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This tea is from RABS and her wonderful Geek package. The rules stipulate that I not try more than three a day. I’m trying to limit myself to just one a day so that the bliss lasts longer.

Today I rolled a “2” on the die. The beautiful package yielded a most generous sample of Adagio’s “Golden Monkey.” I like Adagio a lot. Although they can sometimes be “off” a bit or even a lot, they offer some really exquisite teas for what I consider a most reasonable price. I also think that the “blend your own” tea can make a wonderful gift and have used it four times thus far….but I digress.

I wanted to have this tea hot. I know that I could have opted for iced, but I was feeling a bit urgent. I love the image of monkeys high in the tea trees, gripping the bud in their little hands (while a primate compadre carefully and contemplatively picks the fleas off his tea-picking amigo).

This tea is malty and earthy in all the best ways—not too much, but sufficiently pronounced that I like it a lot. I detect some chocolate notes and I see how this tea can be, like The Simple Leaf’s justly celebrated Dawn, one of those miraculous tea shape-shifters that manages to mix and mingle a panoply of tastes and aromas.

I also sense a range from what I would call the buttered grape/prune/current range—perhaps I’m referring to what others call a “wine” taste. For me this taste often, but not always, comes with some overtones of date. (By the way, I love dates and anything cooked with dates). So far we are hitting most of the major tea notes I love aside from the tobacco/tar/roof pitch family.

This really is an exquisite tea. Approaching the bottom of the cup I added one sugar crystal and a dash of milk. I would say that the tea can stand up to the milk and sugar well and that they only enhance the flavors. But the tea is superb without them.

I really love teas that are AD/DC: great black but also supportive of a bit or milk and sugar and this is one of these. I am thinking of ordering a full bin of this and also small sample sizes of chocolate, current, and plum. I’ll probably place an order with Adagio soon and get Golden Monkey and Mambo and add a dash of the flavors from time to time.

Thank you so much, RABS for this excellent choice. It happened to be the perfect tea at the perfect time for me and I continue to be so very excited about being a winner of your Geek contest.