Auggy

A new day, a new tea! This one somehow managed to hide from me, managing to be the sole untasted tea from my TeaSpring order a few months ago. But I found it yesterday and decided we can’t just leave it unsampled so it gets busted open today!

I really like milk oolongs. But see, they don’t taste milky to me. I don’t know why exactly, but I always end up tasting a light and strong sweetness that makes me think of Juicy Fruit gum (which is a positive, in my world). Nothing like milk (though I suppose an argument could be made for a bit of condensed milk due to the sweetness) but I love them still.

This, however, is surprisingly different. There’s a heaviness, an almost spiciness that reminds me of white pepper. Underneath that is the sweet tropical fruitiness that I associate with Juicy Fruit and milk oolongs. The end taste’s fruitiness continues well past swallowing, becoming higher and sweeter as I breathe through my mouth. It’s gorgeous.

As it cools, the darker spiciness and lighter sweetness start to sink into each other creating this heady, rich mix of thickness and sweetness that still isn’t milky to me but is much too sophisticated and sensual to be associated with a mere gum.

In the second steep, the flavors have swapped. First I get the sweet, thinned condensed milk fruit-ish sweetness followed by the darker, heavier former spiciness that has evolved into something more bready, like fresh white rye bread. The overall taste has muddied up some but it still tastes very yummy. Not as sophisticated as the first steep, but tasty enough that my cup emptied super fast. The aftertaste is still sweet, but not quite as pretty and it is coupled with a prickly faint pepper note that isn’t as nice as the first steep but still interesting and enjoyable.

Not the most perfect, end-all-be-all of milk oolongs and probably the one that has reminded me least of Juicy Fruit gum. But I quite like this and think it is a very nice example of the milk oolong category, or at least my somewhat limited experience with it.

Hello Steepsterites! I know, I (and my massively long tasting notes) have been MIA lately. Shame on me! My absence has been due to a sad lack of new teas. As some of you might recall, a couple of years ago the husband and I paid off our house. Awesome, right? There’s only one downside. See, turns out we don’t like our neighborhood. And honestly, I’d really like a dining room and a bit more of a back yard. Which means we’ve been contemplating buying a new, slightly larger house. But with no current mortgage, you can bet we don’t want to buy a house in a way that saddles us with a new mortgage, right? Which means we’ll have to save up a fairly substantial amount of money. Which means the budgetary belt has been tightened. A lot. Which has really impeded my tea purchasing (especially since it has to fight my knitting obsession for my monthly discretionary spending). But my tea pantry has withered to a measly 68 teas and that’s just not on, so this month tea has defeated knitting in the battle for my money.

I’ve placed a couple of orders (with Le Palais des Thés and American Tea Room) but they haven’t come in yet, so I spend some time today meandering around my grocery store’s tea section and managed to I come across this little tea. I can’t say no to a good Keemun so I didn’t even try to fight it when it jumped into my buggy. (Seriously, it just jumped in there! No help from me at all!)

I really wasn’t expecting all that much from this (after all, I love CTG’s Keemun almost as much as I love my cats and this tea is being sold in a grocery store) but I am pleasantly surprised by it. It has an amazingly sweet and fruity smell to it. There’s a bit of that typical acrid/acidic-ish smoke edge that is common to Keemuns but the majority of the smell is a full slightly-earthy-but-mostly-floral/fruity scent. I want to say it is somewhat fig-like. (That could just be because I was contemplating the figs at the grocery store today but it also could be because it is actually figgy. I might have to get out some of my dad’s fig preserves for a more accurate comparison.)

The smell isn’t the only fruity/figgy/floral thing about this tea – the taste is, too. It’s very smooth (I got almost no smoke/acridity sharpness) and it’s quite soft and pretty. But as nifty as that is, it’s also a little disappointing. I mean, yeah, it’s neat to get that fruity/figgy/floral taste in a tea that, when done poorly, can be scratchy, acrid and rough, but that sweet, soft floral, etc is pretty much the entire taste. I find myself missing the earthier notes of leather and mustiness a bit.

Don’t get me wrong – I like this tea just how it is. The smoothness is quite nice but I would totally trade a bit of it for a tad more depth. Brewing for a bit longer might take care of that, but even if it doesn’t I won’t be too sad because this is very pretty. I mean, it’s not lovely enough to replace my CTG Keemun love. It’s also behind Adagio’s Anhui Keemu in all but price and I’m sure TeaSpring has at least one Keemun that could make this one cry for its mommy, but I believe this could claim a spot in my Top 5 Keemuns.

The second steep helps cement this opinion. The taste has a dash more depth – it’s still sweet and fruity/figgy/floral but has just a touch of texture to deepen the taste and give it a hint of almost bake-iness. The finish is still high, sweet and makes me think of the color of pink that is on inside of a fig (maybe that’s why I think it tastes figgy) but now with an added note of toasted sugar.

So yeah, totally impressive for a grocery store tea. Really good for a tea full stop, actually. Still not my favorite Keemun but definitely not one to be dismissed. I think I’ll enjoy drinking this one while I window shop (since that’s the only type of shopping I’ll be doing for the rest of this month).

I must vent about this tea for a moment. This is one of the teas I picked up at our grocery store to use for the husband’s morning tea. (He loves Earl Grey and isn’t all that picky so I figured it’d be a win.)

I AM NEVER BUYING THIS TEA AGAIN.

