__Morgana__

Yesterday was River Shannon’s first trial (Assam + Ceylon), today this (Assam + Ceylon +Yunnan).

All I have time for now is a pretty rushed note, as I have to get to the office, but I wanted to put at least something down before I forgot what I was thinking. ;-)

That depth I remarked was missing from the River Shannon? The +Yunnan changes that. There’s a balance, too, that tones down the Assam a bit at the same time it gives the tea some heft. There’s more sweetness, more maltiness, more yum. It has a fuller body. It’s closer to what I’d consider an appropriate coffee substitute.

Pretty sure I prefer this one for most mornings. Pretty sure I’m a Yunnan fan, not so sure about Assam yet. I don’t have a firm reference point in my mind for it yet as I’ve mostly had blends so far. (I’ll have to try Thomas Sampson soon!)

One thing I have to figure out about this one is whether I need to add milk to it. It is pretty strong even when brewed at 3 minutes. If I’m not careful, it can grab me in the back of the throat when I’m not looking.

This is a May tea of the month on the Classic plan. Again, though, it seems to have been reblended since the info was entered here. The label lists the ingredients as: Apple pieces, hibiscus flowers, elderberries, rosehip peels, flavoring, kiwi pieces, rose petals, strawberry pieces, marigold petals and cornflower petals.

What makes it Caribbean? No idea. The earlier blend at least had passion fruit and citrus. I’ve noticed, by the way, that Teavana seems to change their blends pretty frequently and pretty much across the board. It seems to be more the exception than the rule that something with a particular name will have the same ingredients as those listed for that name several months ago.

It’s very pretty, per the usual texture/color combo for the chunky fruit blends. Its colors range from very dark purple/red to brown to medium red, with blue flashes that must be the cornflower petals. Strawberry is prominent in the smell of the dry blend, the rest being a rather generic fruit mix.

Steeped, it’s a beautiful deep reddish purple wine color, and there is hibiscus in the aroma. I’m starting to wonder if this is the Teavana answer to Tazo’s Passion, or The O Dor’s Je M’appelle Dorothee. Which is a little freaky when you consider the ingredients in all three of these are very different from each other; it gives you an idea of the dominating power hibiscus and rosehips have.

It’s definitely in that ballpark. Both the Tazo and the The O Dor tasted like unsweetened black cherry to me without sweetening and like unsweetened grape juice with sweetening. This sort of does as well, except that it’s more unsweetened strawberry mixed with cherry before sweetening (like that flavor you get from tasting dry kool aid concentrate to which sugar has been added) and strawberry mixed with grape after. And something about it isn’t as flavorful as the other two examples.

Each sip starts with a hit of flavor and ends with one, but in the middle it’s as though there’s a stretch where everything got diluted just for a few seconds (maybe they should have called it Rose Mary Woods). It isn’t too tart to drink, but it has a little pucker to it and I prefer it sweetened up a bit.

Not my favorite, but certainly drinkable. I’d like to try it back to back with Passion and see what that’s like.

Another of my “starter” group that I get to wave goodbye to. Not at all sorry to see this one go. Looking back on my previous note, I see I had convinced myself I’d been able to improve it some. Now I’m wondering whether it wasn’t that I was just better prepared for the assault to my taste buds.

This was the first vanilla tea I tried. In a way, it was probably good that it was the first because it set the bar really low. In retrospect, I now understand just how low as I’ve since had really, really excellent vanilla flavored tea.

So as I take my leave, knowing what I know now about just how good vanilla flavoring in a tea can be, I must dock some points.

Had the end of the sample tonight and it wasn’t nearly as good as the first time around. I think mainly because there was a lot of dusty stuff the closer to the end of the packet I got and I’m guessing the orange flavoring sifted down to the bottom of the sample some. It was a lot stronger and not as pleasant this time. A fair amount of the dust escaped the Breville. I went through two infusions but had no desire to do more.

I’m torn because on the one hand, I remember being so pleasantly surprised the first time around that this didn’t come near sucking. But this time it was pretty disappointing. I wasn’t planning to order more anyway, but I’m glad I found out about its darker side.

Knocking it down a few points, but I don’t feel it’s fair to rap it too hard since it was obviously a problem mostly caused by the dregs of the leaf.

My first taste of this, made in the Breville.

