Amy oh

Tea of the afternoon…
this stuff is so YUMMY! I think I need to order some more now.

that is all. :)

This tea is a bit strange…
I love darjeelings but I’m not really sure this combo does a lot for me.

The blackberry reminds me of elderberry and seems slightly medicinal. I’m usually a fan of anise but in this combination it just seems weird. At least it’s supposed to be good for your stomach. Probably my least favorite of the teas I got from the Jasmine Pearl so far but I will drink it eventually. I felt it was much improved by the addition of some soymilk.

I think this would be really nice as an iced tea — I will have to try it that way someday. :D

I haven’t had this tea in a while. It isn’t awful but it also isn’t one of my favorites… been trying to decide if I should keep it but I don’t think black teas really go stale like green ones do. Definitely one to take with milk (or in my case, soymilk).

See previous notes if interested.

I am finishing off the last of this sample tea today…

I’ve said it before but it’s too bad that Rare Tea Republic has gone away. I especially liked their white tea selections – now what ever shall I do? This tea is custard-y and pudding like It reminds me a bit of rice pudding. I like it!

Tea of the early evening…

I had a lovely afternoon today at the Conservatory of Flowers and now I’m having this floral named tea. :)

I’ve had this for too long, I think it might be a little bit stale but it’s still drinkable. This is by far one of my favorite teas from Rishi. It’s also very good iced.

I thought I’d continue the theme of chocolate tea by having some of this today. Why haven’t I been drinking more of it? It’s so good!

see previous notes for more details

Tea of the morning here.

My general feeling on chocolate teas is that they leave a lot to be desired, especially if you are expecting them to taste like hot chocolate.

This is a nice blend of black tea, pu’erh, carob and chocolate. I believe there is some vanilla flavoring in here too. It’s mildly chocolate-y and has a bit of heft. I like the fact that they decided to put pu’erh in here which gives the tea a nice added dimension. I am not blown away by it, but I do like it. It’s nice with some vanilla soymilk added in. Probably would be more appropriate as an afternoon/dessert tea. I’ll certainly finish off the bag happily.

Tea of the afternoon here… an oolong from the Jasmine Pearl.

GABA is supposed to have a calming effect and who couldn’t use more of that?

I decided to use the gaiwan to steep this and put in about 1 tsp of tea, steeped for 30 seconds. The wet leaf smells very much like fresh corn to me.

1st steep is a light yellowish infusion. I am getting the sweet starchy quality that gets compared to bananas & yams. For me it is still reminiscent of corn since it has a slightly vegetal quality. The overall flavor is quite pleasant.

The 2nd steep I did for around 30 seconds and it is a bit darker. Now that the leaves are starting to open up, there is a definite buttery flavor coming up in this tea.

3rd steep is much like the first. I think I am detecting some subtle notes of vanilla. It’s difficult to say whether or not I feel any calmer from drinking this, although I am inspired to do some meditation right now.

Finishing off this sample pack today… I purchased way too much darjeeling last year and still have a massive amount of samples so that’s one thing I do NOT need this coming spring. I do admit it was fun to try all the FF darjeelings but I still have so many. Blah!

This oolong is floral and fruity, I did a tasting note on it months ago so you can check that out if you’re interested.

You can never have too many straight black teas, which is really the reason I got this with my last order. :)

First tea of the morning here, the sun is out and I will need to go for a nice, long walk later.

I steeped this for 4 minutes and am enjoying it. I don’t think its anything in particular to write home about, just a nice yunnan black tea. It has some light notes of malt/sweetness along with a very mellow character. I would definitely recommend trying this plain before adding anything to it, it doesn’t really need a lot. I am not really getting the peppery note described, but perhaps it’s too early in the morning!

Here’s another tea I got from the Jasmine Pearl Tea Merchants.

This tea sounded very intriguing to me… a smoky dark blend with orange and spice. I would say the predominate black here is the keemun, along with a bit of lapsang. Then I am picking up the orange, clove and lemon… the rose is very faint. It is a bit like a chai but with more smoke and more citrus. I like this a lot better than I thought I would, it is very warming on a chilly night — especially since the heat is still not on here at full force.

