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My other 52teas purchase (yes! I limited myself to only 2. Why do you think I then had to avoid steepster until the sale was over?) I had been extremely interested in this for my original 52teas purpose in the hopes that it would be able to replace my matevana-toffee rooibos blend from Teavana (they no longer make the toffee rooibos). Unfortunately, they were out of it at the time, but have (obviously) since restocked (yay!).

Interestingly, I do not get the overridingly chocolatey scent that other people have reported from my batch. Mostly I get a roasted smell – almost like burning wood, as well as a light kind of dusty cocoa smell. Very interesting.

For my first cup I decided to just go with it completely plain, going with 7 minute steep time after reading the other notes on this. After seven minutes, the tea’s color was a fairly midrange brown, and the scent of the cocoa had come out more but the roasted/malted scent was still dominating.

The taste is…quite complex. There’s spiciness, which has since resolved itself into more of a cocoa flavor as the tea has cooled. The malty taste is also there. And SOMETHING is combining to produce this almost minty taste. Perhaps that’s the mate itself? I confess to not having had a lot of plain mate, although the taste I associate with it is also there, so…dunno!

When hot, it was all spicy, malty roasty good lord this is heavy. As it cools the chocolate is coming out a LOT more – which makes me think (for some reason) that the addition of milk would bring it out even further. That will definitely be trial number two. The spiciness is also receding as the temperature decreases, which is good because we are not quite past the time in the morning when my belly rebels against spiciness of all kinds. Oh yes, I am definitely getting the liquid chocolate vibe a lot more, although the malty taste is still providing a fascinating backing to it.

Aside! So last night I dreamt that I went to a big gourmet tea place which for some reason also sold chocolate malt balls (and was haunted, but that’s not as relevant. Besides with the aid of some kids and their lovable dog I was able to discover that it was just the groundskeeper trying to scare off customers). Anyway, I didn’t get a chance to try this last night when it actually came in and between that and worrying about my tea frog order possibly being stuck in customs, (I didn’t get tracking on my order so I have no idea what it’s actual status is but Morgana mentioned that her package appears to be stuck at the border, so…. Are they just confused about what it is? or…are they DRINKING MY TEA THE BASTARDS) I guess I have tea on the brain. (End Aside)

Anyway, so I was thinking of using this as my morning tea but I think it’s a tad to heavy for that – although we’ll see what adding milk to it does. I’m still quite pleased with it, though – a very nice addition to my tea cupboard. I’d noticed lately that it was getting a little black tea heavy, so I’m definitely glad to introduce a little variation into it.

(This post brought to you by: parentheses (yay!))