Tamm

I am changing my score on this. Why? Because I’ve loved every cupful. There are plenty of mineral, honey, roast, and almost nutty notes today. See previous notes.

No notes yet.

I think I know what it is that throws me off about this tea: it kind of smells pickled. Both the dry leaf and the steeped tea have this kind of pickle-ness that is just weird in tea. After that first cup I’ve been avoiding this one a bit. Not because it is really terrible, it just has a very intimidating factor. This is a really “dirty” tea, in that even with my finest mesh this leaves a huge amount of floaties in my cup. I hate that. I find tea floaties and oily blends visually displeasing.
Today this tea smells much more juicy than my last one. I tried to make sure I got equal parts tea and extras. Today the tea seems more spicy with equal parts juicy fruitiness. It is okay; just okay. I can’t pin down what type of fruit this is supposed to be even though mango is in the name. It is not overly citrus, berry, or mango. It seems like the tea that can’t in a way. It wants to be this tropical, spicy thing and almost does just that, but fails because it is just a weird jumble of lots of things that sounds tasty.

I’ve almost been in a tea mood recently. All I drink is this and Amandine Rose! I’m sad that I didn’t purchase more of the Amandine Rose now that I found that I love it so much…
This tea is going to be gone pretty quick if I keep this up! I’ve had at least 5 16oz cups of this the past two days. I don’t know why I like this one so much as it has pretty regular flavors. There is herbal tones, chamomile, cherry, just a hint of white tea, and a surprising amount of apple. The apple itself is a lot more noticeable than the cherry and it pairs really well with the chamomile. I just figured out what it reminds me of! I had a Christmas (winter?) apple wassil or cider tea from Twinnings that was awful. I ended up giving it away, but this is just like that if it was spruced up and the craft store smell somehow got taken out. I wanted to like that Twinnings tea and that may be part of my love for this one. It has all the apple and herb notes without smelling perfume like. I may have to order a larger tin of this at some later time.

So some of these blends are a mystery when it comes to steeping times/temps. They just don’t tell you what you should be using and often combine white, black, and herbals all in one tea. So for this first steep I tried just under boiling water for 5 min. since my bag has tons of chamomile in it. The smell when opening the bag is really cherry, but much better cherry than in the Stiles blend (which is pretty meh to me). Steeped the liquor is light pinkish brown and smells really herbal. There are tons of herbal, cherry, and almost apple notes in this cuppa. It is really very sweet, which is something unexpected. I think that this tea is perfect for the character! I may tweak my steep times/temps to get a cup that is a bit lighter than this, but overall I’m pretty pleased with this one.

Screw the suggested temp. on this tea. I just made this at boiling and it smells divine. The cinnamon and almond cookie notes are far more prominent than at 195. The original tea did not fare well at boiling and sometimes tasted a bit like play doh if steeped this way; but this newer version takes the heat and tastes better for it. This is a pretty great tea and I have become quite attached to it.

This. tea. it has been haunting me for quite some time now. I’m lowering the score because it has become pretty obvious that I really just don’t enjoy it. This tea really needs balance. There just is not enough white tea to (a) justify the price and (b) make any difference in the flavor. There are mostly spice, orange, and warm flavors in this.

I’m actually pretty sad that I blew my tea budget already because a pound of this during the heavenly sale would have been pretty good. This doesn’t come out as good/tasty as the original tea; but it is a decent substitute. I’d love more cinnamon flavor. The rose is not as soapy as I was expecting (a really good thing!!!) I’d say that this is a pretty good tea and one of the more affordable Teavana selections.

I was cleaning out my tea cupboard yesterday and found this in the back. I really don’t drink this one very often because for whatever reason, it kind of bothers my throat. When steeped today at 3min. it smelled really roasted with less banana than other experiences with it. mmm this blend tastes of cream, banana, and light crust. I’m really glad that I tried this one because I haven’t had any other chances to try flavored hojicha!

