ashmanra

Bought a sample of this – youngest child aka the tea addict says BUY A TIN! This tea has a wonderful aroma – I could sit here sniffing the leaves for the rest of the afternoon but I have to go to the gym. (We had eclairs with our tea this afternoon so it is especially important!) The dry leaves are interesting to look at – black, straight leaves, thin lightly curled ones, and green ones that aren’t green tea I think but maybe darjeeling? At least when it is steeped they look just like my 1629 Blend Darjeeling from Southern Season. It was initially astringent, which I don’t like, and might mean I should steep it for less time. I added milk and a little sugar (my friend added only milk and was satisified -she’s a no sugar gal) and it was deeee-licious! This one is a keeper! Plus, I LOVE the history behind it. And my kid wants it, so…….

I bought this because it was on sale. I will buy it again because it is AWESOME! There are strong honey notes – nay, the pot fairly exhuded honey and honeybees! Winnie the Pooh would follow this pot of tea around! If you like Golden Monkey by H&S or Zhen Quo by Southern Season, you should like this one as well. Sweet and light, with plenty of flavor. It went well with our chilled eclairs! (It is about 100 degrees here.) This was wonderful without milk or sugar.

I got my new supply of this tea in! Hooray! This was my first morning cuppa today, with Margaret’s Hope on the way. This is very lightly smoky and has nice full body. I think if I put Harney’s breakfast choices on hand in order, I would say they go English Breakfast, Queen Catherine, Supreme Breakfast, in terms of body and smokiness. The last two may need to be reversed – I should try them side by side! (An excuse to drink more tea!) But all of these are only lightly smoky compared to Bohea or Lapsang teas. Excellent….

Wow! Thanks to TEAEQUALSBLISS for this generous sample! I had tried two darjeelings in the past and didn’t care for them much, but I didn’t know I was supposed to cut the steeping time for darjeelings. We often do side-by-side teas in the afternoon when we have new kinds to try, just for the fun of comparing all the aspects of the teas. Our choices today were this one and Supreme Breakfast by Harney and Sons. My first impression was…holy cow! This smells VEGETAL! It reminded me of my beloved Ruby #18, also known as Sun Moon Lake. The taste….quite good. Less astringent than my early attempts at darjeeling when I oversteeped. Also, it is very light, but not without flavor like a decaffeinated tea, just light and refreshing. I hadn’t read the description yet, but I served Raspberry Pim’s with this tea and they went together well. So they were right on with their serving suggestion! :) The astringency always kept me from making it through a whole cup of darjeeling before, but I had two cups of this one, even though I knew we had another pot of tea to try.

With this one, the second’s time is the charm for me! I just tasted Margaret’s Hope darjeeling for the first time, and followed it with Supreme Breakfast, which was probably serendipity since I think the contrast between the two made me see favorable things about both. This time, the smoke was more prominent than before and…I can taste the chocolatey flavor of the keemun! I didn’t pick up on the cocoa note last time! My palate is pleased and tickled by today’s samplings!

Had this one for the first time this morning – a farewell cuppa with the friend who introduced me to fine loose leaf tea. It has a very light smoky taste, lighter than Queen Catherine. I find this one a little bolder than H&S regular English Breakfast, though. It grows on me….I think I could drink either and be satisfied. Will try again, and again, and try to make up my mind as to which I prefer, or when I would prefer them!

Strong tea aroma for the dry leaves, light and crisp, too. Steeped, it is a very good tea. I tasted assam pretty strongly I think, but since I have not had many oolongs yet, I think I may also having been tasting the oolong as well. We took it with milk and a little sugar. It is smooth, no bitterness, low astringency in spite of being rated as a 2 on their scale. A light clean cup. I liked it for afternoon tea time, but would not want it as my hearty breakfast cup.

Today I gave this tea to two friends – one who only drinks green and white teas, the other who doesn’t like green teas. They BOTH really liked this tea, and both said it had a lot of flavor with coconut being the most prominent. We had it hot, but I plan to try it iced as well. It has enough body and flavor to hold up to ice well, probably without sweetener – even for me! I am not a huge fan of greens, but this one is quite good.

This is a lovely English Breakfast, very similar to the one by Harney and Sons. It is lighter than Queen Catherine. I like this one with milk and sugar. It is a very comforting cup, good for morning when I want a gentler start to the day. Sometimes I do need something stronger to kick me into gear, but this one is nice for days when I wake up alert or don’t have to be on “go” right away.

This is another sample from TEAEQUALSBLISS! What a great tea! I have been wanting to try this one but wanted to do it on a special day when I could really spend some time with it. The only other chocolate tea I have had is Florence by Harney and Sons and that one is a real favorite for me, so I was eager to try this one. The scent is marvelous and chocolate-y. It brews up to a nice medium color and still has a lovely aroma. I was afraid it would be just the same as dumping some mini-chocolate chips in a cup of hot tea, but it isn’t. The tea has a lightness, a cleanness, I didn’t expect. It has almost the tingle of Uva Highlands, but no astringency or bitterness at all. I tried it plain – lovely! And totally drinkable just that way. I added a little sugar – still good. I added a little milk – also good. I think you can take this one any way you like. A really interesting tea. I would love to have some again.

If you like rooibos based tea, and if you like Cranberry Autumn by Harney and Sons, you will probably like this tea. One friend who only drinks greens and whites loved this one. I bought it so I would have a decaf option for evening, but in the evening I find myself longing for black tea, so I will mostly stick to Decaf Orange Pekoe and Vanilla Comoro. A good tea, though.

