Emilie

The last time I had this, I accidentally drowned out the flavor with some almond milk. This time I used normal milk and went for a ten minute steep. I really enjoyed this one. It’s a less intense chai, with the coconut adding more creaminess than actual flavor. If you’re wanting a very strong coconut flavor, this probably isn’t the best for you, but otherwise it’s really good.

Looks like Steepster ate my note for this one. This smells really strongly of rooibos, but doesn’t taste like it. It’s a good creamy banana flavor, but no chocolate. This should be renamed Banana tea, though it is good.

Just finished the last of this. I really enjoyed this one. I only steeped for six minutes, and definitely didn’t get as much flavor as the eight minutes. I recommend going for more time.

I saw someone mention earlier today that they wanted to try a combination of Della Terra’s Autumn Leaves and a lapsang souchong. Not only did I think that sounded very good, but I have samples of both that I want to clear out. So I combined Autumn Leaves with Lapsang Souchong from Happy Lucky. I figured the lapsang would overpower the Autumn Leaves, so I used extra Autumn Leaves. The lapsang is still overpowering and the maple doesn’t really come in until after the sip and in the aftertaste. This smells really good, but will have to be messed with to get the taste right.

Finished the last of my sample from Greatlin off. Unfortunately, I think I waited a little too long on this one, as it had lost a lot of flavor. This is one I wouldn’t mind buying at some point

This was the last tea I had last night. I wanted something cold brewed, and I wanted something fruity. I’ve only had this once before, so I put it in the fridge for about 12 hours. It looks like my thoughts haven’t changed much since my last note. It smells sweet and fruity and delicious, while the taste is more white tea balanced well with the guava, without one feeling like it’s overpowering the other. One I will definitely be using to get me through the upcoming Texas summer.

For some reason, I’ve never logged this, even though I had two ounces and I used the last of it last night. This was one of my first loose teas, and I’m sad to see it go. I’ve had it for almost two years now, so it was about time it was drunk. This is a very sweet peach tea, it smells a lot like the gummy peach rings I used to eat all the time. So, I may like this partially because of nostalgia, and partially because it’s local, but I promise this is a good peach tea if you’re looking for something sweet. If you’re in the Austin area, check out the Steeping Room. I hear they’ve remodeled recently, I may have to go back and get more of this and check out their new look.

My roommates left for a week of spring break, while I’m staying. I’ve needed to go through and redo my tea cupboard, and now that they’re gone, I can go through all my tea without the judgement. I’m not sure I want them to know exactly how much tea I have! This is one that I’ve had forever and forgot about, sadly. I finally get to try it! Unfortunately, I’m not really tasting much from this. I don’t know what’s going on, because this has a million good notes. I’ll have to try this again later.

I’ve noticed a lot of the reviews of this mention an odd smell before steeping. Mine, however, was all creamy coconut with a bit of an earthy smell. Maybe there was a bad batch going around at one point? As soon as the water hit the leaves, I got this really delicious smell of some kind of baking coconut cake amazingness. I drank this along with my Greek chicken salad. I really enjoy the way the flavors are mixing together here. The coconut isn’t super strong here, it’s more subtle and adding a creaminess to the puerh than being a BAMINYOURFACECOCONUT flavor.

Cold brewed this one, and I’m really liking it. I’m not very good at picking out individual flavors, but I feel like I might be getting cranberry at the end of the sip. It’s an overall fruity, berry, slightly tart (but the good, berry kind of tart) flavor that I’m enjoying. I’m not sure how well this will hold up hot, but I think this will be a good iced tea when the weather warms up.

TART. That’s the first thing. It seems like a mix of the hibiscus tartness and the berries. There’s a vague sweetness there too, that I think is the chocolate hanging around the edges. The aftertaste actually tastes like some berry filled chocolate thing, but I was really wanting the whole tea to taste like that. I’ve had good luck with cold-brewing overly hibiscus teas, so I may try that out later. For now, I’m not overly impressed. I feel like this tea could actually possibly taste like it’s supposed to if the hibiscus was removed

I got this in a coffee and tea exchange, along with wonderberry truffle and superfruit unity.

When I opened the bag, it smelled extremely cinnamony and spicey. Not really what I expected from the name. There were big, delicious looking pieces of nuts in there. After steeping,it smelt very toasty and nutty and more of what I was expecting. I think I didn’t use enough, because it was a bit weak, but the flavors I was getting were lots of cinnamon and a definite toasty, nutty flavor.

Today is a bit crazy. A final all morning, work from 12:30-5, and my on campus job from 6-midnight. All while trying to survive in Mafia, which is basically a campus-wide excuse to run around shooting each other with nerf guns. So I KNEW I had to start the day strong with some black tea. This was the first one I came to, so I decided to give it a try.

Unfortunately, my travel mug is a bit soapy. Not too much, but its there. I know that’s spoiling the flavor, but I did get a bit of cranberry as it cooled.

Hmm, so this is an interesting one. I’m not sure if I like it or not yet. In the bag, I could smell plenty of milk chocolate and a bit of a bergamoty smell. However, it didn’t really taste like that. The chocolate was there, but the very first thing I thought when tasting it was that it tasted like somebody took the orange out of Davidsteas Chocolate Orange Puerh. I haven’t had a chocolate puerh, but I would imagine it tasting just like this. Now don’t misunderstand, it wasn’t bad. It just wasn’t what I was expecting. Perhaps chocolate does weird things with bergamot? I did brew this in my travel mug, so I will have to try it normally and make sure there wasn’t any contamination, though I really don’t think there was.

Got my Della Terra order in today! I had mentioned that I was interested in the Peach Oolong in a discussion, and I received it as a sample! I don’t know if that was a coincidence, but I really appreciate it.