So I was actually really sad on my last Adagio order that the next Zodiac Series/2012 mix that I wanted (Scorpio) was out of stock. These have been a really great value and the presentation is just amazing. Another thing that should be noted about Adagio is that their shipping far exceeds Teavana’s. Adagio’s shipping for my latest order only cost me $4 and will be here on Monday; I placed my order on the 30th. Teavana’s shipping cost $7, order placed on the 28th, and I won’t get it until next Thursday. : /
Back to this tea! This reminds me mostly of the rooibos lemon cloud, but with many more herbal notes. I’m glad it got more toned down because the original mix was not something that I enjoyed. I’m really glad Adagio offers such inexpensive samples for most of their flavored teas because there are a lot of them that I just don’t care for and the ability to try it out cheaper before investing in a larger amount really helps me keep my cupboard clean. Overall I’d say this tea is enjoyable and a great value, but would suggest this mostly to people who already enjoy the lemon cloud tea and rooibos; as those are the dominant flavors.

I love this tea so, so much. I think this tea is what made me fall in love with dan cong oolongs. This has mineral, fruity, green, and sweet notes. This has a heady honey taste as well that really astounded me the first time I tried it. I highly recommend this tea for oolong lovers!

sipdown!
This one has mostly green and fruity notes to it. I’m very surprised that this one lasted so long in my collection, but it has been haunting my sample box for awhile now. This tea can be steeped 3-4 times and is just amazing for me. I like my Tie Guan Yin to be green rather than roasted flavored so that must be why I prefer this one so much. A great intro to oolongs for newer tea drinkers and a great addition to my cupboard.

Ahhhh. I wasn’t feeling top notch today and I thought this tea would help. This is sweet, roasty, and kind of reminds me of oatmeal at times. See previous notes.

Smelling this in store worried me a bit, but on sale I just thought, what the heck, I’ll try it!
But it is very intimidating. I can smell this one whole room away once it has been steeped. The aroma is mostly chili and odd fruit notes. But you know what? It really doesn’t taste bad! It smells so weird, but the flavor is instantly fruity. There is some warmth to it, less than I was expecting, but it is interesting to say the least. The pu’erh really grounds the tea in a way that I wasn’t expecting. Dare I say that this one is almost tasty? I don’t know how to describe the flavor very well, but it isn’t the worst tea I’ve had. When this first came out and I smelled it I thought it was an aberation. Now? Not completely terrible. I’d say for those who are interested to give it a try and don’t write it off before trying it.

Okay so at the sale I picked this up forgetting that there is more than 1 version of this tea. So now I have Six Summits+berry pieces and Six Summits sans berry pieces. The sales person didn’t tell me that this was a flavored tea and you’d almost miss it if you didn’t know it was there. The tea is green, sweet, and fruity. I may have used an excess of leaves, not knowing how much these guys would unfurl! This is another one of those teas that is good, but first, didn’t need the flavoring, and secondly, is not worth the high price tag. If this was an $8 tea I could see that, but $18 seems unreasonably high.
The rating is the one carried over from earlier tastings of the Six Summits+berries version. I’m lowering it a bit now to reflect my current feelings on the tea.

backlog
This was a gift from my mother! :) I was really surprised about this gift as she’s LDS and there’s a big thing about no tea drinking. I guess she’s coming around a bit. The tin itself is super attractive, but unfortunately it is tea bags instead of loose tea. The dry leaf smells a lot like cake.
There aren’t any instructions on the tin so I steeped this for 3 min. at boiling and it turned out really great! For being some gift company this tea is quite nice. The base and overall flavor remind me vaguely of pancake breakfast+Pineapple Upside Down cake from 52teas. The cherry (gernadine) flavoring is very light and reminded me more of the filling for those sheet birthday cakes. It is a pretty enjoyable tea and I am surprised at how nice the presentation is.

There is something truly romantic about this tea. This is a beautiful tea: full rose blossoms, candied violets, a giant piece of carrot (I think?), lavender, and tons of dark, as well as lighter, white tea. I actually looked on Amazon at candied violets and they are hella expensive! The sales person indicated that they really wanted me to have a lot of the “goodies” so she scooped me out extra violets and rose buds. I really wanted to try this tea before, but the $18 price tag really dissuaded me; so the sale was a special chance to try this out. I’m also dying to try this mixed with the Swiss Vervaine tea to see if I can’t mellow it out.
I’ve liked lavender teas before and it is one of the purely floral teas that I enjoy. Steeped this is a very pale yellow. The liquor also has a very green smell that surprised me. The tea itself has a very soft lavender flavor, much less than I was expecting. Lots of floral notes too, backed up by white tea. This is a pretty good tea and it is instantly relaxing to sip on. I didn’t pick up on any of the peach notes that other people were getting. I really enjoyed this! I think that it wouldn’t be an everyday tea for me, but it is very enjoyable.