Look, I’m all for organic and environmentally sustainable and all that stuff. I fully support the green and granola lifestyle – my dad was organic before organic was cool so I grew up thinking (knowing) that was the better way and my parents always said I’d make a great hippie. Add my food allergies on top of that and I am fully behind the granola way of life. But dude, if you want me to support your company with all their wonderful sustainable practices and environmentally sound packaging and whatever, I honestly don’t care if you are more expensive, but YOU MUST BE WORTH IT. I’m cool paying almost twice the price for organic bananas because organic bananas are still tasty and fill all my banana needs. But this tea? This is like buying organic bananas and having them taste like potting soil.

Okay, okay, it doesn’t quite taste like potting soil. I think potting soil would have more flavor actually. But taste isn’t my first complaint about this tea. My first complaint is the container. Because this is like buying an organic banana only to find it’s been wrapped in that hard plastic stuff that you always have use scissors to open but it’s so stiff that you usually end up cutting yourself on it before you get it fully cut open. Because the tea is packaged in a cute little cylinder made out of a nice feeling cardboard-ish material of which the top few inches slides off to open. Let me rephrase: the top few inches SHOULD slide off. Because the material this is made out of isn’t slick enough to slide against itself so opening this is a study in applied force. A little too much pressure on one side and it sticks like glue. You must raise it totally straight off with lots of little twists while pulling. Wiggle wiggle wiggle, twist, twist, slowly try to inch it up…. it takes forever to open this stupid thing. And trying to close it is just about as hard – you have to twist, twist, twist it down and it usually gets stuck about two thirds of the way down. Ugh!

But what’s the reward for opening this horridly unfriendly little container? I mean, maybe it is worth it? Well, inside are two thin canvas-like drawstring bags that don’t fully close. Why? I mean, I’m guessing the container is airtight (since it’s so hard to open and close properly), so why put the tea in more packaging? It’s not a reusable steeping bag – I only have two, both filled with tea and there are some little disposable filter things included in the container. So why? Okay, fine. Whatever. Useless but at least they aren’t annoying and difficult like the container. Let’s get to the tea.

So then you open up one of the bags. First off, check out the second picture on their website: http://www.villageteaco.com/tea/simply-organic-earl-grey-tea/ My tea looks NOTHING like that. Those are leaves. Small leaves, sure, but leaves. My bags? Fannings would be too kind. Coffee grounds are larger, I kid you not. I’m not a huge fan of CTC, but it has it’s place so I’m okay if I buy something (particularly a morning-type tea) and it ends up being little grapenuts of tea. But buying a loose leaf tea and getting something that Lipton would consider too small to put in there bags? Shameful.

And then, after all that horror, we get to the taste. Or rather, we SHOULD get to the taste. But no. This is massively bland. I mean, I can look at this from the point of view that at least the flavoring isn’t too strong or perfume-y or chemically or whatever. But that’s only because it has the barest hint of flavoring. They waved the closed bergamot oil jar over the dust particles before they swept them off the floor and stuck them in little bags and into that horrid cylinder.

But then you get a nice tea-flavor then, right? Nope! You get a warm, slightly muddy, slightly bright, wet flavor going. And that’s it. One cup of muddy, watery blandness was enough for me so I’ve been using up the rest of this tea for the husband’s morning tea with sugar and milk. I brew it for 5 to 7 minutes and, if I’m accidentally a little heavy-handed with the milk, he comments about how it’s a bit flavorless. Seriously, 5 to 7 minutes steep time and anything more than a tablespoon of milk in 16oz should not make a tea taste like sugared milk. But it does!

So yeah, I won’t be buying this tea again and honestly, I think I’ll be avoiding this brand like the plague. Because if this was fantastic, I could deal with the fact that opening it is a big giant pain in the ass. And hey, organic and recycled, so bonus. But no. Not fantastic. Not even good. Add the massive annoyance factor to the poor leaf quality (and taste) and you have an example of why a lot of people still think organic equals expensive and substandard. Bleck.

I’ve been slacking on trying new teas some lately, mostly just enjoying the bounty of my earlier TeaSpring order. But I decided to get back into it with one of the last remaining samples I have from Ninavampi.

Uhm, I may have picked the wrong tea to try to kickstart my sampling. For once, though, it isn’t the honeybush that’s killing this for me. Actually, the honeybush is adding a nice bakey back note to this that really does make it taste like freshly baked gooey sweet rolls. Nope, I get lost with the cinnamon on this one. It’s just too Red Hots cinnamon. It’s a lot like drinking Hot Damn cinnamon schnapps but without the punch of alcohol. I supposed I’m used to a milder cinnamon flavor than what this is.

Oh well, good to try! And also good to know that sometimes honeybush does work for me (even if the rest of the tea didn’t).

More TeaSpring tea! I’ve had this twice now and the first time, all signs pointed to deliciousness but it just didn’t wow me. It was a nice mix of Keemun and Fujian-ish notes – a Keemun-y rye flavor with faint toasted-smoke but also with a nice Golden Monkey-like roundness and hint of creaminess – which logically should have made me ooh and ah and mmm, but didn’t. And that made me sad.

This morning, I said to heck with TeaSprings 2g/5oz suggestion. I wanted a big cup. So I did 4.6g/12oz. Same steep time (though technically it takes me twice as long to get the water out of the Zojirushi, so maybe it had about 10 seconds longer today but really… same steep time). Today? Yum’s and mmm’s could be heard.

It’s like the mix of flavors has changed. It’s still mostly Keemun notes of rye and malt with some toasted/smoke (which is a bit heavier now) but now instead of a Golden Monkey-like smooth creaminess at the end, it’s a bit more of a Yunnan stoutness and peppery prickle (though some of that prickle feeling could be from the stronger smoke notes). Still a full and faintly sweet aftertaste, but with a little more oomph and texture to it. And that oomph really tickles my tastebuds.

