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thank you stacy for my sample. i have no problem admitting that i chose this sample as a test, lol. pineapple cilantro cream? sounds lovely… but how would one bring such an unusual blend to fruition? understand that my motives came not at all from maliciousness… stacy of butiki teas has been declared the very best in flavoured teas to me. not by one or two of my steepster friends, but by all of them! imagine the skill sets of one woman being the common point of people all over the planet with disparate tea tastes and backgrounds… lovely! thus, as i perused the butiki website trying to narrow my millions of choices down to three i looked not only at the teas that appealed to me, but also for a single one that i felt would be challenging to execute. this is it!

how do you blend a summer flavour like pineapple, most frequently paired with tropical compliments like coconut, with an asian flavour (that i equate with awesome peanut sauce over noodles) like cilantro without tasting like a take out tea from noodle box? a challenge… that ms. lim met head on.

the bai mudan base has no astringency. it is light and sweet and was an inspired choice for this blend. the pineapple is not overpowering and does not have an overripe flavour. interestingly enough it has a vague roasted flavour to it. the cilantro is subtle, but clear… but it has an unexpected effect: it cools the tongue!

this is the truest summer blend i’ve ever tasted. it is refreshing and light without a hint of bitterness or acid.

brilliant….. just think! this was only the first sample, and i haven’t even started into my order proper!

thank you again, stacy!

right off the bat i’m going to say that i’m a bit off today: it was infusion day which segued into physio and all this linked by stop and go traveling through gong show traffic. REALLY… vancouver island is small enough… i have a very hard time believing that we have enough people to turn a freeway into parking lot! in any case, infusion day often leaves me a bit fuzzy with it all blurring together.

the dry tea is choppy, but not equivalent to pieces as big as in a verdant teas blend. i smell apples, but don’t see any. the only bits i see aside from black tea are gold coloured petals. it smells very sweet.

followed the instructions on steeping (what a strange day… i am being very well behaved!)… got a very dark tea from a short steep time, but the smell is still inviting.

overall, not bad. it’s not unforgettable but then outside of the really brilliant companies most aren’t—they’re different versions of something that any number of other vendors have by the same name just with a slightly different spin to it.

my only criticism would be that after a 3 minute steep i had a significant amount of bitterness from the tea! that’s the biggest drag down in terms of marks.

thank you cavocorax for this sample…. i will also thank sil as sil’s name is also listed on the sample bag! lol.

Not bad. i liked the puerh base, but i found myself wishing somewhat for more of a flavour commitment. i like peppermint tea, and i like vanilla, but despite there being 3 significant taste contributers i still didn’t really get a solid flavour direction or blend. not bad, but just kindof there.

a vanilla based mint where the mint is strong and the vanilla subtle so, a 60/40 mix. or the same ration with a vanilla with a fresher taste of mint? hmmm…. wonder if the puerh was responsible for the murkiness? might be more successful with a black instead….

i any case— not bad, but not great.

OOPS! forgot to thank cavocorax for this insightful sample! i am having one of those days!!!

without intending to my eyes flashed to the vendor’s description as i hit the ‘tasting note’ button…. ‘it would be impossible not to love this tea.’ well then i am an impossible boy.

dry it swells like sweet pipe tobacco, not quite what i was expecting, but as long as it’s not too heavy on the smoke i’m game to try it. as it steeped the smell evolved: tobacco and vanilla. however, once i moved to sipping my adjectives and taste palate vocabulary devolved to just one word ‘NOPE!’.

i must seem exceptionally uncharitable creating an adjective out of such a word, but candor saves time and ‘nope’ is shorter than ‘absolutely not!’.

in order to steep the black tea the higher temperature burns the white. i tasted no cocoa nibs or vanilla, although i did spy little black specks. i taste no malt as was described. what i do get is an on again off again flash of sea weed with tobacco ash.

i understand wanting the best of both worlds from the black and white teas, but i think that when you’re looking at such different steeping temperatures that the calamity that befell my teacup was very predictable.

not sure i will finish this cup. i am certain i won’t finish this sample…. what i will do is go and gargle with sTEAp Shoppe’s cinnamon swirl bread because that one is outstandingly executed.

for the second time this week my score is coming in far lower than the steepsters above me and i do feel the need to reassure those that are reading: i do not have a cold, i do not smoke, i am not terribly picky about foods and i have a freakishly good olfactory sense (nose). i even followed the directions! (not the way i usually roll).