This looks like a more official post for the dan cong so I’ll be putting the rest of my tasting notes here.
I steeped this a bit long today (~40 sec.). The liquor is a light amber color and has some really prominent honeysuckle notes to it. It also has some interesting nutty notes to it as well. I am really missing the mineral notes that are so unique that were in the Asha Teahouse dan cong. This is a really good dan cong and I can’t wait to try more varieties!

This is my first ever blooming tea! I generally stay away from jasmine if possible (except on rare occasions) so this is likely the cause of this. This was another sale tea and I’d never, ever pay the $18 for this one. I have no idea where they get off thinking it should be that costly for these blooming teas. The balls themselves smell just like pineapple! They even have that acidic bite that I love so much.
Steeping this was pretty fun, I think that it didn’t fully unfurl during the 1st steep. The liquor is very, very light, but smells nice enough. A lot of the white tea smell is coming through. mmm this is pretty nice. Mellow, fruity, with white tea notes that remind me of the strawberry paradisio one from Teavana. Overall, it is a good tea. Is it an $18 tea? No chance.
edit
2nd and 3rd steeps were very good too! My husband liked it so much he stole a glass of it for himself. He was pretty sad when I told him we won’t be getting more anytime soon.

I’m actually really glad I ended up picking this one up today. Had I known I’d like it so much I would’ve purchased more!
So, unfortunately this is not almond biscotti. It is almond biscotti plus rose and it has its ups and downs. First, I felt that the base is less finicky than the original one; which was easy to embitter. It also had a weird play doh undertone every once in a while that was a bit odd that I completely missed today. The rose isn’t too prominent in either cuppa I had, but again, I’ve still got the sniffles so I’ll have to see if I notice it more later. The second steep was very thin tasting. I really liked this one for the price though and I’m really glad I tried it out! There aren’t any candied violets in mine and only 1 rose so this might change the flavor a bit.

So. I basically caved today and went to Teavana. Long story short I spent way more than I was planning on! But this is a more unexpected find. The tea seller had no idea they even had this tea and she had never tried it before. I said that I’ve had it and I like doing it with short steeps and can get 5-6 steeps out of mine. I think that the seller’s jaw dropped a little. She also seemed confused at how much I got for 2oz. It almost didn’t fit into their regular bags! So even though the weight was only 2oz the value seems to be much higher and this was on sale for $5/2oz instead of the usual $25/2oz.
I’m still struggling with my cold, so I’m a bit stuffy and tasting isn’t my strong point. The leaves are huge, wiry, and deep black/browns with almost a purple sheen; a really pretty tea. The liquor is a light brown color and smells mostly of honey and fruit. These flavors carry over into the flavor and it is very, very good. I’m surprised that this tea has a lower rating on here; maybe it has something to do with the pricing. I really love dan congs and this one is a great addition to my stash so I’m giving it a big thumbs up!

Another Teavivre tea for me!
This tea is really great for when I’m not feeling my best. It has a lot of sweet and roasted notes. It is super easy to make, so I can ask my husband to prepare it for me. I really love this one so I’m upping the score.

I’m still sick and I guess pu’erh is the only thing I can really taste, so here’s some more for today! :)
I can’t taste much, but this is leathery, bread, and broth like. I really like this one! Hopefully I can continue getting better through today!

I have been so sick this week. I was supposed to be tackling a huge reading assignment for a project I’m starting Spring semester, but I can hardly keep my thoughts straight. I’m very stuffy so this is the only tea that I can even taste today.
Today’s steep was at the same time, ratios, etc. as usual, but yielded a much lighter brew than other cups I’ve had. It tasted distinctly salty to me today. The hay notes were more evident with lots of honey too. I am glad this more brash tea is making me feel better.