I had this one for the first time in a while today. After drinking Queen Catherine for frumpled mornings and trying my first light lapsang, I now know that tea is barely, barely smoky, but it is there! It is a sweeter smokiness, though, and I now know that I will HAVE to keep it around for those mornings when I want something a tad lighter than Catherine. This was delicious with a little sugar and the tiniest bit of milk. Sometimes I don’t use the milk at all. Much, MUCH smoother than some of the Keemuns I have tried. Don’t even compare this to Keemun Hao A! It is a completely different taste to me! And I like this one better…..for now. Who knows how my tastebuds will grow up in the coming year? :) I steeped for four minutes, and I think five would have been better.

I am not usually a fan of anything peach, but this tea doesn’t reek of the heavy peach flavor one sometimes gets. The aroma of the dry leaves reminded me of Harney and Sons Cherry Blossom, in fact. Though it is a white tea, it brewed up slightly darker than many of the greens I drink – a lovely color in the cup. I drank this with a student who loves greens and is only just now trying whites, and we both liked it very much. I still love black the most, but having greens and whites on Wednesdays is really expanding my palate! I would definitely recommend this tea to green and white tea lovers.

I have been wanting to try a smoky tea, and I have wanted to try Bohea ever since I saw that Colonial Williamsburg sells it on their site as a historic tea. Today I got to address both of those wants! We heat our home mostly with a wood burning insert and this tea smells like my clothes and hair after I have started an oak fire and gotten in the smoke a bit. That’s a good thing to me – speaks of home and hearth. I don’t TASTE the smoke, I smell the smoke, but after you swallow your sip the smoky flavor drifts lazily up into your nose. I can definitely see how smoky tea can have passionate followers, and I think for myself it will be something that I occasionally crave but wouldn’t drink every day. In winter this would be especially good, though I just got back from a 30 minute walk in 93 degree heat! Thank you, TEAEQUALSBLISS! I can say I have now had a lapsang style tea and….I like it! It is definitely more smoky than my beloved Queen Catherine from Harney who gets me going on tough days, but I hear this is one of the lightest and truer to the original historic lapsangs. Only steeped for three minutes – the smoky leaves had me scared! Tea flavor is lovely, though, but after I made it I read that long steeps won’t hurt this tea.

Mmmmmm….your honey aroma and flavor grows on me more each time. A fine tea, to be enjoyed with eyes closed while you make yummy noises…..

Served Florence to a friend who loves hazelnut and Ferrero Rocher chocolates. She whipped out a notepad so fast to write down the name of this tea to order it that I didn’t even see her hands move! So…..good…..with a tiny splash of milk and a scant teaspoon of sugar you will think you are drinking a decadent chocolate drink, only better!

Today I was introducing a good friend to some teas. She is the one who introduced ME to Harney and Sons tea as she is a devoted Hot Cinnamon Spice drinker. This tea got the honor of being her only refill tea, the one she liked best of today’s teas. This is a very good tea for people who like Paris or Earl Grey Supreme as there are similarities in body, aroma, and flavor. It is very drinkable for those who haven’t developed a taste for a lot of different teas yet.

This is a LOVELY tea! Thank you, TEAEQUALSBLISS! This is the second white tea EVER for me (I know, can you believe it?) and this one really delivers. It is smooth, it is light, it is sweet, fresh, and delightful. The mix is so beautiful you will want to put a small amount in a glass bowl for display.

Another from TEAEQUALSBLISS. This is a British legacy style tea – strong, with dark flavors, not astringent but full bodied. It takes milk and sugar very well, so I think I would be likely to use it for breakfast or with a hearty tea-time snack, but probably not with more delicate tea cookies or cakes. It would also go well with a meal. Be careful with your timing on this one! Oversteeps easily, but worth watching the clock for.

This tea is so much more than the tin says! It says Chinese Black Tea with honey flavor, but the fine print says there is stone fruit and bergamot as well. This is delicious with NO milk and No sugar! So glad I got this one. The bergamot is mild and lovely, having none of the synthetic aroma that scalds your nose. If you like sugar in your tea (and I usually do) this would still be a delightful tea. I am thinking it would be great iced as well.

This is another TEAEQUALSBLISS tea! Thank you! Since it says it is a blend of high middle altitude estate teas, I thought it would have the wintergreen tingle of Uva Highlands, and it does! Since I like low astringency I think this one for me is best with milk and sugar, but for those who like a brisk cup, you will want it just as it is. We steeped for 4 minutes to keep it from being bitter after reading some other reviews, and that was good for us. You could probably leave it a tad longer, but not much!

This is indeed a decent cup of tea! Thank you, TEAEQUALSBLISS for this sample! I was
expecting this one to be very like an Irish Breakfast since it is blended in honor of an Irishman. I would say it is a lighter, cleaner, crisper cup. Not weak, and not astringent though it did leave a tiny tingle on my tongue that I liked, and I DO NOT like astringent teas. The tingle reminded me of a lighter version of what happens when you drink Uva Highlands and get the mintiness after you drink it. Great with milk and sugar. Is that just a touch of Darjeeling in there?

Hadn’t had this one in a while, so I decided to revisit it today. Tea time on the patio with Paris, Bordeaux cookies, and Dare Lemon Cremes. It was 97 degrees out there! So….go back inside, ice the Paris, and put “Summer in the City” by the Lovin’ Spoonful on repeat!
Paris is pretty good iced!

Did anyone else see that Harney and Sons is making this available in a 7 oz size? I asked and Harney provided – now that’s customer service! Wheeee!
Just like Paris, the tin that normally holds 8 ounces can only hold 7 ounces of this one. I guess its bodacious awesomeness takes up extra room!