This is yummy afternoon/evening tea that is really good! I like this blend.

After lunch tea here for me…

I am glad it’s Friday. I feel like a nap is in order but I don’t think I will get to leave the office early enough. More caffeine it is. This is a yummy dessert tea, I almost forgot I had it hidden in my desk. See previous notes for more info.

Sipdown!

Finishing off the last of this great tea from Butiki, I have enjoyed it. See previous notes for additional information.

One of the teas I got yesterday from the Jasmine Pearl Tea Merchant.

Last night I had Indian food for dinner which didn’t really sit well. I thought perhaps this tea might be nice for settling my stomach a bit.

In my opinion the spice in this tea is VERY strong, the ginger really stands and then the cardamom. The peach is a very faint note somewhere in the background. This blend is not for the faint of heart, it is definitely stronger than any other ginger peach tea I’ve had. I like it though, and ginger is really nice for a chilly San Francisco day.

Tea of the morning here — last night the heat did not come on in my apartment so it’s been chilly. BRRRR! I needed some tea.

All of my new tea orders came in this week so I’ll be busy logging & drinking soon.

This particular blend is nice but I think it needs more strawberry flavor, see previous notes for more details.

3rd Flavored pu’erh here from Nature’s Tea Leaf.

The tea I received looks like a big leaf pu’erh. I’ve had a few before and didn’t really love them, but this blend is kind of nice.

There are dried orange peels in the tea and the flavor is VERY orange-y but natural. I can’t help but think this might be good with some ginger and a little less orange, but this is still pretty nice especially as an after lunch tea.

I decided to do a second steep of this, which turned out pleasant enough and slightly less orange-y. Also it was good with a touch of turbinado sugar. It would be interesting to try this as a chilled tea, I will have to try that someday.

No notes yet.

I’ve been out of this for a while but decided to get more with my latest order from Verdant. I forgot how good this is! yum yum

Sorry I wasn’t able to get a picture from the NTL website.

Of course once I get a bunch of new teas I am keen to try them all, so I thought I would give this mango pu-erh a whirl.

This actually smells very nice and natural in the bag. I steeped the tea for 2-3 minutes (sorry don’t have an exact parameter).

Yum! I really like this. The mango flavor is very sweet and natural and it doesn’t overpower the pu-erh. It has a chocolate sort of taste. These two flavors go fairly well together. I decided to add some soymilk to this because I was wondering how it would be as a latte. I think I prefer it plain but it is nice with the soy, it’s kind of like a tropical milkshake.

Overall, good! I think I would get some more of this. The marigold petals are a nice touch. I much prefer this flavor over the cherry.

My new tea arrived – hurrah!

Okay I was skeptical of this from the get-go, but I really wanted to try it. I opened up the bag to take a whiff… to me this really smells like cherry cough syrup.

I steeped it for around 2 minutes and after tasting it, I still got cough syrup flavor. I decided to steep it for around 1 minute more and then added a bit of turbinado sugar to it, which definitely helped the flavor somewhat. From what I can tell the pu-erh is good but the cherry flavor really overpowers it. I will be tempted to find some chocolate syrup to put in this.

It isn’t as good as I was hoping and seems a bit artificial to me but overall it’s fairly decent. If anyone else wants to try it I’d be happy to swap some of it.

Tea of the mid-morning here. I haven’t been drinking a lot of oolongs for some reason. Winter seems to be a season of black tea and shu puerh.

This tea is incredibly aromatic smelling while it is steeping. Great for a foggy day like we are having today. See previous notes for more details!

Tea of the morning here – I love this assam so it is a bummer that Simpson & Vail is not going to carry it anymore. I guess this will be the excuse I need to go look for a new assam!

Shu pu-erh of the afternoon. I am almost done with the little tin of this but probably won’t be buying anymore with all of the pu-erh I have already. Plus nothing about this really stands out to me, although it isn’t bad at all.

On another topic, has anyone noticed that a watched tea order seems to take forever to arrive??

Purchased on the way to work today, honestly I can’t understand the other glowing reviews because to me this tastes like a really weak and mediocre black tea. I might have had too high a water to tea ratio so perhaps I will try it again someday.