order in which I ordered several different samples of green tea. This one is slightly sweet and has the faintest hints of butter when I do that slurpy thing with my mouth. I like it but do not love it.

This is an okay cup of tea but is not has described by Adagio. It is a very light cup of tea with hints of sweetness and grassiness.

After my last tea experience which was a BAD one I decided to try to block the experience out with another tea immediately. So here I sit with a cup of Yunnan Gold I’ve never had a Yunnan Gold tea before (I don’t remember if I have) anyway so all of the steepster reviews of Yunnan Gold had me anxious to try it.

This one has a dark amber brown liquor and I don’t get much on smell other than tea. Taste wise it doesn’t have a whole mouth feel it’s easy to sip slight hints of maltiness but still not as good as Adagio’s Golden Monkey if what your looking for is maltiness. It is a decent cup or as Doulton would say “this is a serviceable cuppa tea”. Definitely nothing I would reorder.

Hmmm okay what to say about this one. Well the dry leaf smells delicioso just like cream but I smell maple in there too and this is a good thing because I like maple.

Steeped the leaves 5 minutes in boiling water as per Adagio’s steeping instructions and once steeped the leaves smell a little less creamy and maply the leaves have really grown once steeped and filled up the infuser basket. The liquor is dark black typical of a cuppa Ceylon. I know I don’t care for Adagio’s Ceylon base so this one can go either way.

My first sip taste good on the front of my tongue but as soon as it hits mid tongue and back of throat I’m totally grossed out by a strong astringent, BITTER taste that I DO NOT LIKE! Ewww how could something that smells so good go so wrong.

Anyone who enjoys this tea or thinks they may enjoy this tea PM me and I will happily send it your way (it’s a sample tin).

This is a nice florally and buttery tasting oolong but it simply doesn’t hold a candle to my formosa silk oolong by Te’House of Tea. I’ll rerate the second steep if it is better than the first as is the case with my other oolongs.

It’s been a LONG week. I thought I would reward myself with something and about the time I was trying to figure out what my reward would be my son comes in and request chai. I have only made some chai’s using coffeemate chai creamer and I’m out right now so I dug into my GM sampler and pulled this one out.

I made it according to Takgoti’s chai recipe and it turned out wonderful and luckily it made enough to give him a huge mug and me a dainty cup. I am not usually really crazy over chai’s but I might have to purchase this one for those days when I need a chai. See picture here http://www.flickr.com/photos/48612840@N07/4546576793/

I do not have really any other chai’s besides one or two experiences to compare this one to but it was yummy so it’s going to get a high rating.

Thanks Takgoti for the recipe! :)

At my age one should not stay up all night. Yep my pulling all nighter days are long over on Wednesday night (technically Thursday morning) I woke up to the saddest dog crying ever and I had to sit up with him all night or he would start up crying again. So imagine this its about 3:00 am and me and my neapolitan mastiff (about 200lb) dog are sitting on my bedroom floor (well he was laying) with his head in my lap and he is in a weird miserable position I’ve never seen him in sorta tangled looking. He’s crying and I’m crying I mean he is my BEST FRIEND EVER and I can’t stand to see him in misery. I sit there and comfort him thinking about when the vet my open and if he will make it until then and lo and behold he is pulling through (Thank you God).

Anyway on to the tasting note I just had to let you all know where I’ve been the past couple days and what I’ve been going through if you’ve ever loved an animal you completely understand I’m sure. On to this tasting note I needed something soft and comforting and I thought why not go with this white licorice so here we sit me and the white licorice tea and all I can smell in the dry leaf is star anise which doesn’t remind me of licorice but pizza yes I said pizza when I was in H.S. I would rush home from school to eat and most times the easiest thing would be to throw a totino’s party pizza in the oven and wait well the sausage pizza had star anise so I’m thinking that’s why I think of pizza.

While I’m not tasting much of the white tea I do somehow know it’s there but mostly I’m getting the pizza star anise flavor and I don’t know that I like that in my tea. No I do know I DO NOT like that pizza spice in my tea. If you like star anise you probably would enjoy this tea unfortunately I do not.

P.S. Thank you to all of you who have been sending me your heartfelt wishes for Massimo I appreciate you all.

I was sent this tea by Doulton (Thanks so much). I was in search of a black tea in my cupboard and decided to go dig through my stash and here I found this little gem of a tea. I didn’t know anything about it besides the name and who blended it but while steeping I noticed an interesting smell filling up my kitchen. I then sipped and boy was I surprised it is this wonderful cup of black tea with hints of peach. I really do not get much more than that taste wise but the thing that really impresses me is this is a strong black tea that has NO astringency a very smooth cuppa. Thanks Doulton! :)

I was so craving a cuppa Florence and went to my tea cupboard to make me a cup and there sat my samples from all my steeps and in front was this one. I decided to give it a shot as it is a chocolate flavored black tea. I was very excited to try it as it is made by LiberTEAS while I’ve never actually had the opportunity to try any of her teas I love reading her posts.

Anyway on to the tea the dry leaf smelled delicious like delicious enough to eat delicious. Steeped 5 minutes in boiling water and the smell is still delicious but I am now picking up on very faint hints of the rose in this blend. The liquor is very dark with hints of orange and red the chocolate taste is very good. As you all know I love me some Florence and so it’s hard for me to be unbiased when it comes to chocolate teas but I have to say where Florence has the hazelnutty chocolate taste this one has a rose chocolate taste so they are completely different chocolate teas. Enough rambling I like this tea and I have to Thank AmazonV for this sample (Thanks AmazonV).

Okay I guess my taster is just off today! This one is is sweet, florally, woody and what I was thinking to be peppery but instead of pepper it maybe peony I don’t know what peony tastes like so I’m going to have to assume that flavor to be peony but I wouldn’t bet money on that. I don’t get melon but as it cools I get a small hint of sweetness at the end of the sip. Thanks to Erin I get to try this one (Thanks Erin).