Starfevre

Got this as a sample from yssah in a humongous pack of samples. Thanks so much!

Blackcurrant isn’t my favourite thing by any means, but it’s not bad. This is, for a flavoured tea, quite good. The blackcurrant is nicely strongly flavoured, no chance of missing the flavour in this tea. It’s not overpowering though, just very present. The black tea base sort of fades into the background, supportive but not pushy. And I got the perfect amount for exactly one pot of tea!

OMG guys, this one is AMAZING! I think it just popped itself up to being my favourite matcha, green matcha even!

When I opened the package I could smell it pretty strongly, not quite sure what it reminded me of, but it was definitely cherry. Black cherry soda possibly? I’m definitely going to have to try this one with the cola matcha because I have that one too, though I haven’t tried it separately yet.

I used my Breville to heat up some water to 175 degrees because that’s the only kettle I have at home that can heat to specific temperatures. I have two at work, go figure. So that was a bit of a pain, but I used that and frothed with my little electric matcha whisk with a bit of sugar and then put in 10 oz of skim milk that I had heated up in the microwave. I think I’ve got the perfect time down for milk in all the microwaves I associate with. The half-pint carton at work gets a minute in the upper microwave and the 10 oz of milk in the liquid measure gets 2 minutes. I guess that means my microwave is only half as powerful as the work microwave, oh well.

I frothed this one up a little extra, even after I poured the milk in, which I don’t usually because if I don’t hold it precisely at the correct depth to the liquid it either does nothing or it sprays everywhere. There was a bit of spraying.

But seriously, this is one amazing flavour. I was not expecting this one to be done so well, though looking at the other reviews perhaps I should have been. I might have to try the other cherry flavours now to compare. There are what, four of them? More than I have seen in any one place where cherry flavoured things are located. Including the grocery store sometimes where there are actual cherries and Washington is a cherry producing state. Hmm, Rainier cherry flavoured matcha? But I digress.

This is really good and you should go get some at: http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/black-cherry-matcha.html

I should also note, that I got classic matcha level and distinctive flavouring and there was certainly plenty of flavour at that level.

Fruit juice again. I used to like this tea a lot, but now I get tired of fruit juice teas. I prefer my tea to taste like tea nowadays. This is fairly old, but doesn’t seem to have lost much flavour. Good, just not feeling it today.

Drinking this again this morning. Actually, I just finished my cup, but it was made nicely (as I only sometimes manage to do) with complete smoothness and no bitterness at all. The matcha flavour was quite present and the vanilla was there, but not as strongly as I would prefer. Reading back through all the reviews, it seems that pretty much everyone but me got this flavour in robust, so I’ll definitely have to try that next time.

Another sample of this. This time it is, I believe, from Alphakitty instead of my own order. Hopefully I love it this time as much as I did last time. It was really really good. This time there was a lot of tea dust that got shaken out of my strainer before I put it into the pot. I noticed it all over my desk when I was filling the basket so I shook it over the trash a bunch of times. Hopefully there will be less contamination in the actual tea because of that.

Well, I’m wondering now how old this sample is. I’m getting much less vanilla than before. It’s still present in the aftertaste and in the slightly creamy smoothness to it, but it’s not quite as…there. I still like it, but I’m not IN LOVE with it as before. Hopefully when I finally end up getting around to buying this tea (eventually, hopefully, need to drink some tea down before I make any more orders) it will be more like my first experience than this one.

Got this one as a sample from my order from The Persimmon Tree. Made it up this morning to drink, although I would much rather still be in bed sleeping than drinking tea this morning, but work awaits.

I actually find this one to be pretty strong. Possibly this is a function of putting less sweetener in than usual, but it seems quite bold to me. Peppery and smooth, it is a nice tea, nice flavour. I have too many other wicked high end plain black teas to buy this, but it’s nice.

Well, this is very much like fruit juice. Truly, if I hadn’t had fruit juice in a while, which I haven’t, I would think it was fruit juice. Very fruity tisane. A bit too much hibiscus.