This is the first one I decided to try. It smells minty in the bag, but after being steeped there’s not much mint at all. I can taste the creaminess, but not much mint or chocolate. I added some sugar, which really helped quite a bit. I feel like this would be really good with milk, but I don’t have any :( I think I might steep for longer next time, since the range on the bag is 2-5 minutes.

Decided to try this today. It smells very cinnamony, with a pastry smell mixed in. After steeping, it smells more like really sweet cinnamon, a little less of the pastry. I had to gulp this one down really quickly before lab started, so I didn’t get to take time to taste. However, I remember it being a bit weak and watery. It was more cinnamon and a bit of tea flavor, not much pastry. I’ll have to give it another go when I have more time.

On the bag, this tea recommends a 4 minute steep, and on here a 5 minute steep is recommended. A lot of people seemed to have success with a five minute steep, so I went with that. It smells really good, very naturey and campfirey. I really like smokey teas, and this one is good. It’s very smokey at the beginning of the sip, with the mint coming in at the end. I’m not really getting much of a berry flavor, I think it might be mixing in with the smokey flavor to make it nice and earthy. I wonder how this would do as a cold steeped. Maybe the berry flavors can come out more

Trying this one again after quite a while. I have to agree with a lot of my previous tasting notes about this. It has a very strong peppery smell before steeping, and a sweet, warm, bakey smell after steeping. I went with the four minute steep, and two teaspoons this time, and it seems that more of the peppery flavor has come out. It seems like before, it was mostly sweet. Now, it’s a peppery sip, with a sweet, bread-like aftertaste. I’d definitely be interested in trying more Yunnan black teas. Raising the rating a bit, as I really enjoy the variety this tea has.

Uh oh. I think I killed this poor tea. I was talking to my roommate and wasn’t paying attention to what I was doing with this tea. I accidentally poured boiling water in, and didn’t realize until afterwards. I was hoping it wouldn’t affect the tea too much, but I’m getting hardly any taste at all! Of course, it could be my taste being off because I’m sick, but I didn’t really have trouble with the others I’ve had today. Definitely trying this again once I’m not sick, and with proper brewing conditions, as the reviews for this are wonderful.

This one was next in my day of tea. I’m sending the rest of it out soon in a trade, so I wanted one last cup, even though I apparently never logged the others.

I have to agree with some of the other reviews I’ve seen that say there isn’t a strong coconut flavor here. It smells very creamy and coconutty, and while the creamy smell is there in the flavor as well, the coconut is difficult to find. The spices are nice, and the chai flavor is good. I feel that adding milk might help bring out that coconut flavor, even though this is creamy enough that milk probably isn’t needed. Unfortunately, there’s never milk in my dorm room, since my roommate doesn’t drink milk at all and I only like it in teas. We can never use it fast enough, so it’s pointless. Also, our fridge is tiny.

Big surprise, after taking care of my sick boyfriend all weekend, I get sick. Fortunately, it hasn’t hit me anywhere near as hard as him. I’ve just been staying home all day, sipping tea and doing homework (and by that I mean playing Civilization.)

I started with a resteep of this one. Not much different to say. Probably a little sweeter, and less of the other flavors.

I received this in a swap on r/teaexchange. I don’t know anything about it besides that it is a high mountain oolong.

I didn’t get much time for tea yesterday, as my boyfriend is sick, and I had to go take care of him at his apartment. It’ll probably be about the same today, so I’m getting this one in before I go over.

This is a really nice golden color. I’m still not really good at picking out scents and flavors in unflavored teas, but I’m working on it. I would say there is a vegetal smell, with a hint of something roasted. With the first sip of this, it is definitely sweet. Sweet, smooth, and creamy, though a little weak. Perhaps resteepings can fix that. There is a vegetal flavor in the aftertaste.

I wish I had someone nearby who could be my tea mentor. We could taste different teas, and they could show me what all these different flavors are. Right now, I feel like I still don’t know what I’m talking about. Though, I guess the only way to fix that is to drink even more tea!

I made this up this morning for a nice caffeine boost during my classes. I’m mostly just logging that I drank this, as I was paying more attention to my notes on resistors and capacitors than the taste. However, I do remember that it was sweet, and a little tart and juicy. I can’t say much about it, but I do know it was good.

This is a tea I received in a “Secret Santea” exchange over at www.reddit.com/r/teaexchange. I was given this story along with it: "oh another note that black tea called “Tender Lovers” has a story with it that i think makes it even tastier and special :-).
When me and my gf went on vacation last year we visited Washington state and in a strip mall in Renton there is a tea shop names Xiu Xian tea and we stayed at the store for no less than 4 hours talking with the owner all the while tasting at least 10-15 teas and multiple steeping of each.
I asked if she had any rare tea or interesting tea and she pulled out “Tender Lovers” and explained that her family had a wedding a few months ago in china and they had picked and processed this tea specifically for the wedding. She had only 3 pounds of it left and then there would be no more of that specific tea.
I know this story wasn’t bs because the woman was very honest and it wasn’t any more expensive than the other teas so she wasn’t trying to up-sell it. Hell she even had me taste it to be sure and it was “so damn good” as she would say about a lot of her teas.
So when you drink that tea it is a one of a kind!"

I’ve been putting off trying it because it sounds so special, I almost didn’t feel like I deserved to get to try it! I’m glad I do get the chance though. There weren’t any brewing instructions with it, so I went with boiling and three minutes. I always see people mentioning hints of chocolate flavor in straight black teas, but I never really got it. At least until this tea. When I finished steeping it, I picked it up to move it and got a big whiff of creamy, slightly smokey chocolate. It tasted like it smelled, very lovely and smooth, with no bitterness. I’ll play around with steep times and temperatures to see what personality this tea has.