The dry leaves have a rich, dark smell and I’m thinking “coffee substitute.” Good. Pretty, clear, red-tinged liquor, reminds me of the color of the GM Sinharaja. I definitely get the Assam in the aroma, but it’s fairly mild under the influence of the Ceylon. Once you get past the strength and pungency of the Assam, there’s a malty sweetness.

It tastes pretty much like it smells, with one pretty significant difference. It’s smoother than I would have expected based on the aroma. There’s some briskness and bite right at the beginning and again at the end, but in between it has no sharp edges. It sweetens up on the tongue in the minute or so after sipping leaving a mildly sweet aftertaste. It’s not sugary, but it is tasty. I’d call it medium-bodied.

There’s not a lot of what I think of as depth to the flavor, but I’m not sure it’s necessary that every breakfast blend be deep. Sometimes you’re having an omlette or a Belgian waffle, and sometimes you’re having cold cereal or toast. Seems like having the ability to mix and match is a good thing.

Although I’ve been resisting additives I am tempted to try this with milk, or maybe milk and sweetener next time.

I haven’t tasted this in a long time, and I’m a little surprised that I still think pretty much exactly what I thought about it the first time I had it. I’m sometimes bemused by that sort of accuracy because I wonder whether it means my palate hasn’t developed over the past few months?

To sum up, it’s better than any of the other Necessiteas rooibos blends I’ve tried (including the Rootbeer Float, which has a lot of fans) as well as some others, but not as good as the Teavana Rooibos Tropica or the SpecialTeas Rooibos Lemon Chiffon. The rooibos is mostly concealed, but not quite enough for my taste to be up there with the other two. Still, it smells unbelievably just like the real thing, and the taste is more than halfway to the real thing which seems something of a feat to me in and of itself.

It’s something I only see myself making an occasional cup of, but there are times when I need a caffeine free alternative that I can see it hitting the spot.

I rescued the Breville from the car! Actually, the BF remembered to bring it in when he got back so I can’t really take credit. But I thought since I’d wanted to use it for Jackee’s debut this morning but been foiled, I would start over and pretend this was my first Jackee tasting.

Using the custom setting to steep at 200 for 3:30. I just have to say that watching the Breville do its thing is really entertaining. I love how the basket lifts up after it’s done brewing. It’s like Disneyland.

Now. Let this be a lesson in how different brewing conditions can completely change the taste of something. I now believe that I previously brewed this too cool, rather than too hot as I’d feared. I think that in futzing around with the thermometer I inadvertently let the water cool more than it should have.

Incredibly, I now see the similarities between this and the Harney’s where I didn’t before. Either it has to do with the steeping, or it’s just that I’ve got a frame of reference for Jackee now. There is still smoke, but it isn’t as overwhelmingly smoky as I’d thought initially. It now has a lot more going on. The smoke is primarily on the tail, as it was with the Harney’s, though it is significantly more.

Caramel? I still get the hints, and I’m now getting a lot more sweetness. I can see where it could go to caramel, but it isn’t quite there for me yet. It’s more a suggestion than a full blown flavor. It’s certainly enough to make me want to engage in it’s pursuit, though.

ETA: The empty cup, after drying a little, does smell like caramel! Which must mean I’m pretty close…

I have to say I’m thankful that I’ve come to the end of this box. I only wish I didn’t still have about half a box left at work to get through.

Over the course of a few months I’ve tried this sixteen ways to Sunday — lower temp, longer steeps, shorter steeps, shorter temp, cold, hot, warm. It’s just not something I look forward to no matter how I prepare it. Sometimes there’s more peach, other times there’s more cucumber, sometimes there’s more or less tea, but it doesn’t really matter. It just doesn’t send me.

I have to bump it down a few points for not even having the ability to grow on me over time.

