Cavocorax

Thanks Josie Jade!

This might not be for everyone, but it’s insanely cinnamony. A pretty bold afternoon cup. This would be a good one once I return to work – my cubicle would smell nice too.

And there goes the last of my sample. I loved it while it lasted.

I had this earlier but want to make a note of it before I forget: this is really good! I didn’t know if I’d be crazy about the rose, bu it was really enjoyable. I wouldn’t to drink it all the time, but it will make for a nice treat.

Thanks Terri HarpLady

Sometimes… sometimes this is all I need. <3

This was the tea that I drank every day, all day, before I discovered loose leaf.

I’ve had bad luck with my last two cups not working out (dumped immediately), so time to try an Oolong instead of a third black.

This is just what I needed!

First steep was 90 seconds as the package directed. It’s very creamy, buttery and has lots of spinach notes. It smells like tasty oolong and the tea itself looks barely yellow.

Second steep: 110 seconds. It’s a deep golden yellow this time around, and the creamy butter has subsided. I’m getting spinach notes still and other oolongy flavours. Very rich.

Third steep: 120 seconds. It’s almost orange yellow, and very vegetal. Very enjoyable.

Drinking this again. Yeah it’s good. Too bad the name keeps making me think I won’t like it. I should just give it a new name/label so that I drink it more often.

Roodswing came over on the weekend for a bit of a tea swap and she left me with some of this. It tastes exactly how it sounds, and I love it. Nice and simple – nuttyish vanilla goodness.

The company sadly is lacking ALL information on its website, but hopefully that will change as I’d like to look at future orders! (Yes, yes, they’re a “local” company, but Fort Langley is still a few cities over. :P

Not much time to rate this but I like this. It’s warm and toasty and a touch creamy and it does somehow remind me of chocolate. I’m happy I grabbed a little pack,and it turned out great even with DavidsTea standard brewing instructions.

Do I store it with my black or white teas? :O

I’m getting low on this and, as I’m making an order of Murchie’s 1894 blend for the book/tea club, I made a cup of this to see if I should re-order it.

Sadly – no. Not this time. It has some really good notes, and there is an interesting taste where the green and black mix together, but I just can’t make myself fall in love with this tea.

Maybe I’ll add some green tea to my order instead. :D The prices for 2oz are just SO GOOD.

Oh wow. This is amazing! I had the boo-berry cotton candy the other day, but I didn’t get anything cotton candy-y out of it, so I figured I must have messed it up and didn’t rate it.

With this one? NOPE. It’s perfect. It really actually reminds me of sticky cotton candy. I made it iced, but I had a sip of it hot before I put it in the flash icer thingy and both hot and cold it is really smooth, really sweet, and makes me think of sticky tongues.

I see this isn’t a regular for 52 Teas. I hope they change this because I’m going to want more. :| But I have a full pitcher of iced tea in the fridge, and I can try to resteep my leaves tomorrow too.

I guess it’s Superbowl? Totally not my thing, although I’m curious about Blackberry’s commercial. Can they be successful again? I have their tablet and I love it. It’s totally worth $150 – I use it around the house mostly but it’s never far. (And that explains why I’m on Steepster so frequently).

Anyway I’m watching BBC’s Pride&Predjudice miniseries, while I sip tea and play GuildWars2! Talk about multi-tasking! But I’ve seen this series several times, so it’s nice to listen to. I just watched the 2005 P&P movie earlier this week and now that I’m watching the miniseries, I sorta feel like the movie is mostly rubbish as it rushes everything! I realize there’s only so much time to express things, but the characters are sorta hard to understand when condensed so. Also, Lizzy in the 2005 movie goes from “I hate you Mr. Darcy” to “OMG Look at his pretty shiny house – what did I do?” in like 10 minutes. Bleah. It had some good points but I better just stick with the full thing.

So! Happy I have the miniseries.

Oh! I had a sample of this last month – I completely forgot! Guess that’s why logging it is so important.

I steeped 1tsp of this in my gongfu pot for a minute. This smells so great. It tastes like white grapefruit, slightly tart, but also slightly buttery too. Interesting!

2nd Steep: More grapefruit. More butter. Very lovely. I could see this becoming a staple in the spring.

This is one of my samples from Libertea’s box. Lucky me!

I have no idea what Bananas Foster really is, but based on the description I would probably love the heck out of it. I really like this tea too. Hints of cinnamon, caramel and banana make for a tasty treat!

Bonus: Sipdown!

Just a funny though – when I started on this site I used my standard internet name, but it doesn’t make sense her. I think a good chunk of you guys have got my mailing address from swaps, and if you haven’t, on a long enough timeline you probably will. So hiding behind a screen name does what? :P

No notes yet.

