ashmanra

This is a free sample from “Zen Tea.” Thank you, Zen! I understand I have some presents on the way from your store!

When I opened the pouch, I thought, “Coffee! Foofy coffee shop flavored coffee all creamy and with too many calories!” I forgot this had hazelnut and thought it was just the vanilla until I looked at the description again! Ah yes, thus the deep, dark, rich aroma.

Now that I am sniffing the steeped tea, I can definitely tell this is hazelnut I am smelling. I think Bossa Nova is a great name for this tea. It evokes a sultry, somewhat sensual atmosphere. Think dark coffee house with slow freeform jazz, poetry readings, and bookish sorts wearing glasses that shouldn’t be sexy but they are. The glasses, I mean.

I could be wrong since I don’t drink coffee, but this seems like a tea that a coffee lover would love to drink. I don’t think I would drink this when I wanted an oolong experience, sitting quietly and experiencing all the changes of the different steeps, closing my eyes to focus in aftertaste. I think I would drink this just to evoke the atmosphere, playing some jazz, and writing letters to friends or chatting with one who is sharing a pot of tea with me.

I am drinking this tea courtesy of K S, one of the most generous souls I know! Thank you!

Flicking through lots of notes on here, I decided to go with a 5 second rinse and a short first steep, increasing for the second. This was made in my small glass pot which is about 8 ounces.

The dry tea is tightly rolled into balls which expand impressively upon steeping into full, deep green leaves. The scent of the tea is a light floral lemon, and the taste is much the same as the aroma. This is a greener oolong, floral, lemon, and light, but the magic happens in the aftertaste. There is a lingering light roasted taste and a warmth left behind.

I have only done two steeps so far, but will probably keep going later this afternoon. This is really delicious!

Hubby and I had this with our Chinese take out tonight, seeing as I didn’t open any of my new tea. Wink wink nudge nudge.

I don’t know why, but it was especially good tonight. The dry leaf was rich and chocolatey in aroma, my favorite kind of Da Hong Pao. The aroma was so much like the tea the owner of the restaurant gave me that his family had sent to him from China. When I had asked him what kind it was, he said, “I don’t know. Expensive. Very expensive.” Well, it tasted expensive, and so does this one.

I had decided that next I would try Old Fir Da Hong Pao but can it really get better than this?

Has anyone tried the aged cakes of DHP? How does it compare?

Shhhh! Don’t tell on me!

I went out my front door and there was a small box sitting by the step. What’s this? I picked up the box and read the name. No way! Impossible! It can’t already be here. I casually walked into the kitchen, not drawing attention to myself, and opened the box. It is! It is! It is my Christmas present tea! Surely I can try JUST ONE. After all, I did ask for tea, I did place the order myself, and no one has any idea how much I ordered and from where.

After an agonizing three or four seconds of mental battle and rationalization, I carefully opened this one. The kids don’t know new tea is here because I controlled myself and didn’t do my SQUEEE dance.

Since this is a brand new company to me and most of us, I will go into a little more detail on packaging and such. First, the box is nice and sturdy, and obviously shipping was fast for me to be surprised that it is here already. Inside the box is a lovely handwritten note, a receipt, and a little brown paper to keep the tins from moving around. The tins are in pristine condition and are very attractive. You would have to involve an elephant to damage the packaging.

Opening the lid on the tin I find a layer of very thin aluminum foil to keep the tea fresher. Hugo Tea is presently changing their packaging, but if you order before the change is complete, be sure you keep that little circle of foil. It makes the lid nice and tight. Initially i didn’t put it back and when I reopened the tin I noticed that the lid came off a little too easily (unlike a few companies whose lids make me weep and I spill as much of the leaf as I get to drink because of obstinate lids) and though in normal circumstances it would be just fine, when is life really normal? People drop things, bump into shelves, etc, and if this tin fell it would almost certainly spill. Keep your foil, or put in a new piece.

Dry leaf: deep army green and somewhat twisty. Nice and full. Aroma is root vegetables like turnips or mustard greens.

Steeped: Nice medium gold color, fragrant, again of root vegetables but a wee bit milder now. First steep is root vegetable with a slight dryness and tingling to the tongue, the sort of green I serve mainly with food. Aftertaste is lingering, lots of staying power. I think of this as a tea that awakens you.