Yesterday, after the Earl, I did a Keemun from Harney & Sons. Today, I’m trying the fabled Jackee for the first time. He’s even more intimidating than Samovar’s Yunnan Golden Buds in terms of fame here. He’s like the really handsome and popular guy I was too intimidated to even talk to in school. I just knew no matter what I said he’d consider me a mild annoyance, like a gnat buzzing around his head, and that was if I was lucky. If I really made a fool of myself he’d consider me a foolish gnat, which would be even worse. And this with the full knowledge that he’s already taken anyway, so what’s the point. ;-)

The smokiness of the dry leaf was surprising to me, even though I’d seen mentions of Jackee’s smokiness. I wasn’t really expecting quite that much, since I think of him as a Keemun given his name and yesterday’s 100% Keemun didn’t have nearly this much smokiness; I only noticed anything near smoky in the aftertaste and that was pale by comparison. So I’m thinking Jackee must have some lapsang mixed in? I really should read all the notes methodically to see if anyone has actually figured out what is in here. I just read enough before trying this to know to try a lower steeping temp to make the caramel come out. I am guessing to some extent at my steeping temperature, because I boiled the water in a regular stove top kettle and I don’t trust my thermometers. (The BF took off in the car WITH THE BREVILLE STILL IN IT before I could get it out. Curses!)

The aroma of the steeped tea is also smoky, in a mild, non-tarry way, and here I get some sweetness as well. Yum.

Now for the taste. I get why everyone loves this. It’s got a mix of all the flavors and character that set off my pleasure centers: smoke, sweet, smooth and round. I have a feeling I need to play with it a bit more to get the parameters just right. I can see the caramel hints but I think I can make them come forward more with practice.

I will say though that I’m just as baffled as to what to expect from a Keemun now as I was yesterday since this is quite different from the Harney’s. I still feel the need to broaden my Keemun horizons before assessing how the Harney’s fares as an exemplar.

Jackee, though, is obviously in a class by himself.

Yesterday I started with Harney’s Earl Grey Supreme so today I’m giving the A&D a whirl.

Wow. I really like this. Figures, right? Limited edition and all.

The bergamot smells fairly strong in the dry leaf, but in an appetizing way; not oily, not perfumy, not stomach-wrenchingly acidic. When steeped isn’t too strong at all, just a little stronger than the Harney’s (which means pretty much exactly the right strength for me). And not only that, it has a very interesting quality to it. It isn’t oily, and it isn’t tart, but it has a sweetness to it, and it’s almost as though it has a floral note to it without being perfumey. In any case, it’s got a depth of character that I haven’t experienced in a bergamot flavoring before except maybe in the Samovar Earl Lavender.

The tea is mild, smooth and medium-to-light bodied. It’s a good foundation for the bergamot flavoring to show off on, and frankly I find the bergamot flavor so interwoven with the tea as to make an attempt at describing the tea separate from the bergamot futile. It has an unobtrusive, slightly sweet finish.

I’m sad that I’m going to have to distance myself from this one so as not to fall in love, it being limited edition and all.

I wasn’t able to get the kiwi to do a solo using the rest of the sample, but I have the feeling that even though my view of it is somewhat obscured, it’s in the back of the room raising its hand. There’s definitely something going on other than strawberry and apple, and it isn’t rose hips or hibiscus. It’s a nice drink.

I’m noticing that unless they’re too tart (unless you like tart, in which case substitute the word “sweet”), fruit blends can basically be described as “nice drinks.” The heat of them is calming in the evening which makes them more comforting to drink than juice, and without the calories. They’re also generally less in-your-face-fruit than juices are. It’s hard to say one is terrifically better than another apart from which side of the sweet/tart dichotomy you happen to fall on, and which fruit flavors you generally prefer. I suppose one could give extra points for a particularly satisfying blend, too. But that’s about all I can see to distinguish one from another. Anything I’m missing?

This was a tea of the month for April on the Classic plan. You can probably tell from the fact that it’s halfway through May and I’m just now getting to this one that I wasn’t overly excited by the sound of it. First three ingredients: Apple bits, hibiscus, rose hips. I’m puckering just reading it. This is already sounding like a job for the two bags of Tazo honeybush.

Then it goes on: beetroot, citrus peels & slices (in case you missed the orange slice the size of Alaska), flavoring, orange petals, sunflower petals, orange juice bits (um, er… I guess this means they freeze dried it? does that mean there is Tang in my Teavana?) pomegranate blossoms, rose petals.

It’s beautiful in its chunkiness as I’ve found all Teavana fruit blends to be and dry, it smells wildly of orange, so in that respect it lives up to its name. The tisane itself smells much more well rounded, almost like a fruit punch but without strong berry or cherry representation.

Now here’s the really interesting part. This cup, at least, IS NOT TOO TART! How can that be? Maybe it’s the “orange juice bits.” Or maybe the “flavoring” is sugar. It tastes like orange, but not in an orange juice or orange drink way, and it has a sweetness to it that is all the more welcome for being unexpected.