I’m much happier with this in my big mug. I can’t say I will necessarily pick this up with my next TeaSpring order though, but that’s more an indication of the massive wonderfulness I’ve encountered in other TeaSpring teas than an indictment of this one. Even when this tea wows, it still doesn’t make it to the top of my “TeaSpring Teas of Wonder” list. I think this means TeaSpring is spoiling me.

ETA: Second steep is more smoky and Keemuny. And there’s almost a minty/mentholated whooshy endnote now. Very yum!

I finally got around to ordering from TeaSpring! Yay! It’s only taken ages. Since I ordered mostly black teas (just a few oolongs), my goal is to start my day with a new TeaSpring tea each morning. This morning, I pulled this one out of the tub o’ goodies, and I must tell you – I think I’m in love.

The dry leaves smell like a hot chocolate mix. Not just cocoa, but hot chocolate. There’s a sweeter smell to the steeped tea with a woody toasted note, too. All of which is really lovely, but it is the fast that really gets me. Sweet and syrupy and creamy with a super silky mouthfeel. The main flavor is of syrup – not quite maple syrup but a little more flavorful than the generic pancake syrup, probably because of the strong malt notes. Malt syrup? And there’s a lovely cocoa aftertaste. Not overly strong but like I’ve eaten a very nice dark chocolate just a few minutes earlier. And there’s a tiny prickle left on my tongue gives me the faint suggestion of pepper.

I have to admit, this is delightful. TeaSpring says that you can blend this with sweetened milk to make it taste like chocolate milk but honestly? Why would you want to cover up the lovely malt syrup and cocoa notes it has? I must go have another cup!

Updated: The second steep? WONDERFUL! The sweetness has shifted a little to the back of the taste, giving a stronger “normal” malt flavor up front and a delightful caramel chew-ish taste at the end with a faint aftertaste of toasted bread and a hint of that pepper-ish prickle.

This is another sample generously shared with my by Ninavampi! I will admit, I’m a huge coconut fan but the honeybush aspect of this? Makes me a bit nervous. But I enjoy Teas Etc’s Coconut Custard, so maybe it won’t be as bad as I fear.

Gotta say, the smell of the unleaf isn’t exactly calming my fears. It’s okay, but I don’t get coconut at all. More like… vanilla flavored Greek yogurt. Post-steeping, though, that’s got me really worried. I smell tart-sour like unripened berries and cough syrup and hamster bedding (wood shavings, basically, but a little sweeter).

Hold me. I’m scared. sip

Uhm. Okay. Not as bad as I was fearing but I had gone pretty far down the fear road because the smell is so rooibos-y (aka sour wood). But the taste… is okay.

I mean, I’m not really getting coconut, but there is something vaguely creamy going on. I keep thinking of cream cheese. Kind of bland and white and creamy and smooth and coating. So yeah, I’m going to go with this tastes like cream cheese.

That is, underneath the icky wet and slightly rotting wood.

Honeybush is better than rooibos for me because it doesn’t seem quite so rotten, but yeah, this is wet, squishy wood, like a fallen tree that’s been rained on for the past three days and it’s started swelling and going soft. (Rooibos is more like that tree fell into a pond three months ago and grew things on it.) Theoretically, it is possible that there is some coconut in here and it is a more nutty, woodsy style coconut that is just blending into (and being dominated by) the wood from the honeybush.

I’m going to go with a big ole “not for me” with this one. Cream cheese tea is interesting and thumbs up to 52Teas for getting that taste right (cause I figure cream cheese is just one step from cheesecake) but the flavor is too dominated by icky honeybush for me to deal well. But at least I got to try it!

Thanks to Ninavampi for a chance to try this one! I’ve only had one 52teas experience before and it was… not good. So I’m excited to have some more chances!

The dry leaf smells fun – very strawberry-like, though with a hint of Jello strawberry-ness. I don’t get any of the lemonade until post-pouring when I smelled the leaves in the pot. Then it is pretty much full-on lemon. It’s faintly Pledge-like but with a woodsier/deeper note to it. I like. The liquor has a more balanced smell with a hint of tart lemon and a sweet dash of (Jello) strawberry.

The taste isn’t bad. We’re kind of fighting an uphill battle though since I don’t really have much of an appreciation for Bai Mu Dan. And I can taste the vegetal, thick, lima bean notes of the BMD which, even though I’m not a fan, actually tasting a tea underneath flavoring is a nice thing. I can also pick up lemon(ade?) which is a nice, natural feeling flavor. I think the lemon(ade) with the BMD alone might be something I heartily approve of since the fresh/tart/sweet of the lemon lightens the heave BMD.

The strawberry, though, is a little eh for me. Half the time it’s very nice – sweet and dessert like with a bit of creamy bit to it. Super yum. But other times, I get warm Jello and that throws me a bit and I just have to wrinkle my nose at it.

Honestly, I’m not wild about this one (a combo of the BMD and the Jello bit) but it’s totally drinkable and a lot better than I feared when I saw that it was a flavored white. Nothing I’ll buy but then, I don’t really buy many whites (or flavored non-blacks) anyway.

I’m just not having luck with Talbott Teas. Which is disappointing because I’ve seen some logs about some yummy sounding ones but my track record is abysmal enough with them that I just can’t buy any on the off chance they’ll be tasty. Prior experience is proving they aren’t.

This one is no exception. The smell is woodsy and malty, a lot like a Dalmih Italian Almond Ceylon I had previously (and I think I logged here? I have some catching up to do, I think), though not quite as thick and syrupy smelling. The taste isn’t near as thick, either. It’s starchy, a little flat, woodsy and has a faint tail note of something brightly Darjeeling-ish. And that’s pretty much all it gives me. Honestly, it’s pretty dull.