First matcha made at home! First matcha made with my little electric whisk! (wow is that thing ever whisky). First try of this matcha, having finally brought out my tea tins from RLT to fill. I made this one into a hot latte, with a bit of hot water to whisk it up with, half a teaspoon using my ‘perfect matcha teaspoon’ and 10 oz of hot milk. I think next time I need to make the milk hotter. I actually measured too, in my liquid measure. So this is made as perfect as I am capable. Added sweetener because that’s the way I like it, but not too much.

This is really really good! The raspberry is really nice, light on the tongue and not too heavy and blends well with the creaminess that goes above and beyond the milk added. It’s definitely living up to its name as ‘raspberry and cream’, like most of the Red Leaf Tea matchas I’ve tried. The black base is nicely supportive of this flavour. I’ve always liked pairing fruit and black tea together so I’m glad I chose well when I picked this one. There’s a hint of that bitterness that black matcha sometimes gets, at least when I make it, but it’s in the latter half of the sip and ignorable with the rest of the goodness overwhelming it in the end. Altogether, I’m very glad I got this.

You can find it at: http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/raspberry-and-cream-matcha.html

First cup of this! Order came 2 days ago and I’m getting around to tasting it now. Funny how it came before the order I had placed previous to this that is just getting around to being shipped. I guess they really wanted this one to get out to the people! Not complaining in the least.

So I made a 2-mug pot out of this. Western style, about 3.5 teaspoons to 750 ml of filtered water, 175F and 2 minutes. I wish that the packaging had western style brewing instructions instead of just gaiwan ones because I don’t have a gaiwan. Oh well, guessing it is.

I don’t think I guessed too badly, though I think I’ll add a minute to the second steep later. First mug added milk and about a teaspoon of sugar. It didn’t taste too sweet, though the sugar definitely brightened it up a bit. The black tea was sort of subdued in the face of the RICE RICE RICE that landed on my tongue. I’ve had (one) chocolate genmaicha before, from 52teas, and I couldn’t taste the chocolate then, as I can’t taste any chocolate now. I read Terri’s review though, after I had made it, so possibly I just didn’t shake up the package enough for the cacao to be in the spoonfuls that I scooped up for this batch. I’ll be sure to do some shaking next time.

Second mug, filled up way to the top so, without sweetener or milk, I sucked down a couple of ounces. I generally can’t pick up much for tasting notes with plain teas, for some reason they all mainly just taste like bitter. Although there really was no bitter in this, no squish face for me, and it was drinkable, but I still haven’t reached a point in my tea journey yet where I can drink black tea without sweetener. I’m down to a quarter of my original sweetener additions from the start of my journey, but can’t quite make that last jump.

Added a bit less sugar to the last of the second mug and it suddenly tastes a little too sweet. Perhaps the toffee I had for breakfast finally wearing out? Tastes less like RICE and more like rice and black tea. I haven’t had Laoshan Black separately, though it is in my order that is coming in the mail soon, so I can’t really compare, but it’s a really nice black tea. Still no chocolate, but that’s to be expected since it’s the same pot. Looking forward to steep #2.

Not quite sure what I did to this today, but it’s quite bitter, even with about twice as much sweetener as I originally wanted to use. Will have to pay more attention next time. Maybe froth more? Drink faster? Use less?

Used 1 teaspoon to make one 10 oz mug.

So other than the disastrous peach matcha episode of a couple of weeks ago, this is the first fruity matcha I’ve tried. I was kind of concerned because it is a generic ‘berry’ flavour and not any specific type of berry, but back when I made smoothies with berries, I used to dump at least 3 different types in at a time and it always came out pretty well (unless I overdid the cranberries).

Berry matcha from Red Leaf Tea (found here: http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/berry-matcha.html) is definitely ‘generic berry’. Not to say that’s bad, exactly. It’s certainly not my favourite thing, I just got off of a batch of dessert-y matchas including the infamous caramel matcha so I have some matcha favourites pretty cemented already. But it is good. Not great, but good.