I don’t think this is something I’d buy again, but I’ll enjoy drinking my way through it. The reason I wouldn’t buy it again is, apart from lemon and apple, I’m not really in the market for a single note tisane. I may have to eat (or drink) those words at some point, though.

Side note: I got the Breville! We got it at Williams Sonoma tonight, a late mom’s day present. I can’t say I made this with it, though, as after getting the kids new shoes, going out to dinner, coming home and putting them to bed, we were too tired to get it out of the car. Tomorrow. ;-)

This is a tea of the month for May on the Classic plan. What they actually sent, though, is called Rooibos Peach (sans Bloom) and seems to have a slightly different ingredient mix. Ingredients listed are: green rooibos tea, peach pieces (peach, rice flour), flavoring, marigold petals, safflower petals.

It looks like very fine confetti in a mostly neutral color palette (muted green, hay color, brown, some flashes of red which appear to be flower petals). In the package it smells strongly of peach. There’s a little bit of a grassy/hay smell also that is the green rooibos. There’s no red in here that I can see. I am wondering whether Teavana has stopped using red rooibos in some of its fruit blends? If so, it seems to be working well. To me, green rooibos has even less flavor of its own than red, so it is an even more malleable base for fruit flavors.

The aroma after steeping is also strongly of peach, with a hint of vanilla (which must be coming from the rooibos? or maybe it’s the rice flour?) as is the taste. It’s quite nice. The rooibos isn’t noticeable really except as a vanilla note and as a sort of green aftertaste among the fruit/vanilla. To be clear, this isn’t a “peaches and cream” flavor, despite the vanilla note. It’s like peach with a vanilla outline.

It meets my criteria for good rooibos, as the rooibos isn’t loud at all. But it is sort of a one trick pony without a lot of depth or surprises. If you’re a peach lover, you’ll probably enjoy it. I have to give it a high mark for being a good rooibos, but it’s not as interesting flavor wise as some others I’ve rated higher.

Apparently I’m on a bit of a Harney & Sons sampling kick. I’d like to say I’m going to be methodical about it and stick mostly to these for a while but that would probably be misleading. I have just as much of an urge to go on an Earl Grey, Breakfast Blend, or oolong or pu erh or chai comparison kick, or to do a methodical French tea sampling. I can see myself doing a lot of H&S for a while, but I doubt we’ll be in an exclusive relationship. ;-)

100% Keemun. Hmm. Not sure I’ve had that before? In the sample packet the dry leaves have a dark and sultry smell. Not sweet, more earthy or planty, at least to me. There’s also an interesting sharp note that seems like …. vinegar and salt? Seriously I’m having a flash to potato chip seasoning. I’m getting that note in the steeped aroma as well. Pretty interesting and not something I’ve experienced before. I’m intrigued.

With that aroma I’d expected a sharpness to the taste, but that’s nowhere to be found. It’s incredibly smooth! There’s a sugary sweetness in the finish that follows a woody flavor. No salt or vinegar in the taste. There’s a fullness to the mouth feel, though I wouldn’t describe it as quite full-bodied. Closer to medium. There’s an interesting, almost smoky note in the aftertaste. The tea is a little drying, but I kind of like that so it doesn’t bother me.

Hmm. Not sure exactly how I feel about this. It’s good, but I think I need more Keemun experience before I pass judgment. I’m not sure I’d pick it over a richer, fuller breakfast blend. But you never know.

The dry leaf smells promising as the bergamot isn’t too strong, oily or perfumey. Once steeped, the bergamot’s aroma takes a back seat to the malty, sweet black tea. The liquor color is a light brown-orange.

The flavor is quite nice. It’s like the GM Tippy Earl Grey would be without that bakey weird thing that bothered me about the GM.

I never thought I’d say this about an Earl Grey, but if anything, the bergamot could be a little stronger. Still, it’s quite enjoyable because the underlying tea is very tastey. It’s medium-to-light bodied, no bitterness, a little astringency. There’s a citrus and sugary tea aftertaste.

I have a lot more Earl Greys to try, but this is a strong contender.

Celebrating bidding farewell to this today as I polished off the last of the bags in the home stash (never mind that I still have about half a box left at work).