I suppose that’s my problem. It’s just dull. Cardboardy, but not in a happy way. Flat. Starchy. Woody. They all tie back to cardboard and that’s just not sexy. It’s boring. Sigh. Oh well, at least I’m out of this one.

It has been a few weeks since I’ve done more than dip a toe into the Steepster pool. It’s been kinda rough – first a week-long visit to the in-laws, which really was nice… well, until I came down with the stomach flu. So battled that and after a week, I finally start feeling better and my kitty (who was 20 and I got when she was just a few months old) passed away. So yeah. Rough month lately.

For a while I wasn’t really branching out beyond CTG’s Keemun and Adagio’s Yunnan Golden Curls because I just couldn’t deal with thinking about new tea. But now things are better (which my computer corrected to butterfish???) now and I finally no longer feel like I’m wandering around in a fog. So it is time to start having a little tea fun.

I’m not really a big dancong fan, but I’m trying to develop an appreciate for the not-so-green oolongs. Thus, I got a little sample of this one.

It’s lovely. Creamy and sweet on the front end, fruity and honeyed on the back. The smell and taste bring to mind pouchong and milk oolongs, which is big mark in the plus column for me. Of the few dancongs I’ve had, I don’t think it’s going too far to say that this is probably the best one I’ve had. The others have seem too mild and delicate and soft. Pretty, yes. But faint, no matter how much leaf I used. This one has a good, noticeable taste that I don’t feel I need to concentrate hard just to taste. And the taste? Well, I’ve already mentioned it is lovely. It brings to mind tropical beaches and lush jungle and farmers markets (the peachy aspect, you know).

But it has helped me realize something: I don’t think I will ever love dancongs. The flavor? DELIGHTFUL! I made several oohs and ahhs while drinking this. But I think this type of tea just consistently has a bit of a drying aspect to it and that’s just not what I tend to go for in teas, especially ones that have such delightfully decadent front ends. I don’t think it is drying enough to be considered astringent, but it is drying enough to make me smack my lips together a bit after each sip to reline my mouth with saliva (which does bring out a lovely aftertaste in my mouth – very stone fruity and sweet – but still). And I just tend to go more for cuddly teas than refreshing ones.

That being said, I think for those more inclined to want refreshing or bright aspects to their tea, this one is pretty stellar.

(Oh, and PS – not giving this one a numerical rating because I can’t quite figure where it would fit – the dryness of the tea just makes me unenthusiastic about it but the flavor is deserving of massive enthusiasm. So yeah, torn.)

If you had asked me a few months ago, I would have said that I didn’t like Chinese greens pretty much as a general rule. To me, Chinese greens remind me of that time in college that I wondered about the little mineral stones I’d give my hamster and so I licked one of them. (It was a new one, if you were concerned. No hamster bits on it.) Salty, mineralish, briny, drying… I mean, I was glad my hamster liked it but it wasn’t something I wanted to include in my regular diet. Which, yeah, was pretty much my thought on Chinese greens (in both taste and dietary inclusion).

But stupid Chicago Tea Garden. Making me reevaluate my entire policy towards Chinese greens! How dare they?! I mean, first I had good success with their Lu Mu Dan Flowers. Then, more recently, I fell in love with their Wu Yu Jade Mist (which I just ordered 50g of, by the way). And now this sample. Dang it. I like it! I still like the Wu Yu more – it’s more nuanced and exciting to me – but this is a really tasty tea.

I think the main thing I like about this is the zero astringency bit. Sure, some tea descriptions will say that, but this tea actually delivers. Instead of having an astringent (or briny) endnote, this one is all smooth and sweet. The whole tea actually is smooth and sweet. And maybe a little bready – like a very light rye bread or something. So light (very pale) honey and a non-dark rye bread. That’s what this tea makes me think of. Yum!

And now my cup is empty. And I have to go refill it. And find a new stance for my Chinese green related tea thoughts.

I had this last night and it had a little bitterness at the end. The bitterness wasn’t bad, actually – it balanced out the super-creaminess – but I still wanted to give it a shot with a shorter steep time to see what would happen.

Apparently, angles sing.

Seriously, y’all, this is so good. Creamy, milky, rich, vibrant, chlorophyl-y, a little citrusy towards the end. SO. GOOD. I thought it was tasty last night? It has nothing on how it is tonight.

It was probably the noisiest cup of tea I’ve had in quite a while, what with all the ‘oooh’ and ‘wow’ that was going on. The husband was staring at me with a confused look for a while until I offered him a sip. Then his eyes widened and suddenly he understood. Fantastic.
^{7.2g/7oz/155°/1min}

I’ve been on a bit of green tea kick lately, mostly because I have a fair amount of it that I want to make sure is gone before shincha preorder time rolls around. This one isn’t next in the rotation for what one to open – there are others that I’ve had around longer that are probably getting kind of old – but I just couldn’t resist anymore.

Is it just me or does all sencha smell delicious when you open it up? I just adore that smell. Anyone know if they make sencha scented candles? Because it has to be one of my favorite smells ever. This one is grass and butter, or maybe cream. Sniffing again post-steeping, I get chlorophyl and pumpkin.

The taste is smooth, creamy, mild but thick, full of chlorophyl and milk. There’s a sharp bit of bitterness on the end but pleasantly no astringency (which usually seems to go hand in hand with bitterness in green tea but also something I’m not a fan of). Maybe the bitterness comes is from too much leaf? Though in some ways it is a nice contract to the heavy silky smoothness of the rest of the sip and it isn’t overly strong or too overwhelming. Actually, the more I sip it, the more I kind of like that brief flash of bitterness. It gives the tea a nice balance and keeps it from being too rich.

