LiberTEAS select Send Message

This is a sample that I purchased from Samovar a while back… and just now getting around to trying it.

This is one of the better tisanes I’ve ever had. Generally, I prefer tea to tisane, although, there is a place in my life for tisanes – especially later in the evening (and since it is 12:30 in the am, I think that qualifies!) when I’m starting to think about heading to bed.

The flavor is very fresh and vibrant, yet the tea is very soothing. It is a very nice tea to have at the end of a long day. I suspect that this would be very refreshing as an iced tea too. Now that I’ve had a chance to really try this, I wish I would have gone ahead and bought the 2 ounce tin, rather than just the sample package… this is one that I would like to enjoy again, and also share with friends.

Perhaps I will have to remember that when I get around to placing another order with Samovar!

The mail came today and with it came this very special tea that was created just for me – but not by me! And, I so prefer being a tea customer to being a tea purveyor.

So you fill out a questionnaire and a few weeks later, you receive a blend that was created just for you! This is what Madam Potts created for me!

I was going to save it to “christen” my breville with, but since I will most likely be waiting until July to receive said toy, I really don’t want to wait that long to try this tea… and I’m glad I didn’t!

The Darjeeling and Oolong work really well together. The floral notes sort of meld together into a unique kind of flower – it’s sweet, sharp and very pleasant. The Sarsparilla is a pronounced flavor here and together with the carob root it makes for a sort of cocoa flavored root beer-ish flavor. The black pepper adds just a subtle hint of spice that cuts through some of the sharper floral notes.

I REALLY like this. I love the floral notes here together with the carob… It’s just… so difficult to put into words how interesting and yummy and ME! this tea is. And since it is so me… I must give it the highest rating possible. :)

Yay! Earl Grey!

I really like this tea. I steeped it a bit longer than I did previously. Even though Andrews & Dunham suggest 5 minutes steeping time, I just can’t do 5 minutes for a black tea. I think my palate tends to be overly sensitive to bitter taste, and since most black teas do take on a slight bitter edge when brewed over 4 minutes (there is the occasional exception, but, for my palate, I have found this to be the standard), I don’t usually take a black tea beyond 4 minutes for the first infusion.

So I decided to push it to the 4 minutes this time (usually, with a black tea, I have a “standard” time of 3 minutes, regardless of what brewing parameters might suggest). Only a slight bitter note at the back of the palate… but not off-putting. But what I do notice is that brewing it longer brings out more of the floral qualities of the bergamot, whereas the 3 minutes, I’m left with a fruitier bergamot with only hints of floral.

It’s quite good both ways … but I think I prefer it with the 3 minute steep time…

Having a Ginger Peach Matcha Smoothie today: organic vanilla yogurt, frozen peaches and Ginger Matcha. YUM!

The smoothie looks a bit like split pea soup (or maybe baby food peas) but, gratefully it doesn’t taste like it (I hate peas). The matcha flavor is softened quite a bit with the other ingredients, but I can still taste it, along with the ginger. The peaches and ginger taste amazing together. The vanilla flavoring of the yogurt adds a nice creamy flavor to the whole thing… Very YUM.

I am contemplating even increasing the numeric rating on this based just on this delicious smoothie, but, I won’t. But… I will just say that this Matcha was MADE to be an ingredient for yummy-yums like this!

This tea smells yummy! I tried it first without any sweetener, and then added a little bit of raw sugar and found that this brought out the caramel-y goodness. This would also be very good as a latte with some steamed, frothed milk… but I don’t really feel like getting out my frother, so I think I’ll just drink it as is… it’s really good this way.

It’s hard for me to drink another caramel tea without comparing it to my Sweet Caramel o’Mine, because, well… I really like my Sweet Caramel O’Mine. :) But to be fair, I will try to leave that bias at the door.

This is a very good tea. The black tea base is smooth and rich. It is a non-assuming kind of black tea, that is, it doesn’t try to overwhelm the flavor of the caramel toffee. I love the buttery notes here. It reminds me a lot of a piece of… well, caramel toffee! Once upon a time, I used to make my own (when I didn’t have kids and a lot of other responsibilities that kept me from doing things like that) and this reminds me of that fresh, buttery toffee.

This is the first time trying this tea. It’s been in my cupboard for a little while, I bought it at the same time I purchased Dawn and Honeybee. But, as I said, I have a lot of teas …

Anyways… This tea is yummy! Fresh vegetal taste – less on the grassy side and more on the cooked veggie side. These beauitful, long, spiral-y leaves slowly unwind and unfurl to a full leaf that appears to be small and quite young… but whole… and absolutely lovely.

I am currently enjoying my third infusion of this tea. With each new infusion comes a smoother flavor that is savory and sweet all at once. The Simple Leaf is simply amazing!

Decided to start my day with a cup of maple-y goodness today. This really is a great change up from a breakfast breakfast blend. The black tea is pleasantly brisk, with a very smooth temperament. It also has just a hint of smokiness to it that compliments the maple flavor nicely.

The maple is sweet and lip-smacking YUMMY, but not too sweet (at least, not for me!) Overall it’s a very rich tasting cup with a good amount of “get-up-and-go” to it that I look for in a breakfast tea.

Around this time of night, I’m always looking for an interesting tea that is not a tea – that is – a tisane. This one kept calling to me tonight. The last time I tried this one, my taste buds were just starting to get out of whack, so I consider this my first “true taste” of this tea.

I love the look of this tea (as well as all the teas from 52Teas!) Big (huge!) coconut shavings, and chunks of pineapple… and it smells as good as it looks. I can smell the rum in this one.

Yum! it is so deliciously tropical. The pineapple, the coconut… the rum flavor is so nice too. The flavors are very well balanced.

As yummy as this is hot, I do think I’m going to reserve my remainder of this tea for iced tea brewing… it is just so much better when it’s cold!

I’m increasing my rating of this one a bit, because it deserves it! It really is good.

Decided to enjoy a bowl of this on this very cold, rainy evening… it’s very comforting to cup my hands around the warm bowl and sip the warm, ginger-y matcha. The ginger is not strongly spicy, but it has enough warmth to it to make it pleasant, especially on an evening like this.

The matcha is smooth and rich, although, I must admit after my very frothy matcha latte last night, and the beautifully frothy Den’s Tea Matcha a couple of days ago… I do miss the froth in this cup. It does froth – but not quite as nicely as the latte mixes or Den’s Miyabi Matcha.

Sweet, vegetative, just a little bit of bitter, and warm ginger-y spice = a lovely bowl of Matcha!

Another one of my favorite teas from 52Teas. If Chocolate Banana Rooibos is my favorite, I would have to say that this one comes in a close second. I love it.

And… an interesting side note, every time I brew this tea (or even happen across it as I sort through my stash to find a tea to brew) I hear that song “Knights in White Satin” from the Moody Blues playing in my head. I realize that the song is WHITE SATIN and not Black Satin, but tell my head that. LOL I love that song – so mysterious and beautiful…

And this tea is so good. The licorice flavor is the BEST of any other licorice flavored tea I’ve tasted (a close second would be Golden Moon’s White Licorice, which is also quite special to me because my favorite ice cream flavor is Tillamook’s White Licorice…but I digress) The cinnamon is not a sweet cinnamon, rather than a spicy-hot type cinnamon flavor, and the sweetness of the cinnamon cuts through some of the sharper notes of the licorice perfectly.

An AWESOME tea!