Seeing all the hubbub about the 12 Teas of Christmas has reminded me that I never finished mine from last year – in fact, I don’t think I even tried half of them! I found Christmas far too busy with family and food to have time to deal with the 12teas, and then they were forgotten at the back of the tea shelf until now. Luckily, only one last year contained an ingredient I loathe (coconut) so there were still 11 others to try. I am excited that Frank is doing bigger sample sizes this year as I thought it was a bit of a ripoff last year (2 cups per sample, so $30 for 24 cups), but I will not be partaking this time. Unfortunately, 52Teas don’t tend to be to my liking, with a few notable exceptions.
All that aside, I’m brewing up some cinnamon roll honeybush – the cinnamon is certainly there in aroma, though I’m not getting anything pastry or bakey. 5 – 6 minute steep yields cinnamon flavoured water, with a hint of something honeybush at the end. I am not a huge fan of cinnamon and I find it to be very overwhelming in most teas, but when it’s done well it can be really nice. It may just be because of the age of my sample (obviously it’s a year old) but this one isn’t yielding anything beyond the two notes of cinnamon and honeybush. I would like to see something in the middle there filling it out, a bit of sweetness to represent the icing, or something bakey. I love cinnamon rolls, but this is just cinnamon tea, to me. : (