I became used to it, and the lemon flavor was ok, but it never wowed me. It didn’t do much as a representative of mate either as it didn’t have enough of a positive effect on my tastebuds to make me want to try more or better mate.

Not a purchase I will repeat.

I’m obviously in something of a minority here, as this tea was pretty much exactly what I expected it to be and I enjoyed it quite a bit.

Let me say first, though, that I put about 1.5 tsp in for about 8 oz of water. I didn’t find it to be weak, the chocolate and the mint were both present and accounted for and not overly subtle in my experience. I didn’t get a lot of the tea, but frankly, that’s become a secondary consideration for me with flavored teas — if I wanted a strong tea taste I’d drink it unflavored, or I’d drink something I knew to have a strong tea base presence. It doesn’t bother me that much anymore, as I have added more and more members to my pantheon of great teas, that some flavored ones are more about the flavor than the tea. Next time I might go to two tsp and see what happens. Maybe that would bring the tea out a bit more.

To me, the mint was very fresh tasting. It didn’t have a candy aspect to it, but it naturally sweetened up the tea and the chocolate so that the tea didn’t whisper to me that it wanted to be sweetened or to have milk added. This in contrast to the Herbal Infusions Chocolate Mint, which seemed to want sweetening.

The aroma of the steeped tea is heavier on the mint than the chocolate for some reason, but it’s still a nice smell. Sniffed in the sample packet, the mint is eyewateringly strong, which seems to me a good confirmation that it is v. fresh and its volatile oils haven’t dried up. It’s got that pretty black/green mix thing going on in the dry leaves. I’m biased though because black and emerald green is my favorite color combo.

This is going on the list for if/when I ever come out of lockdown and place a full order with H&S.

I have been wanting to try this for freakin’ ever and I decided today is The Day.

I expected to smell Frangelico when I opened the sample packet. OMG. It’s not a syrupy “essence o’ nuts” I’m smelling, it’s the nuts themselves. Down to their planty innards! I can almost feel their little round bodies cracking between my teeth. And the slightly bitter smell of baking chocolate. I can see why people are invoking Ferraro Roche (drool), but the thing that makes this different is it isn’t sugary like those little balls of trouble are.

And this is just the smell of the dry leaves, which, by the way, are dark dark dark and look almost soft and beautiful. I’m coming to recognize this as the signature of an awesome flavored black tea.

The liquor brews lighter than I’d expected for some reason. It is, interestingly, a sort of hazel nut color. The “true nut” aroma of the hazel nut seems to have mellowed some with steeping, and blended into the chocolate. Mmmmm.

And the taste is a lot like the smell. It’s quite wonderful plain, but the lack of sweetness in the chocolate seems to beg for milk and something to sweeten it. I was happy to accomodate it. With just a small amount of sweetening, the flavor becomes downright lush. The chocolate moves from the unsweetened taste of baking chocolate to the bittersweet of dark chocolate. With more milk, it would probably move further, all the way to milk chocolate. Three, three, three drinks in one! The hazelnut is an accent; a strong, Italian one, that provides a middle note during the sipping and a reminder on the back end.

I was only in Florence for a few days many years ago, but I loved it. It was unseasonably cool when I was there in the summertime, a welcome contrast to the heat of Rome. My memories are, primarily, of clear blue skies and flowers in window boxes everywhere I turned. I remember going for a run along the Arno, the Uffizi (of course), and the adorable little bed and breakfast we stayed in with its old fashioned cage of a lift and its roof garden where we ate in the morning. I still have the pocketbooks and coat I bought while I was there. Mostly I remember being young and in love, the future stretching ahead like the clean pages of a new journal, waiting to be written.

I’m not sure how much it is the name of this tea that makes me want to buy a pound of it immediately, and how much is how it actually tastes.

Ah youth.

I can’t believe I even ordered this, since the thought of bread pudding makes me make a yucky face. I don’t like puddings in general on consistency grounds, but the idea of bread pudding is just gross to me. Of all the things one would make a pudding out of, why bread? When I was in college I lived in a co-op and one night a week I was the main dinner cook for something like 140 people. Bread pudding was pretty regularly something the menu planner had decided I should make and during the whole process of preparing the bread I kept asking myself why?

So it was only for the sake of completeness that I ordered a sample of this. And I say for the second time today, it works surprisingly well. Who would have thunk it? Probably the main reason it works, for me anyway, is it doesn’t really taste like bread pudding. It tastes like the ingredient profile that goes into bread pudding, but without the main objectionable ingredient: bread.