There’s a slight slight slight tinge of bitterness in the back of the throat as I drink this (as a hot latte) but it’s certainly easy to ignore and doesn’t detract much from the experience. I think if I were to buy this again, I’d pick the robust level of flavouring instead of the distinctive. I would stick with the classic grade matcha though. I don’t like this one enough to warrant a higher grade matcha. Although now that I’m thinking about it, I think I might enjoy this one more if it were made with black matcha. I’ve always enjoyed the interaction between black tea and berries.

I did add a bit of sweetener to this, about a half teaspoon of rock sugar to my 10 oz mug of milk, water, and matcha. Used about 2/3 teaspoon of matcha. I think I might use a full teaspoon of it next time. It will probably take a while for me to get through this small order.

There are days, like today, that I wish I was affected by caffeine. Matcha has a fair amount of caffeine, 70 mg/tsp or something, according to the Red Leaf Tea website. I’m still searching for caffeine content for black matcha, but I expect it’s quite a bit higher than that. I didn’t get any sleep the night before last and I think I woke up in the middle of a REM cycle this morning because I kept having to slap myself to stay awake during my commute in. Unfortunately, while matcha is tasty first thing in the morning like today, the caffeine is not helping me wake up.

Creme Brulee Matcha (Found Here: http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/creme-brulee-matcha.html) is a nice thick custardy sweet sugar drink. I made this as a hot latte with a bit of sweetener from classic grade, distinctive level flavouring, green matcha. After having French Vanilla and Bavarian Cream matcha yesterday, I can’t say I’ll get all 3 again, probably just one of them, though I don’t know which one, but it’s nice to taste this all the same. It tastes like the custard part of the dessert, not the spun sugar top, but it’s quite nice. I haven’t had creme brulee in a while, too obsessed with chocolate things, but this is a nice reminder.

Trying this matcha, my 7th run at flavoured matchas, right after having the French Vanilla matcha so I can definitely taste the difference. They really aren’t very similar at all.

Aside from the custard-y vanilla flavour that’s not quite the same as the french vanilla, there’s also the definite flavour of lemon! Quite strong for me too. This is the classic matcha grade with distinctive level flavouring made into a hot latte with a couple ounces of water, frothed with a fork (I’m at work) and finally with one of those little half pints of milk like you get when you’re little for $0.25 from the school cafeteria in elementary school. They’re probably a dollar now, but they were 25 cents in my day! Man I feel so old, I’m only 30! But I digress.

There is a slight hint of bitterness in this that I didn’t experience with the French Vanilla matcha, that one was a bit smoother, but this one is creamier and the bitterness is quickly overtaken by the flavour of matcha and vanilla/lemon. I think I like the distinctive flavour level on this one, I’m not sure I’d want the lemon flavour to get any stronger. But this is good. Not my favourite, but good. Another success! Now I just need to keep that streak going for the next…15 matchas that I have that I haven’t tried. I won’t be opening them all at the same time though, I only have so many tins and I’d be hard pressed to drink them all while they are still fresh if I had that many open at the same time. A pity, but I’m happy to drink the ones I’ve tried so far that I purchased.

This matcha can be found at: http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/bavarian-cream-matcha.html

Well, let me start off with the fact that this is the 4th normal (green) matcha I have tried and is now ranked number 2 on my ‘like’ scale of green matchas. I have LOVED my black matchas, but I’m just starting out in my world of ‘normal’ matcha. Haven’t managed any of the non-flavoured stuff yet, but it’s just a matter of time.