I ordered a sample box from Liberteas and was delighted when it showed up today! She managed to stuff 23 samples in there, and nearly half of them were from 52 teas, so now I’ll have a better idea of what those crazy blends are like. Each little bag is nicely labeled and has the brewing instructions too so I don’t have to worry about not knowing what the heck I’m doing. I don’t know how often she does these little sample boxes, but I highly recommend it as a great try-me package – you can check her profile for the link if anyone is interested.

I should mention that I had a good amount of say in what I wanted her to send but I decided that besides trying some 52 Teas, I’d like to be surprised.

I ran out to check for mail before I made any tea, so once I opened this treasure chest up, I picked this one because of the name and I am off to a great start on this sampling journey!

I have a really hard time describing it – it’s very complex but I guess it’s a blend of three different teas and each are contributing something to it. I love how smooth every sip is, and slightly malty, but more and more into the cup I’m getting fruity notes and cream too! I think I have enough in my sample pack for at least two giant 16oz mugs so I look forward to trying to puzzle this tea out.

Hmm – maybe Assam and Darjeeling? Not sure of the third.

I really love this though. Guaranteed that if I ever order from Hugo, I would get this!

I had one cup of this last night, and five today!

I love this tea.

I’m cheating with this one again. I made 14 oz of tea, added 2 oz of milk and a decent clump of brown sugar. It’s AMAZING. It mellows the marsh, and brings out the orange and makes the chocolate OH SO GOOD. Maybe I’ll always break my no additives rule for this tea. I mean… it is good on it’s own. It’s just better with friends. :)

It’s an oolong! And it’s peachy! And it’s.. OK. I may have misteeped it. It doesn’t wow me.

The dry tea is very pretty though. So many fruity bits.

As I was resteeping this I thought I’d add that this is a tea that knows what it is. There are lots of dessert teas and gimicky ones that promise to taste like something it isn’t and we sip them up and remark, “Yeah this is just like chocolate cake, or bacon or whatever!” And that’s not a bad thing of course.

But this is a tea that knows it’s a tea. It tastes like tea. But it’s sophisticated and reminds you of eggnog without actually trying to BE eggnog. Kudos.

I thought I’d go with something milder to start off today and wow… talk about mild. And smooth. And very nice.

I’m used to drinking strong blacks in the morning, so this threw me off at first, but I am loving this. Each sip is very smooth and buttery and just a tad creamy as well. I think this is going to be my favourite of the ‘eggnog teas’. Sorry Della Terra – the rooibos thing was neat but this delicate green tea has got you beat!!!

I’ve got enough left for a few more cups. I’ll have to make it last as I just made my tea order for the month and can’t justify another, even though Butiki has this one on sale. :| Maybe I can snag it in early Feb!!! :P I’ll just have to order enough to make up for the shipping.

I’m rating this tea… which means that I finally watched Farewell Ponds. ;___: No surprises there.

Well maybe a few. I knew what was going to happen, I knew that the episodes leading up to this were hinting at endings, yet I still teared up during a few moments of the show. OH MAN I AM A SUCKER FOR DOCTOR WHO.

I want to buy some TARDIS tea as well. Why does it have to be so expensive to ship to Canada. Basically $9 of tea will cost me $31 with the shipping. WHUT?!? So I won’t be getting any time soon, and I won’t be getting any Farewell Ponds either. I liked this tea as a nice mild blend but I was too busy watching the episodee to really enjoy the tea.

I’ll update this when I try the last bit of my sample. :|

And guys, don’t hate me, but I am happy to see Amy and Rory go. They were great. I love them, and I like that they spent 10+ years with the Doctor in their lives. But I’m afraid that it would have gotten very stale had they kept the Ponds in the show for much longer.

I was surprised by this! I was worried about the artificial flavours, but it’s not bad. It really tastes like cinnamon hearts with a splash of orange. I have 4 oz of it and don’t imagine I’ll have any trouble drinking this all down!

Nothing too fancy here, folks. Just black current on a smooth base.

Sipdown! (I’m down nearly 20 samples this month!)

Speaking of samples, a friend tested me about one I gave her that was a. (she thinks) green tea with white chocolate. :O I went through all my notes and I have no idea. (You know you drink too much tea when…)

I’m not sure the directions are right on this – steep 3 minutes and then resteep 2-3 more times for more flavor and to allow the leaves to unfurl. I steeped it in my little gongfu pot and those leaves are already unfurled. Maybe I should have tried a minute to start?

(i don’t know how am i supposed to know i need to trust the directions whaaaat)

So my first cup is very strong and malty. It smells really good – earthy! I’m enjoying each sip, except right at the end the flavour kicks up a notch and is nearly too malty.

Second cup: First reaction, “wughh!” Not a great sign. This seems stronger? I am detecting cocoa notes now though, and I’m actually enjoying this now that I made it past the first few sips.

Third cup: Ok. This is more like it! Very smooth. Lots of cocoa notes. It’s very woodsy! I bet I could get another cup out of this!

I love how smooth this tea is. I could have had this with my sore throat!

Looking forward to trying this again sometime!