Thanks cavocorax… i didn’t like the tea, but i greatly appreciated the experience. AND if you are someone looking to try a tea that all but one raved about send me a note and we can swap!

i am a great admirer of verdant teas… my reviews reflect that clearly. it isn’t just the quality of their teas, or their credit given to the He family of tea farmers and traditions, it’s also admiration for their customer service and their understanding of their clientele. this tea, however, expanded my horizon in a manner i wasn’t anticipating.

i joined steepster when i began to take loose leaf tea seriously. i had had a strange series of unfortunate tea events at david’s teas… i’d been back and forth several days in a row with problems ranging from allergies to just not liking what had been recommended to me! my patience was running thin and i was tired of spending my meager budget on gas. i decided to research my teas online before i bought. there through steepster i found verdant teas, butiki, teavana, andrews and dunham… and yes david’s teas (i just improved my margin of error). my eyes were opened and i found myself in love with leaves and flowers across the globe!

i had no idea that the simple act of opening the sample package of this tea would be the start the next stage of my education. the tea was brown as opposed to black, curled, with some leaves as long 2 centimeters. alright, so maybe not a hugely intellectual description, but not too bad either. my real problems arose when i tried to describe the taste.

it was… it reminded me of…. words hadn’t just failed me, they had made mass exodus out of my beleaguered brain. that is a rare occurrence for me! once upon a time i was an english major, i have been an english tutor and editor, always a writer and poet (don’t even get me started on art school). i was very much out of my comfort zone as a digital wordless and stammering goof. time to study.

the taste that was so familiar was a refined echo of a pecco orange black tea…. however, that particular genre can be quite harsh and acrid, whereas this tea was not. why not? because verdant uses (i think my terminology is accurate here) flowery grades… as opposed to many bagged tea blends that use fannings of minute size referred to as dust which are the lowest quality, and quite brutal to drink. i am beyond unqualified to estimate the grade of whole leaf used in this blend, LOL.

back to words i know: i taste earth and ceylon, i taste autumn and not spring, minute traces of citrus. i wonder what crops were planted nearby that vicariously influenced the tea bushes and their progeny. there is also an understated acidity that could have evolved into a harshness but did not and instead added freshness.

i have always been curious, but i can honestly say that A tea has never on its own pressed me into multiple feverish searches through wikipedia.

the great thing about a surprise is the many different ways that it can manifest. it can come in the form of ‘BOO!’, a lottery ticket win, realizing that someone was listening when you didn’t realize it and plugged in your favourite movie or meal. this tea was a surprise!

i am the scrooge that picks through the valentine’s day treats and chucks out the cinnamon hearts. they’re revolting. they burn my tongue and i hate the taste. i’m the one that only buys tins of watkins cinnamon because i genuinely think it’s the best tasting. don’t even get me started on oranges in tea: invariably tea companies dig too deep and include too much of the pith in the sample and my tea tastes bitter.

dry this tea smells like souped up cinnamon hearts. steeped… well, the orange much have been zested exactly right and the cloves of good quality because it works really well! surprise! the orange is present but doesn’t mess with my cream.

honestly the day couldn’t be better for it either because while the date may be june 20th it feels more like december 20th… wind, rain and a long day of errand running while it galed around me.

thanks cavocorax!

thank you so much cavocorax for this sample…. it was my first tasting from 52teas! (very exciting)

when i’m reviewing a tea i make a point of not reading other reviews until after the fact. i am relaying MY tea experience and my interpretation and i would prefer to communicate my strongest thoughts first before i reinterpret with ‘actually, that’s a good point.’ so i have read none of the reviews for this tea but i have seen the rated number… with which i must disagree but will explain why.

