I have saved the ones I am most afraid of for last (from last year’s 12 Teas of Christmas) – Ginger Ale White tea, Pancake Breakfast and Buttered Popcorn. The thought of them makes my tummy go queasy. White tea makes me nauseous and the other two just sound revolting in tea form. I won’t even eat buttered popcorn jelly bellies! Anyway, obviously this sample has been kicking around a while so take this with a grain of salt.
The dry aroma is reminiscent of dill pickle popcorn seasoning. Wait a minute, what? Yep. Dill pickle seasoning. Weiiiird. I found this sample to be smaller than the others so I am pushing it to get two cups. Hopefully I have enough in there to make a well flavoured cup. Steeped in a T-Sac for about four minutes, this is lacking in flavor. Thinking I should have just used the whole sample rather than trying to get two cups.
Steeped aroma is non-existent, maybe a whiff of something tea-like. That’s pushing it though. The flavour is a smidge of ginger followed by sweet white tea. So far it’s not upsetting my tummy, but it’s not doing anything good for me. Not much of a taste or smell so it’s hard to judge. For me, this is not a winner but I am not a fan of white tea as it is, so it would be harder to win me over. I think a bit more ginger strength would really help here – the best ginger ales are potently ginger with less sugar, at least for me! : ) I can drink this, but mostly just for the merits of a warm drink on a cool day. The windchill this morning was -18!!
EDIT to add that this one only gets worse as it cools. While I did over-steep it a bit in my attempt to couch some flavours out I am just getting some over-powering lower quality bai mu dan. My leaves were pretty broken up and I am getting some bitterness from that, which is not my thing.
Second EDIT: Bergamot. Of course. That’s what’s making it so dusty and dry. I can barely get a hint of it, so my sample must really have suffered from the passing of time.