The first green matcha that I liked was the champagne matcha in distinctive flavouring and so I thought, hmm, maybe I will like everything in distinctive flavouring! Wrong. Robust would be much more preferable in this french vanilla matcha. I like it, it tastes smooth and pleasant and there’s nothing much objectionable in this at all, even for someone like me who doesn’t especially like green tea at all. Unfortunately, I seem to be lacking the actual vanilla flavour though. I can pick it up in hints on the edges of my tasting perceptions, but I like it much more upfront than that. When I order again, and I probably will, I’ll probably order this flavouring again in robust, and there’s a good possibility it will be black matcha as well. I’m finding I like it better. But I have 14 more green matcha flavours to try, of which this is the first that I have actually bought and not just got as a sample from traders, so I’m cautiously hopeful. This one isn’t horrible, like 2 of them I tried, and although the flavouring isn’t as strong as I would like, I can definitely drink the rest of this without problems.

Key points to note: this was made as a hot latte, as in the ‘second best’ way to make matcha according to RLT’s pamphlet they send out with each order. I added no sugar, though I usually do for these types of things. This just plain didn’t need it. Though I think I will right now with the remainder of my latte. Maybe that will make the flavour stronger? Hang on a sec…

Alright, this is even better, sweetener does bring out a slight French Vanilla flavour. Now I know what to do next time.

Apologies for the rambling nature of this comment. I got no sleep last night.

This tea can be found at: http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/french-vanilla-matcha.html

I’m a little wary of the itty bitty black tea leaves that are in this blend. It’s just not what I look for in a tea. Perhaps I should have read the description before requesting this tea from Alphakitty? Who knows. I have enough for 1-2 more cups after this, though I usually make pots of 3 cups at a time, as I did this time.

I added a ton of sugar to this after reading all the reviews on the astringency of this blend. I hate astringency. It seems to have worked partially, although now the flavouring is POPPING and so much so that it all tastes pretty artificial now. There’s a bitter tinge to it that not even the sweetener could eradicate. I’ve let it cool down some now and the cherry flavour is really really there, but at the same time, I do not like this one. Oh well, can’t love them all.

If my last tasting note is any indication, this is the tea I pick when I haven’t had any sleep the night before. Strange that. I’m drinking it again, it’s just as good as the last time. I’ll blasphemously put half of my pot in a travel mug to drink on the way to work. It won’t be as good then, but it will still be good. And I’ll probably brew up the second and third steeps when I get home from work.

Had another pot of this tonight. I’m really finding that I like it better at room temperature better than I do hot. It’s more raspberry and less bergamot at that temperature and that’s the way I prefer it. I’ve really been moving away from earl grey over the last few months, perhaps my tastes are changing but I’m really not liking it as much as I used to. This is still a pretty tasty tea though.

Decided to try out my other matcha that I have here at work before I go home for the day. Maybe the amount of caffeine in 2 matcha lattes (black) will actually affect me in some way. So far it’s just making me vaguely headachey.

I just licked the spoon I was using to stir the little bit of sweetener I put in and mmm this is going to taste so good. And it totally does. The caramel flavour comes across really well (although I DID use the robust flavour setting so it might be that too, this is from my first order at Red Leaf Tea and I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do, so that seemed a safe way to try out matcha for the first time. Playing it safe with both the black matcha base and the robust flavouring level.

This one for some reason doesn’t have that little bit of bite that I’ve started to associate with black matcha, it’s much smoother and nicer. This is really really tasty. I haven’t tried it with regular matcha yet, but I think that might be on my list for my next order (I have 2 orders not even unpacked and I’m planning my 4th order already, I think I may have a problem).

At any rate, this is wicked tasty and I recommend it to anyone who wants to try out flavoured black matcha because it’s just about perfect.

You can find it at:
http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/caramel-matcha.html

I got this in a trade with Alphakitty from a few months ago, just got around to opening the envelope. I need to find a good way to mail matcha though, because I can’t use a normal sized baggie if it’s going to adhere to all the sides and take up all the matcha that way. Going to have to think on that.

I made this as a latte at work. Frothed it up as much as I could with some hot water and a fork, added hot milk to it. It’s a nice inviting hot chocolate type colour, so that’s nice. It certainly smells like it will taste good.

This still has a slight bittery aftertaste like the other black matcha I tried but it fades quickly so that’s alright. The upfront flavour, though, is fantastic. I can definitely taste the raspberry and the chocolate in this and it tastes really good. This is a good one to have with the black base, I don’t know that I would like it nearly as well with a green one.