Second steep: similar to the first, but with a soft caress. Flavor remains much the same, but some of the root vegetable edge is smoothed out so there is a sense of a lighter, slightly buttered vegetable.

Mixing the two steeps together, I do not feel that I have something half way between the two, but rather that the first steep has brought the second up to full strength. This makes me think I should shoot for a third steep in a little while. There may be a fourth in here as well!

This was the first tea served at tea party today, and yes, tea party was a day late this week! My middle daughter had another commitment so we postponed because she really didn’t want to miss.
We served a wonderful type of fruit cake – and I don’t usually like fruit cake – called Southern Supreme “More Nuts than Fruit” Cake. It is soooo good and is made right here in NC. We actually went to the main store two years ago. We also had Fresh Market sugar cookies, White Fudge Oreos, and a couple of other kinds of cookies.

My guest and I both LOVED this. She picked up on the cherry flavor immediately, though I didn’t. It tastes just as a Christmas tea should taste when I imagine what should be in one. Somehow the French tea companies manage to put SO MANY flavors in their teas without the end result being a muddy mess. The different notes can all be teased out, but the black tea base is never covered up. It doesn’t end up tasting like a fruit tisane. Nice!

This is one of the teas given to me by oldest daughter at Thanksgiving! :)

Second tea of tea party today! I thought perhaps I had served it before and I see that I did just a few weeks ago. Delicious and full blueberry flavor, yum!

I have had this sample for at least a year, and it made me think of Quiltguppy and how much I miss her here on Steepster. This is a sip down, the end of a generous sample that had gotten pushed to the back of a drawer with some others that I am trying to finish up.

Kashyap mentioned in his review of this that a tea’s profile is likely to change over time. I think that happened with this one.

Opening the packet for the first time in a year, the aroma of the dry leaf is nut. Nut, nut, and more nut. Specifically walnut I think, but it could be pecan. Steeped, however, the nut aroma is way in back and a fruitiness has come to the front. It reminds me of the sharp scent of scuppernong grapes. There is so much in this cup of tea!

This is so fruity, with a hint of astringency, that it is reminding me of a Darjeeling today. The aftertaste is of apricot. I feel as though I have eaten an apricot dumpling, swimming in syrup and topped with chopped walnuts. Delicious!

I have read so many great reviews for Earl Grey Cream teas from various companies that it made me curious. Why do people love it so much? When Zen Tea offered to let me pick three teas to sample, it was easy to decide to put this one on the list!

And WHOA! I tore open the pouch and the creamy vanilla swirled up and kissed me smack on the lips. I am pretty sure there is a puddle of drool where I was standing because it smelled so good.

I don’t know quite what I was expecting, but I can tell you what I got. This IS what it says it is – Earl Grey tea with cream. But not just cream…it is rich, homemade fresh-whipped vanilla-imbued cream that has been sitting on top of a hot and decadent dessert.

Yummy! No wonder people love it! Thank you, Zen Tea, for allowing me to finally experience this tea! If you like Earl Grey and you like vanilla, you really should try this.

I am the first? Yippee!

I made this tea for a little afternoon tea and cookies time with my hubby and a friend. The friend is fairly new to good tea – he told me a few weeks ago that all he had ever had was Lipton with milk and sugar. His first “good” tea shocked him. He said he didn’t know there was tea that wasn’t astringent. Now he takes his tea at my house with no additions because he says he really wants to taste and experience the tea.

For hubby, I added a tiny sprinkle of sugar that I was afraid was not enough for him, because he takes black tea with lots of sugar normally. But he liked this even though it was only lightly sweetened. Mine and our guest’s had no sugar and was delightful. The aroma is fabulous, from the moment you tear the top of the bag. The tea is smooth – I steeped on the short side, just three minutes, because I wasn’t sure what the base was. It would be fine longer, I think.

As it was, it was an excellent tea, and my guest was very enthusiastic about it and really enjoyed it.
I think the addition of milk and sugar would probably take this over the top into decadent dessert territory. I think I will try it that way next!

Grrrrrr! That was the sound that escaped me, and that was when I smelled the leaves. Same sound, a little louder, escaped when I sipped the first sips.

