4110 Tasting Notes
Sipping on this one this afternoon as I nibble on crackers and cubes of parmesan. I needed a little caffeine pick-me-up after doing some shopping and food prep for dinner tonight. I brought home a bottle of light agave nectar from the store – it was on sale and I was curious how it would compare to sugar. I don’t seem to notice much of a difference but it seemed like I had to use more to get the same level of sweetness.
As a general question, what types of sweetener do you guys use? I’ve seen that brown rock sugar sold on several tea sites, is it worth using?
Looking forward to your responses! <3
Preparation
After having that lovely latte with Bouquet of Flowers earlier, I decided I needed another one! Yeah, I’m kind of a fatty… What of it? :P I selected Troika because of its orangeyness, which I thought would pair really well with cream and vanilla.
Followed the same method as I did for the first one. I used 6 ounces of strong brewed tea plus 2 tablespoons each of milk and half-and-half (which comes out to 2 ounces). Heated and frothed the milk while the tea was brewing, but this time I added a little splash of vanilla extract along with the sugar. This came out quite tasty, sort of a creamsicley version of a London Fog. I actually really love the flavor of the vanilla extract – it’s a very natural vanilla flavor that reminds me of vanilla beans. Will definitely make this again and I can’t wait to try this method with St. Petersburg for a spiced version! :D
Preparation
Now I’m really thinking I need a latte of some sort. I’ve got a few teas that would work very well for this…hmmmm…decisions, decisions.
I can’t help it, I love creamy things too much! I guess 2 tablespoons of half-and-half isn’t that bad… Right? ;)
Made this one into a lovely London Fog this morning. I used almost two teaspoons of tea instead of my usual heaping teaspoon and it came out perfect. I also used half whole milk and half half-and-half (lol) because I find that when I use pure half-and-half, the cream note can kind of overpower everything. Warmed the milk and frothed it up a bit with a whisk before adding it, then added a couple teaspoons of sugar. I think a real London Fog is supposed to have vanilla syrup, but I don’t have that lying around. :P Delicious! I love that light floral note in this!
Preparation
Did a cold steep for six hours on this one. It came out a light and slightly murky yellowish green. As I expected, it pretty much just tastes like licorice root with maybe a tiny bit of cinnamon/orange/vanilla if you really look for it. Still doesn’t taste at all like green tea (or any tea). However, I find that I don’t quite hate licorice root as much when it’s cold, so I did drink this one as opposed to dumping it. Meh.
Preparation
So this is my second jasmine pearl tea (the first being free sample from Yezi). I wish I could taste them both side-by-side, but without that option, I think I like this one a little better. The little pearls are tightly rolled and about a quarter inch in diameter. The smell of the dry tea is amazing – such a strong and sweet jasmine aroma. It smells like actual flowers, not like a perfume, which is a very good sign. The directions say to use a tablespoon (!) of tea per 8 ounces of water, so this is what I did. I think in the future I could definitely get away with using less per cup.
The brewed tea smells very jasminey, though definitely not as strongly as the dry (thank goodness). I can also catch a hint of a sweet, vegetal green tea behind the jasmine. I really enjoy the taste of this tea. The jasmine flavor is prominent and it’s definitely the star, but I can also taste the sweet and mellow green tea base. It came out a tiny bit bitter for me, but I think using less tea or maybe a tiny bit shorter steep would eliminate this. The aftertaste is very floral. I found this was delicious with just half a teaspoon of sugar – it seemed to round out the jasmine flavor.
Flavors: Jasmine, Sweet, Vegetal
Preparation
This was another one of the teas that I put in to cold brew earlier. I didn’t necessarily think it would be good chilled, I’m just determined to try everything cold. May I just say… NEVER AGAIN! This is almost comically horrible, in a way that I almost burst out laughing when I took a sip. It’s just bitter on top of bitter with an aftertaste of roses. I don’t know, maybe florals just aren’t good for cold brewing.
Ew. Yuck. Blegh.
Preparation
Hahaha, I’m sorry, but I LOL:ed at your distress. I’ve also had exactly one tea that made me burst out laughing because it was so incredibly bad.
…but tell us how you really feel. :) Seriously, I have tried some teas as cold steeps that turned out the same way. At least you’re willing to experiment!
I put four teas in the fridge to cold steep this morning, and this was one of them. I have to say, I’m very impressed with this iced. It came out a slightly murky pale green with a brown tinge. I added some syrup and it tastes remarkably similar to ginger ale, but without the carbonation. I think I actually prefer it without the bubbles! The ginger tastes lingers in a pleasant way and the lemon is very mild and lovely. I could see myself drinking this chilled regularly. I guess I know what’s going to happen to the rest of that tin! :)
Preparation
If you’re a fan of ginger ale, I think you would enjoy it. I’m not even that big a fan of ginger ale! :P
I do like it, but I like ginger beer better. It’s more a nostalgia thing. There is a ruin that is supposedly a site of its early production along the Bruce Trail ( a hiking trail along the Niagara Escarpment in Ontario), not to far from where I live. I remember that trail because at that time there were caves and crevice s in the rock face where I was told there was ice that hadn’t melted since the last ice age.
My last cup of this, aww… My sample from Yezi was big enough for two cups since this is such a fluffball tea. Since I think I neglected to say last time, the dry leaf is amazingly creamy smelling with notes of honey and sweet hay. I can’t wait to to try a creamy flavored bai mudan (I’m looking at you, Cantaloupe & Cream!). This time I elected to add a little more than half a teaspoon of honey because I felt it would go beautifully. And it did! Om nom nom. Creamy and hay-like with just a touch of honey taste on the back of the tongue. So far, white tea kind of reminds me of a milder version of honeybush.
Preparation
I am determined to like this tea as much as everyone else seems to! For some reason I can’t seem to find the red fruit flavor that is apparently there but hiding from me. So I decided that this time I would try adding some dried cranberries (just happened to have some on hand). So I added about a tablespoon or so of them to a pyrex cup with my water and microwaved it until the water was up to temperature, then poured it over the tea and let it steep.
Smelling the brew, there was a definite tart fruitiness with vanilla and bergamot in the background. And it was quite tasty! Lots of yummy cranberry flavor. Next time I’ll use slightly fewer cranberries- maybe 2 teaspoons instead of 3. I could still taste the vanilla and bergamot notes but I feel like the cranberry overpowered them just a bit. This also might work a teensy bit better with a sweeter dried fruit like a strawberry or sweet cherry. Yay experiments! :D
Preparation
Trying this lovely tea with milk and sugar this morning. I wanted it to be really creamy and latte-y so I brewed it up with 6 ounces of water instead of 8 and added those 2 ounces back in as whole milk mixed with sugar. Yum! I could stand for the tea to be a little stronger, so I may try adding extra tea in addition to reducing the water the next time I have this. Or I might try making it as a boychik chai and steeping it in simmering milk… Hm…
I use sweetener very occasionally, sometimes to help bring the flavour out of flavoured teas or in chai. I only use maple syrup, brown coconut sugar or honey.
No, never – the whole point of tea, for me, is that it’s leaf + water. I don’t want to get into the habit of putting milk and sugar in it, aside from the occasional latte.
I use organic cane sugar only sometimes. My brother got me some rock sugar with a Teavana gift set and I personally don’t see what the big deal is.
maple syrup (only to bring out the flavor) works best with smoky/Keemun/Lapsang Sauchong teas
In chai, I use sweetened condensed milk—covers both the cream and the sugar! Every other tea I drink unsweetened. Really.