In the packet, the blend smells mostly of raisins and rum. Steeping makes the custard come out to join the other two flavors in the aroma and I’m glad that I can also smell a sort of full bodied sweetness that is the black tea. Liquor color is black tea against my white cup; looks a lot like the Coco La Ven sample’s liquor.

It’s nice. It’s not as interesting as the Coco La Ven, but it is well blended and flavorful. There are no sore thumbs sticking out here, none of the bitter rum flavor that plagued some of the Necessiteas greens that contained rum flavoring. It’s a raisin, cream and rum flavor with a solid base that supports it well.

As I close in on the last of my Necessiteas samples, I’m drawing the following conclusion: they’re best at rooibos, followed by black tea, followed by white tea, followed by oolong, followed by green tea. There are clunkers in each of the categories except rooibos, but for the most part, their black tea blends are worth trying.

ETA: I am at the end after all. I do have a weird mystery tea sample in my possession, but I can’t identify it. It came without a label, and it appears to be black tea. It isn’t Cafe Latte, because I ordered that and they refunded my money because they said they didn’t have any. All of my other ordered samples have been accounted for. At first I thought it might be Cinnamon Bear, but it can’t be — the cinnamon isn’t nearly as strong as the tasting notes here describe. So it will remain a mystery. Which is too bad. It isn’t as good as the Coco La Ven or this, but it was ok.

A strange little tea, full of surprises.

When I read the ingredients, I thought it sounded like a terrible mistake. Yet it actually works pretty well.

The dry mix in the sample packet smells mostly like vanilla/coconut and chamomile. The addition of water brings out the lavender. (The mixture in the infuser after brewing smells mostly like lavender and chamomile. Its nice. The association I had was with the smell of something that belongs in a sachet in my sock drawer.)

My glass tasting cups are all in the dishwasher so I’m having to view the liquor against a white background. It’s dark, definitely getting its color from the black tea. The aroma is mostly chamomile, followed by lavender, followed by coconut, followed by vanilla. I’m not detecting much in the way of tea.

The taste is extremely interesting. It has an almost minty taste and feel to it, a volatile coolness. I think this is the lavender. I can taste the chamomile, and it’s in the foreground, but surprisingly it’s not that mouthful of flowering hay taste chamomile sometimes reminds me of. The lavender and coconut (or maybe the tea) take the edge off, so it’s all of what I like about chamomile with none of what I don’t like about it. There’s coconut/vanilla at the end.

The main thing I’m not tasting is the tea. It’s strange, though. I’m not really tasting it, but I’m aware of its presence.

I didn’t try this with sugar and milk, as suggested. I will give that a try next time.

I am pretty impressed that this turned out as well as it did. Who would have thunk it?

Another big, chunky fruit mixture. This one brews to a really beautiful melon color. OK. I want a sweater in this color, too.

I was in this for the lemon, which isn’t very fair. The aroma is at least one part lemon to one part something else, but the something else is probably closer to two parts. The lemon comes first, then the other, which is denominated mango in the name of the tea.

Thing is, it doesn’t really smell like mango. It smells sweet and fruity, in a Jolly Rancher sort of way, but I’m getting more of a generic fruit back end. If I hadn’t known it was supposed to be mango, I probably would have pegged it as nectarine.

That said, the taste of the tisane only suffers if you expect it to taste like mango. It’s actually, in some ways, better tasting than mango. Mango, the fruit, can have a mealy thing going on that squeezes the taste of the fruit into a unidimensional almost pungent, not quite delicious sweetness. (Other times it is wonderful.) This tastes more like a mixed red fruit taste than a one note mango, which may spare it the risk of mango disappointment.

I like it just fine. It’s as good or a better example of its genre as the Strawberry Kiwi from The Necessiteas that I tasted recently, and probably about as good as Teavana’s Strawberry Lemonade. It’s sweet enough without doctoring. It’s just a different mix of tastes, and isn’t what I was looking for in the continuing lemon search. I prefer the Strawberry Lemonade. But I’m trying not to let my bias cloud my judgment of the lemon Mango’s merits.

The last of the The O Dor samples accompanying my order. Apparently they have at December 25th in almost every color. There’s a black, a green, and a red in addition to the white. Reminds me of my mom, who would buy a pair of shoes in several different colors. I don’t do that. OK, maybe once or twice, but that’s ALL.