This is a delicious black tea. Often, black tea from China will use Asian parameters for steeping the tea and I find it too weak that way and change to Western brewing. This one is super just as they say to make it. It is smooth yet bracing, lightly cocoa flavored, and there is something arresting about the flavor that grabs your attention, but isn’t rough.

This and their Dragon Pearl Green Tea are so good they could be the base for a very nice small cupboard.

My daughter came to join us for Thanksgiving dinner today and brought a gift with her. She said this was part of my Christmas present but that I needed to open it now because it was something for DURING the holidays.

It was the adorable Dammann Freres coffret with two tins of Christmas tea! I made the white tea after lunch because I wanted to share it with her and she really does not like black tea….at all!

This is very fragrant and right away evoked memories of Noél a Londres by the same company, just with a white base. SQUEEE! After the tea is gone, I will have to repurpose this beautiful box and the tins!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24998856@N06/8209475645/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/24998856@N06/8209475451/in/photostream/

My bestie asked me to take a break tonight and come have tea with her. When I got there, she offered me a slice of her coconut cream pie with the tallest fluffiness meringue you have ever seen. I have never had ANY cream pie before. Oh. My. Goodness. It was so very good and I am so very stuffed! I got the recipe but I know my mother will be up in heaven looking down at me saying, “Gee, thanks! You couldn’t try it and fall in love with it while I was alive, eh?” She loved pie, and I never really ate any cream pies.

This tea was a very nice accompaniment to the pie. The base is good, smooth but not overly sweet, and the vanilla is just right – it doesn’t mask the tea but you don’t have to look for it, either.

This was the first tea of tea party today. I broke with our usual attempt of having black, oolong, and green, or some other form of variety and just made two black teas and one flavored black because I was pairing it with something that I felt needed black tea to carry it.

You see, the lovely JacquelineM sent me a tiny little tea book with recipes in it a while back and today I tried one of them for tea time. The recipe is Pear, Walnut, Bleu Cheese sandwiches on Seven Grain bread, except we could only find twelve grain so we used that instead! LOL! The Bleu Cheese is mixed with cream cheese to spread it on the bread. It was very tasty and I don’t EVEN want to know how many calories were in each little triangle!

The sandwiches were very rich, so I wanted a good, strong black tea to stand up to the flavorful Bleu cheese and to contrast with the delicate pear. It was delicious! Thank you, Jacqueline!

Tonight’s tea with hubby while peaceful music plays on Pandora. I want to own every jasmine tea Teavivre sells. They are that good. The Jasmine Dragon Pearl and Extra Downy Jasmine Pearls are probably my favorite, or the white jasmine, with this one coming in as an excellent every day drinker, so much smoother and milder than the loose leaf I bought at the Asian Market. Lovely.

I saw the tin sitting off to the side and said, “Why not?” I completely forgot until I saw it just now about the experiment of icing it and adding vanilla. Seriously? I did that? And liked it?

Well, having made it the usual way I make hot tea, I tried to like it once again. I find it slightly more palatable now, but I think I would rather put this in my bath water because it smells so great. The taste is still soapy and perfume-y to me. And now that I have fallen in love with Teavivre’s jasmine teas….all of them…I know that I DO like jasmine, just not this one. And I don’t see myself caring about it enough to ice it with vanilla. As it cools, it gets worse and worse. I want to wash my tongue.

Foot tea and bath tea it is!

Back logging from last night: I decided to revisit this sample from Russel Allyn of Harney and Sons. This was our late night yoga tea for hubby and me! :)

As I said before, this tastes likes snowmelt in which one has cooked veggies, something like artichoke, asparagus, some smooth and mild and lightly buttered. Hubby, who still adds milk and sugar to his black tea, likes green and oolong tea plain. I watched as he poured cup after cup and drank it down. I think I got about seven of the twenty two ounces I made!

I didn’t want to finish my sample so I had steeped the same leaves three times in a tiny glass pot. I am glad I have enough leaves to drink this one more time – probably soon!

Thank you, Russel and Harney and Sons!

I am decupboarding this one as I finished it today! I was experimenting, and I am hoping someone on here can help me because it was NOT a success.

I made a big batch of this tea, added cinnamon, cloves, and a tiny bit of nutmeg, squeezed a Clementine orange over it, and threw the peel and fruit in to simmer. I also added sugar.