This actually reminds me a bit of Samovar’s Ryokucha but only in that I so love Ryokucha’s milky note – it’s what made me fall in love with it – and this has a stronger, creamier milky note. It’s not something I often get in green tea but it’s totally there in this one.

Uhm, I accidentally kind of chugged my cup. I kept meaning to put it down and sip, but I just couldn’t make the cup leave my hand. And I think this one officially goes down as one of the fastest I’ve rushed to the teapot for a resteep.

The second steep (instant pour) has a bit more “normal” taste to it. There’s still some creamy but it is more in the aftertaste (and more in line with the amount I get from Samovar’s Ryokucha). The bitterness is still there, lasting for a little hint longer but not quite as punchy. There’s also a stronger pumpkin (or maybe acorn squash?) note to it.

And suddenly my cup is empty yet again. Sigh. I’m not sure if I need a third steep of a strong sencha at almost 10pm at night…. But this is a truly tasty tea. It’s not the most nuanced sencha I’ve come across, but it ranks up there. And it’s got the milky taste, which I find really pleasing and unique. Right now I can say that I am a bit infatuated with this tea. And if it keeps giving me what it has given me tonight, I think that’s going to develop into a case of full blow love. ♥
^{6g/6oz/155°/1:30}

Today is not going my way. My notices page won’t open (and not being able to clear the little red 20 is annoying the piss out of me), my house smells of grain mash (the husband is making beer – the smell in itself isn’t bad, but after three plus hours, it gets a little (okay, a lot) overwhelming), one of my kitties is stoned out of her mind because she has a very bad bladder infection (apparently she didn’t respond to antibiotic number one, but I still feel like a bad mommy for letting it get so bad) and I feel bored and fidgety. I need tea.

Sadly, I think I picked the wrong one with this one because apparently The Soho Earl wears a lot of perfume. Or uses a lot of citrus-scented cleaning products. The scent of this alone makes it somewhat difficult for me to drink. It just smells so artificial and wrong. Getting past the smell into the actual taste, though, and it’s okayish. Sweet, almost candied citrus with some orange peel bitterness thrown in (too much, actually, but at least the bitterness is realistic, unlike the rest of the flavor). It has a very noticeable orange-ish flavor. I say orange-ish, not bergamot, because bergamot seems a bit darker of a citrus flavor than this. This is more candy orange/citrus than sophisticated bergamot/citrus. Not quite those orange gummy slices you get at the gas station orange flavored. And now I’m thinking of those circus peanuts my parents used to always get at the gas station. I don’t think it tastes like those either, but for some reason my mind is screaming at me, “CIRCUS PEANUTS!!!! THEY’RE ORANGE!!! LIKE THIS TEA TASTES!!! CIRCUS PEANUTS!!!”

Must reign in my brain a bit….

Okay, this actually makes me think of Constant Comment, when I make it for iced tea for the husband. I don’t ever drink it, but this tea still reminds me of the smell. I can’t say I’m a fan of this one. Maybe the husband will like it enough to drink the rest.

This one is a freebie teabag that was put in my recent(-ish) Kusmi order. I’m not a huge spice-in-my-tea type girl, but hey, always up for trying stuff. (Well, almost always.) And I do enjoy Lindt’s Chili dark chocolate so who knows!

The smell is more cinnamon spicy than cayenne spicy (and I was anticipating/wanting more cayenne so that’s kind of uninspiring). The chocolate is there in the smell, somewhere between a cocoa and a not-so-creamy, kind of cheap milk chocolate. So far this isn’t looking good.

The taste isn’t all that… well, all that anything. It’s a bit warm spicy. Warmer than cinnamon, not as warm as cayenne. The chocolate… isn’t. I mean, maybe there is a faint hint of it but it’s more like Tootsie Roll chocolate than chocolate bar chocolate and the strength is more like licking the wrapper than eating the Tootsie Roll.

All in all, it’s just kind of boring. It’s not bad. But it’s not great either. It’s not going to turn me into a spicy-in-my-tea fan but it’s not going to turn me off of tea, either. I give it a solid ‘meh’.

(By the way, is it just me or are notices not working? I mean, the little red number shows up but I can’t get to the page to see them detailed.)

I’m really not a huge white tea fan, nor a huge Tazo fan. But I had the chance to try a new-to-me tea so I took it. This was that tea.

I’m really not expecting much, so my lack of disappointment probably reflects more on that than the tea, but it really isn’t bad. I mean, it’s not great, but it’s quite drinkable. It has a fairly uneventful taste. I don’t really taste any cucumber (but really, what does cucumber taste like but wet, cold, crisp and fresh which, now that I’ve said that, I guess I do kinda taste). I don’t really taste any white tea either. No wait, I take that back. There might be some white tea vegetal-ness in the very back of the taste. Most of the taste is lime-ish citrus with a little warm spice tingle at the end. It gives it a kind of fresh, lively taste. Sort of summery, though weirdly bland at the same time. (I’m guessing that is from the teabag-ness? Or maybe the fact that I just steeped for one minute.)

Anyway, this honestly doesn’t taste all that white tea (or any kind of tea, actually) to me and I think if you go into this expecting white tea, you’ll probably be disappointed. But it’s a decently respectable (and unusual) teabag herbal.

How is it that I like this tea? I mean, I typically try to avoid any hint of bitterness or tartness in my teas and I don’t even like grapefruit because it is too tart and strongly flavored. And yet I find this tea delightful.

I think perhaps because it tastes like what I wish grapefruit did.