So far in my life, I haven’t liked oolongs very much, but I also haven’t tried very many at all either. Certainly none from such an esteemed company as Whispering Pines. This trade is from Alphakitty. She sent it to me back in January and I’m just now getting around to tasting it. I love to do trades, but I have a bad track record for actually drinking the traded teas in a timely fashion. My bad. If anyone is irritated by that that has traded with me, I can put your trade on the top of the pile. Otherwise I’ll just go on picking an envelope at random a couple of times a week.

Back to the tea, this is not as scary a tea as I thought it would be. In anticipation of not liking it, I couldn’t make myself drink it until now and it’s cooled off completely but I think I like it this way. I’m always really torn between how I like a tea most, hot or room temperature. I rarely drink iced tea, even in the summer. This tea, however, is strongly mint and that’s nicely refreshing at the cooler temperature. I can taste the oolong, oh yes, but I can’t really pick out any specifics to the flavour except that I probably wouldn’t like it plain but it’s just fine with the mint. I don’t pick up really any cinnamon which is strange because usually I’m so sensitive to it. Well, it’s a bit ‘warming’ despite not actually being warm so that might be the cinnamon talking. All in all, not bad. I’ve got another cup of the tea waiting for me (I made a pot) but I don’t think I’ll be steeping this again.

SIPDOWN! I don’t know why I hoard the last bits of a tea sometimes. Sometimes I don’t even like the tea very much. This one might be a little overleafed because it was a bit more than one serving and a bit less than two servings left, or I estimate because I couldn’t get it all into a teaspoon so I just dumped it all into my gravity infuser since there wasn’t enough left for a pot.

This tastes…well, stronger than I normally have it, but still okay. Sweetened and milky, this also has a bready flavour and a bit of malt this time. Not astringent or bitter. Pretty good and I’m glad I could let this one go.

I know I just had this last week, but with a not-great tea tasting day so far (out of four, drank 2, liked 1) I wanted something that would actually bring a smile to my face and that I knew would taste good. Out of my teas at work, this one was right in front so in the pot it goes.

I think I underleafed this a bit. It’s definitely weaker than last time. Possibly also due to the fact that I dropped the temperature a bit to see what would happen. Definitely keeping it at boiling next time. And at least 4 tsp for 750 ml. 3 just didn’t do it for me. I think I used 4 last time.

Other than being pretty weak, this is still a good tea. Nicely flavoured and makes me happy-wiggle in my seat. I’m glad I have a few extra packs of this coming to me in the mail.

This is, I think, the final tea I got in my trade from Tea Sipper (that I hadn’t had before, so I’ll be able to move onto someone else soon. I’m so behind on tasting my trading teas. With the possible exception of my Red Leaf Tea orders, I’m going to stop opening boxes from tea companies until I get through these trades. Probably.

Wow, this is strong rooibos. I’m not sure I like rooibos enough to really enjoy this tea. And yes, just taking some to drink, I can barely taste any vanilla but the rooibos is REALLY REALLY strong. I just don’t like rooibos this much. This is the type of flavour I would expect from a pure rooibos tea since the vanilla flavour is very subdued, if it’s even there at all.

I believe I got this bag from Tea Sipper but my trades are all getting confused in my head. This is why I should only open one trade at a time. It’s also a good thing that this is an herbal tea (which I..uh..didn’t look up before steeping) because I totally forgot about it. The cup is still hot though, so I couldn’t have forgotten about it for too long. Glad I looked it up before putting milk in though.

Honestly I’m not sure I’m going to like this. Hibiscus is a hard ingredient to work with and cinnamon is on my list of ‘do not like’ ingredients. Going to give it a try though. This tastes mostly of strong hibiscus and oranges with a cinnamon undertone. Thankfully the cinnamon isn’t too strong, but the hibiscus is making the tea rather tart. It’s not terrible, but it’s not a tea I would seek out again.