This is very nearly good, yet almost undrinkable at the same time. It smells good and the sip is almost good but there is a really weird aftertaste. It was somewhat drinkable other than that while it was hot but as it cooled it was pretty terrible!

I wondered if this is bitterness coming from the orange peel?

Does anyone have a great recipe for a mulled tea that can be simmered low and slow in a crockpot? Other than the old standby of instant tea, Tang, and cinnamon?

My bestie of 26 years came over for lunch today. I made stuffed baked potatoes with sour cream, sautéed onion, cheddar cheese, and bacon. For dessert we had fresh Snickerdoodles and Lapsang souchong. It was very yummy on this gray, rainy day! My bestie loves puerh, and she liked this, her first Lapsang, but she said it isn’t one she feels she must purchase. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that she craves it later, though. That is how Lapsangs worked on me and on my youngest daughter. They sneak up on you!

Back in the early loose leaf days when I used to go to A Southern Season and sniff sniff SNIFF pouch after pouch of tea and tin after tin from the Fine Tea Wall, I thought Russian Caravans were pretty much the same thing as Lapsang Souchong. They both smelled really smoky to me and I was afraid of them, and puerh was on that list, too.

I lost my fear as I drank teas that had natural light smokiness, then I had some lovely blends, and then I was finally ready for the real thing. The funny thing was that my youngest child loved smoky tea right off the bat.

So here I am drinking this Caravan and wondering where the smoke is! LOL! There are a number of teas that used to seem so very smoky to me that now just seem hearty. This is very lightly smoky but it is sweet and good. No milk or sugar is needed to make this palatable, and it is comforting and bracing as we look out on yet another gray, rainy day with no sign of sunshine in the near future.

Grace Rare Tea has done what they set out to do. They carry only a few types of tea but strive to carry the best examples they can get of those types. I have never been disappointed by them.

Thank you again, Hesper June, for the amazing box o’ smoky teas! This has been the perfect week to try them all!

This was the final tea of tea party today. Because it was sold as a green, I made it like a green tea even though I knew it MUST be oolong. Those parameters have served me well so I still use them. Three minutes in 180F water and you get a pot of buttery popcorn flavor. Treat it like oolong and you still get great flavor, just nuttier and less butter-y. The memory of this tea is tantalizing me even now.

Sip down! It is hard to believe that I thought this was smoky when I first tried it. It is very lightly smoky with fabulous body, almost chewy. Rich, full-bodied tea.

With all the kitchen revamping, I have had to move my tea stash. I realized that I seriously need to prune my collection and I am trying to drink some of the older teas. When we first went loose leaf we drank a lot of Ceylons, but then I went to Fujian black, then oolong and green, and I ignored my Ceylons. Snce this one caught my eye, I thought I would try to find out why I had so much of it left after so long.

This was the second tea served at tea party today. We had White Stilton Cheese with Cranberries on crackers and Pepperidge Farm Pumpkin Cheesecake Cookies, as well as Oreos and Danish Wedding Cookies.

The color of the tea as I poured it was so deep and rich, and the flavor was the same! Why didn’t I drink this up when I got it? This is fantastic tea, and my guest loved it, too! The aroma and taste were fruity fruity fruity. I won’t wait long to make this one again.

I was really curious about this particular Lapsang in the box o’ lapsangs that Hesper June sent! I wondered how the quality would be since this isn’t a company dedicated to tea, but rather herbs in general. Several of their teas get great reviews, though, so we gave it a go, and were not disappointed. Youngest thought it was good, and she is a Lapsang lover. It has a bright, sweet base that I am thinking may be largely Ceylon. This went very nicely with our lunch of chicken soup and cheese toast! Thank you, Hesper June!

Since we were feeling chilly again this morning, youngest and I decided to try a couple more lapsangs from Hesper June!

This one tastes more like natural smoke to me than the Mountain Rose Herbs tea did. The base is medium strength, plenty fortifying for a chilly morning tea! I wonder if they mix this with a bergamot tea to get Morgan Blend, or if that one is entirely different? (Yesterday I didn’t pick up the bergamot so much in the Morgan Blend but this morning when I cleaned the pot I really could smell it and don’t know how I missed it! I think I remember my guest even saying something about it being fruity. Now I want to try it again!)

This is a good warming cup, and I am having trouble choosing which Lapsang I like best!

Thank you, Hesper June! We are having fun trying all of these!