I love the smell of grapefruit – sweet, tart, citrusy – it’s great. But the taste? Yuck. Too much of a mouth-pucker quality. But maybe that’s why I like this. It has the great smell of grapefruit – a rather true-to-life one, I think, specifically if I think of the slightly sweeter smelling pink grapefruit. But the taste is mild and light. Just sweet and citrusy and fresh with a little tiny tingle of tart. (Slurping does bring out a weird, almost grape flavor. I think I’ll pass on that in the future.)

As with most Lupicia flavored teas, this one isn’t for someone hoping to get knocked off of their feet with flavor. It’s soft, almost delicate. Personally, I’m all for it, especially on a potentially overwhelming flavor like grapefruit, but it’s not for everyone. Though I will say the husband did like it saying, “It has the aroma and slight bite of it that blends in perfectly with the normal tea-ish flavor but it isn’t brash like some of the others we have had.” He’s getting so fancy in his tea tasting. :)

I’m sick (fighting off a sinus infection… again) so this will be short(er than normal).

Bagged version of this tea, another new offering from my grocery store. First off, I don’t really like Le Palais De Thes’ teabags. They have a really thick string which wicks tea like crazy. If I leave the little tag at the end of the string on the side of the cup, by the time my tea is done steeping, there is a puddle of tea underneath the cup where it has wicked out of the cup, soaked into the tag and run down the side of the cup. Very annoying.

That being said, what’s in the teabag is pretty tasty. This reminds me a lot of A&D’s Tiger – smooth but with enough stoutness that it would not be defeated by a dash of milk, sweet and a bit honeyed. It’s a little more… floral? than Tiger was. Definitely a big thumbs up for a bagged tea.

More random tea that is newly available in my grocery store. This one came in a Talbott Tea sampler box with six different teas, two teabags of each. The teabags are quite alright – they remind me a lot of Lupicia’s but they don’t seem quite as silky. They do have about as much tea per bag as Lupicia’s though. 3.1g for this one. Good job Talbott.

The smell reminds me of ROT’s Strawberry Chocolate herbal. I don’t think that one is a great tea, but I like it enough to buy it from the grocery store when I need something herbal-y so it’s decent enough. I suppose there are worse things to smell like.

Hmm. I think the ROT tastes better. At least it tastes more chocolate strawberry. This is mostly tea with a faint (super-faint) note of strawberry towards the end. The aftertaste has a sort of musty sock thing going on that, if you tilt your head and squint, might be considered somewhere in the chocolate family. Not a good part of the chocolate family but still, I’m feeling generous so I’ll count it.

The tea itself isn’t offensive or anything. It’s smooth and a little silky and mild with no astringency or bitterness. That’s nice. As it cools, almost to room temperature, more of the strawberry and chocolate flavors come out but it’s still not overly noticeable.

I can’t help but think that this wants to be a plus-chocolate type Marco Polo but it just doesn’t make it up there. Once it cools down quite a bit it’s closer in taste to the flavor of the ROT, but 1) honestly, that’s not something to aspire to and 2) the aftertaste still makes me think of wet socks. Not wet dirty socks, but still, wet socks.

So yeah, nice try but for once I think I prefer an herbal.

Another new offering from my grocery store’s tea section. It’s bagged but this was a new brand that I haven’t heard of, so I thought I’d give it a try. I picked out this tea because I like almond flavoring… not so huge on almond nuts but the flavoring? Awesome.

When I opened the little foil bag, I was hit by the strong (and delicious) smell of pure amaretto. Just what I had been hoping for! When I took out some tea bags, though, I couldn’t help but think that they looked a bit like they were made of dryer sheets. That’s kind of uncool. Mental note: smell the bags, don’t look at them.

After steeping, the tea is a much more tea-like smelling creation. It smells thick, woodsy, malty and occasionally I get flashes of something that smells similar to dark chocolate or cocoa, but just a flash. And waiting patiently behind this very strong and bold tea smell is my adorable little amaretto. I hope the same is true for the taste.

I don’t have huge experiences with Ceylon, not straight at least, but this taste doesn’t remind me of Adagio’s Ceylon blends (or any other Ceylon-based flavored tea I can think of). It actually reminds me of a CTC that I had from Lupicia a while back – thickly textured, malty, a little bit of sticky sweet. (I just looked it up and I’m thinking about Silonibari BPS, which I believe is an Assam.) The amaretto flavor kind of flits around playfully; sometimes it’s at the beginning of the sip, sometimes the end, sometimes I get it all throughout the sip. It’s definitely taking a back seat to the tea but not so much that it fades away.

I do think the tea might be a wee bit strong for the lighter almond taste, though, because the end taste of the tea is so thick and coating that it seems more working counter to the almond than in conjunction. The almond shows up more when I take multiple sips instead of resting in between. I think resting gives the tea a chance to build up its thick, slightly bitter (in a wet, nutty way) end notes which totally drown out the amaretto. Sip-sip-sipping results in more sweet, light almond.

Overall, not bad but it could use a little something. Since this reminds me so much of Silonibari BPS, which turned to flat, boring cardboard when milk was added, I don’t think I’m brave enough to try it with milk. Mentally, I’ve already decided that would ruin it. But trying it with sugar seems like a good idea…

Ah yes, a good idea. It kills off just enough of the nutty bitter that I’m able to enjoy the almond more. It’s still not overwhelmingly almond, but it’s not distractingly wet-bitter at the end, either. Much better. I also seem to drink it faster which helps with the lack of nutty-bitter aftertaste. Overall, the addition of sugar seems to make the tea/flavoring ratio seem a bit better balanced instead of the big bully of the tea running roughshod all over the sweet, innocent little almond.