They gave me the white one — I guess because I ordered a lot of black tea, so my samples were green, rooibos, this one, and mysteriously, Earl Grey. The dry leaves look like white peony (not that I’m an expert) with orange peel and other stuff in them. They smell like a fruitcake, or perhaps the more sophisticated sounding and generally better English version, a Christmas pudding.

There’s a dense, alcoholic (guessing rum) laced with fruit aroma coming from the steeped tea. The liquor is a burnished gold color with sencha-reminiscent particles suspended in it.

The taste is mildly fruit cake spicy, with an undercurrent of alcohol and a mellowness that borders on sweet that I am guessing is the contribution of the white tea. I feel like adding apple into it and calling it wassail.

It’s tasty and something that I might enjoy revisiting in winter. A bit too much for the coming summer heat, even with the white tea base.

Golden Moon sample No. 31 of 31. I just looked back at the note for sample No. 1 and I started this journey 28 days ago. So almost a month here, too, Ewa. This seems like a really nice tea to end on, as it has a lot of love here on Steepster. It’s one of the ones I’ve been most looking forward to trying.

It’s probably not the best idea for me to be drinking this at 9:30 p.m., but at least it should keep me awake to finish my workout, which was interrupted earlier today at about the 1/3 mark.

I love the look of Ceylon leaves, that twiggy, delicate, dark brown bird nesty thing they have going on. The only other pure Ceylon I’ve had is the Samovar, and like that one, the dry leaves of this one smell a little tobaccoey and a little fruity. But I’m getting an interesting mocha-java note too.

Wow, what a beautiful color! It’s not that different from a black “tea colored” liquor really, but it has a rosey hue to it, like someone dropped a few drops of cranberry juice into it. I want a sweater this color!

The aroma is totally nommy. I get the molasses in a big way, but underneath the sugary sweetness is something else. Something that smells like that red color in the liquor, but that I can’t give a name. I think it is what the company describes as berry. The more I inhale it, the more I realize: it’s raspberry, and I don’t have to throw my mind out of focus to find it as I did with the Samovar.

Taste: I like. Lots. This seems to be among the fuller bodied Golden Moon black teas, the opposite of my experience with the Samovar Ceylon, which I found to be less deep and rich than the other Samovar black teas I’d tried. It’s smooth, and it has a character that reminds me of a lighter red wine. I get the toastiness, and some sweetness, but not too, too much. Despite its depth, it still manages to have a freshness to it without being astringent.

It was indeed a special way to conclude my voyage under the Golden Moon. Now, I must go place my order, the one I grandfathered into my lockdown by virtue of starting this trip almost a month ago.

It’s not goodbye, Golden Moon. It’s hello, again.

Another detour along the path of Project Finish Golden Moon samples. This was another sample The O Dor threw in with my order from them.

It’s unclear to me exactly what is in this. It came in a white envelope with a handwitten label on it with just the name of the tea. The web site isn’t much help either. The dry mixture looks like sencha with red and pink flower petals in it, but it’s also got a couple of little twigs, which seems odd. It smells spectacularly like cherry. To the point where I can’t smell the tea at all. I’m guessing there was some flavoring added as I can’t believe a few dried flower petals could generate the sort of cherry fragrance I’m smelling (even if cherry blossoms smell like cherry, which they may, but I wouldn’t know).

The liquor has that characteristic, hazy sencha look, with little particles suspended in the water. It’s yellower than it is green, and on the lighter side but not pale. The cherry fragrance is present after steeping, but it isn’t as strong and is balanced with another, somewhat savory, buttery scent.

After all this build up, disappointingly, it doesn’ t have a lot of flavor. There is a subtle cherry note at the finish, but what comes before isn’t distinctive. I’m hard pressed to identify it as tea. It’s more like a broth without a lot of flavor. I imagine this is what sodium free “lite” chicken bouillon might taste like — mild to the point of almost tastelessness.

Sad. There’s nothing at all offensive about it, and the cherry is done well. In fact, the cherry being done well is the only reason I’m giving this a rating higher than the Golden Moon sencha, since I’ve experienced a lot of poorly flavored green teas. But I’d hoped for a flavored green breakthrough, figuring if anyone could do it, the French could. It’s a curse, I tell you.