the dry leaf has the lovely woody undertone that honeybush alone carries. bits of cinnamon, bits of vanilla, both play a part in the scent profile. the strongest note, however is the strawberries.

strawberries are excellent. they are low in sugar even when they taste crazy sweet, they wear their seeds on the outside (how cool is that?), they are members of the rose family rosaceae, you can dip them in chocolate, whipped cream or put them in tea! strawberries should be at the top of the human edibles food list! (unless you’re allergic and then we could swap it out with melon or i don’t know… mustard.)

even before the waterworks these strawberries were not right to my nose. they smelled very much like the extra ripe strawberries you buy and intend to eat the day of, but then you forget and eat them two days later and you find them over sweet with a turned, almost fermented taste. i was concerned for my cup of tea.

i continued to brew and by the time i got to sipping my opinion had improved somewhat. the strawberries don’t taste right, but neither are they as off as they smelled. if i had to guess i would lean towards the freeze drying as the source of the problem or, perhaps, the harvest time of the strawberries. the berry note is very strongly sweet, but carries with it (to my palate) the distinct twang of ‘damn, i forgot to eat these the other day’. this is not a thing i like.

caveat: as per my post yesterday on cinnamon swirl bread, i was speaking to government ministries all day, so possibly that soured my palate, or perhaps the BRILLIANT cinnamon swirl bread tea made other things seem less than. option 3: steeper error? i will continue to investigate, possibly an iced tea? if my opinion improves i will return and make a note of it.

sorry folks, i have to knock that number down a bit =0(

Dear Cavocorax,

I wanted to write and thank you so much for the cinnamon swirl tea you sent me!

I woke up this morning with (and I’ll be honest) a certain amount of dread in my heart. I knew that today I was going to be stuck dealing with provincial government red tape and that it would probably take hours. Before I even got started I put the kettle on. ‘cinnamon swirl’ I determined as soon I perused the tea stash you sent me. It was the sample I most coveted as we wrote back and forth determining what we would send to one another.

My electric kettle clicked off and I opened the little bag of cinnamon swirl. Long fibers all stuck together reminding me of the tasty goo on top of a cinnamon knot… a vague scent of cinnamon, but not the heavy smell I had been expecting. Well, if there’s anything I’ve learned on this journey it’s not to judge a tea before it’s steeped.

At this point I will confide in you something that I hope you find most complimentary: I followed your written instructions! You always hear about different personality types: A, B, etc. people have always told me that I’m an SC which stands for Serial Contrarian. It’s never my intention to be contrary, and so far as I know I’m not a jerk, I just tend to do things my own way! That said with such a precious sample, did I really want to waste it by serial contrarianing it away? (I just couldn’t risk it especially seeing as I have read frustrations about not tasting what was expected by other steepers). so, 1 tablespoon for 6 ounces of water for 1.5 minutes of steep time…. Really? I thought to myself. Because I am famous for my long deliberate steeps as well as getting distracted and inadvertently making them even longer. Oh well…… instruction following. Yup yup!

The water changed colour and became rust hued, the vapour billowing out of my cup took on a cinnamon slant. I smelled a bakery! Just a second, afk… must take another sip. I’m back. The most remarkable thing happened when I removed my tea ball: mass amounts of red poured out of it! it reminded me of the huge red algae blooms you see in the ocean from space. It just kept pouring out and filling my mug. Wow!

Now, I know the purists would frown, but I added my standard bit of cream and sugar, it is MY cup of tea after all and for reasons that are old and complicated to explain those add ins give me comfort. (and who doesn’t need a bit of extra comfort when dealing with the government all day???)

The verdict: I am drinking cinnamon swirl bread. Cavocorax your instructions were magic! As I near the bottom of my cup there is cinnamon piled there. No floral notes or undertones aside from the warm taste of cinnamon bread. Interesting though because the flavour is warm even as my tea is cooling. This is lovely. Thank you for such a tasty respite from phone calls… and the directions so that I achieved the desired result!

Sincerely,
JustJames