As always, it is nice to come across a flavored tea that still lets the tea be the star. I’m not sure that they picked the best leading actor in the tea world, though, but since sugar tempers that a bit, I won’t complain too loudly. Overall, a nice tea… and one with a pretty serious caffeine punch. (Seriously, my hands just started trembling a bit and I only had 6oz. Usually only lots of sencha or a stout Assam give me the shakes. Wowza.)

Y’all. Seriously, y’all. I got this at my grocery store. A 20g tin. For $3.00. No, not even for $3.00. For $2.99. I kid you not. Teance has this on their site for $37. (As does In Pursuit of Tea… are they the same company?) It’s not out of date or anything. It’s just really, really cheap. Someone was obviously smoking something when they priced this. I knew this tin was a good deal; that’s why I picked it up. I didn’t realize it was that good of a deal. Anyway, on with the show!

Have I ever mentioned that I’m scared of matcha? I would sell my first born for a limitless supply of shincha (Yutaka Midori, please) yet for some reason, matcha freaks me out. The first time I had it was at a tea ceremony my friend was performing at our high school’s culture festival (文化祭) many years ago in Japan. Ryoko, said friend, told me when she invited me that “even the Japanese don’t like the tea in the tea ceremony.” Stellar recommendation. And the tea served totally matched up to expectations. Ick. I think that’s why I’ve not been a big matcha girl. Then, when I finally found the cajones to try matcha again, it was some that I received in a swap and had been sitting on my counter for months, getting icky and not-green, as I tried to get up the nerve to try it. Unsurprisingly, that tasted icky, too. I did have some iced matcha at Teavana at one point. That was okay. But it was iced… and from Teavana. So that was sort of discounted as a typical matcha experience. But when I say this at the store marked $2.99, I figured I’d give another go. Three bucks for potentially nasty tea isn’t that big of a deal. Which brings me to what is currently in my cup…

OMG, WHY was I afraid of matcha??? This is lovely! It smells like a fresh sheet of crisp, sweet, toasty nori. And the taste!! The taste is so mild and creamy and sweet! It’s like sencha, but dessert sencha instead of pungent dinner entree sencha. I know why people make ice cream out of matcha now – it’s so creamy! I could mainline this stuff!

Okay, okay, it’s never going to replace my love of a deep steamed sencha – I just love the rich pungency too much and this is no where even close to pungent. But this is so good. SO. GOOD. Yeah, it could be more complex but honestly, who doesn’t like sencha taste coupled with smooth, creamy and sweet? Green tea ice cream without the cold or the calories, that’s what this is. This is sencha dessert in a cup. With caffeine. And that caffeine is the only reason I’m not making myself another cup RIGHT NOW. And another in five more minutes. And another five minutes after that.

Looks like I have to make an emergency run to the grocery store. I think they had three more tins of this, all at $2.99. Time to stock up!

(This will be my attempt to write a brief(er than normal) tea log. Wish me luck!)

The set up: I’ve had a bit of an uncheerful time lately and today is no different. Fortunately, my Kusmi order showed up a day earlier than expected so I will be able to cheer myself up with tea!

The smell: The dry leaves give me marzipan with a hint of spice and a flash of soft floral and bakey. The tea smells of… tea (like some sort of Lipton-esque blend that just comes across as “tea”) with a little soft spice (thankfully not enough to make me think of potpourri) and something that reminds me of pancakes (sweet and bready).

The taste: It’s mild. I can detect rose and spice when I slurp but otherwise it’s faintly marzipan and orange with a cinnamon-like sweetness of spice at the end. But the notes all sort of blend to give a smooth, rather softly flavored, afternoon tea.

The verdict: I had hoped that this would be a little stronger on the almond and orange (as I love those flavors) but I do like the mild-ness and smooth-ness of this. I probably won’t buy this one again as it’s fairly un-wowing, but the smoothness and mild flavor is relaxing to me on this grumpy day.

Can you tell I recently received a Chicago Tea Garden order? Cause I did! And I got samples! This is another sample I picked up. I’m not typically a fan of white tea but if CTG offers it, I’m probably going to try it. After all, the one strong exception to my general un-fanish stance towards white tea is CTG Silver Needle so why not, right?

I feel a bit like I’m raking leaves in the fall as I weight out the tea to put in my pot. The leaves are big, chunky, light, crispy and fairly unruly. They keep trying to jump off of the scale. For some reason, these leaves (and the leaves of bai mu dan) kind of freak me out. They look a little too unintentional for a food or beverage. Instead I want to pile them up and jump in them, like I did when I lived where fall actually existed.

These leaves don’t really smell of fall-chore leaves to me, though. Mostly the leaves are just faintly musty with perhaps a little tinge of sweet. The sweetness comes out more while I am steeping the leaves, but once the tea is poured into the cup, the smell (any smell) is very faint. It’s perhaps vegetal, grain-ish, sweet and musty… though it’s hard to tell due to the faintness.

The taste is very delicate but my reaction to the first sip was surprise and delight. Normally white teas are a bit too boiled-vegetable-water for me. This, however, is predominately a cross between floral nectar and honey. It’s delicate and light, yes, but there seems to be a richness to the sweet flavor of it, a darkness or heaviness that belies typical (sweet & light) floral thoughts, perhaps even a caramelization? Caramelized gardenia, perhaps? (Gardenias always strike me as a sweet but non-floral-ish type of flower.) Underneath that is a slight vegetal note that is more steamed edamame than boiled green beans and an end note of warmth that brings to mind the feel of ginger, if not quite the taste.

As it cools, the vegetal note pokes out more, but again, it isn’t boiled-until-they-are-olive-green-and-soggy vegetable water but something a hint fresher and more vibrant. Slurping still brings out the sweet gardenia nectar notes and I like that. The spicy warmth is still there but milder, hitting mostly in the middle of my tongue and the back of my throat. Perhaps it is now more of a cinnamon warmth than a ginger warmth.

This is not a fast-sipping tea. It’s delicate and light, but there’s a lot of nuances so I feel the need to slowly and almost meditatively sip. Drinking quickly feels a bit sacrilegious. Which is weird since I don’t really like white tea, but there you go.

I can’t help but wonder how this tea would be if I increased the leaves significantly, steeping it more in line with what I do for Japanese greens with five or even six grams per six ounce cup. I have a feeling it would be kind of amazing…

With that thought in mind, I did the second steep with only four ounces of water (160°/1:30). The smell is stronger – more warm rye bread with butter; sweet, grain-ish, silky. The taste is the same, but different. It’s a bit stronger and more intense and somehow that seems to make the notes combine together to create a fuller taste but also become more distinctive and easier to identify separately.

It’s still sweet but instead of a heavy, dark sweetness, it’s more of a butter-cream sweet. The previous heavy darkness has strengthened and turned into a more separate grain-like note (like a not super-dark rye). Slurping brings out sweet nectar (slightly lighter tasting than the first steep) and each sip still ends with a chaser of spice-like warmth. There is virtually zero vegetal taste in this cup, at least not that I can pick out. Perhaps it has joined with the grain note for added depth?

This steep makes me think less of caramelized gardenia nectar with edamame and more of… cinnamon sugar toast with sweet cream butter. This cup feels less meditative and more nom. And poof, it is gone.

The third steep (4oz/160°/2min), made significantly after the first two, seems radically different. The flavor is predominately green now, with an almost-bite to it (that I think comes from the leafy greens flavor combined with the ginger-ish warmth) that makes me think of collard greens. Slurping still brings out sweetness, but now it is more of a normal clover honey than anything nectary. I don’t pick up any grain notes though that darker note could be coupling with the green note (and spice feel) to give me collard greens as they are a rather dark and heavy green. There’s also a sticky dryness at the end of the sip now – not astringency in the way that leads to bitterness but rather something that makes all the saliva in my mouth disappear for a few seconds. Honestly, this steep is kind of weird and I don’t think I’d go for this tea if this were the consistent taste, but as weird as it is, I still find it pretty interesting. And this is long enough and dinner is nigh so I think I’m going to stop there.

Bottom line: I don’t love this as much as CTG’s Silver Needles, but I do think I will be ordering this at least once, at the very least because it’s so interesting. A sample is simple not enough to allow me to play with it like I want to.

(Once again, sorry about the massive tasting note. Brevity and I don’t get along. If you read this far, you have earned my admiration for your fortitude. And a cookie.)

My grocery store recently revamped their tea section and part of that revamping including selling new vendors, Zhi Tea being one of them. I was looking to see if I could find one of the yummy-sounding unflavored teas Zhi offers but it looks like my grocery store is just offering a selection of their flavored blends. Somehow, I will manage to cope. Coconut will help in the coping process.

I’m a bit mixed on this tea. First off, it smells awesome. Honest-to-goodness coconut with a touch of bakey. The steeping tea smells even better than the dry leaves – musty/sweet coconut. It makes my mouth water. Though after smelling the steeping leaves, going back to smell the dry leaves makes me notice something unpleasant in the smell, something almost fake or plastic. Maybe it is the coconut flavoring or maybe I’m smelling the packaging. I’m going to ignore it for now and just smell the steeping tea.

Once I get the tea into my cup, the coconut smell is milder than it was in the steeping leaves, but it’s still quite nice. I do so love coconut. (Though I rarely eat it because I can’t get behind the texture. Yuck.) Still, quite lovely. But it’s the taste of this tea that has me a little torn.

First off, let me explain. I used to log every single cup of tea that I drank. I can be a little too structured with things like that. But then Steepster slowed down to a snail’s pace and logging was too frustrating so I went away for a while (all or nothing, you know). Now I’m trying a little moderation – logging teas to review them but not being obsessive about it. So this is not the first time I’ve had this cup since I purchased it, it’s just the first time I’m posting (and being coherent) with my thoughts on it.

The first time I had this, it was more Assam with a coconut aftertaste. The Assam was nice – honeyed, bakey, a little starchy – but the coconut felt a bit lacking. This time, however, there is coconut all through the sip, from beginning to end. Good, strong, lovely coconut. I can taste the Assam underneath the coconut, but it doesn’t seem as nice as before. Starchy, malty and maybe slightly sweet. But sometimes I also get flashes of… watery. And strong prickles of astringency that weren’t there before. And the honeyed note is all but gone, replace (or overwhelmed) by a faint tartness that doesn’t quite enter into Bitter-land but definitely has been planning a trip there.

So it seems like my choices for this tea are either 1) delicious, smooth and sweet Assam with a disappointingly faint aftertaste of coconut or 2) strong, full coconut flavor with a rough and unpleasant Assam. I’m not sure how one tea gives two such different cups when brewed the same way both times. Ideally, I’d like the sweet and smooth Assam note to be coupled with a beginning-to-end coconut note. Maybe the third time will be the charm. Or else my next cup will be faint coconut aftertaste coupled with a rough and watery Assam.

So see? Torn. It’s a bit too roulette wheel for my tastes but the potential for awesomeness is there. But this is either inconsistent or picky. And since both attributes make me grumpy when I find them in tea, I suppose I’ll be sticking to SerendipiTEA’s Burroughs’ Brew for my coconut tea cravings.