Adagio Teas

2009-11-24 noon
Preparation Details: Teavana’s Easy Tea Steeper
not sure how much tea… didn’t bring any measuring devices (sigh)

So I just got a bunch of Adagio samples, but I don’t drink black teas in the evening (I have to sleep), so the only way I’ll get to try them before the weekend is to take them to work. Loose leaf tea at work is a PITA!

I read the reviews on this tea and put in more leaves than normal, hoping that if I brewed it strong the pumpkin flavor might come out. No dice. I’m only getting spice. It’s okay spice, but just spice. I have lots of spice teas, and this isn’t outstanding. I won’t be ordering this again.

This is to kill the last dill remnants from that awful cucumber stuff. Unfortunately this is also the last of my tin. I made it a bit stronger than usually because there wasn’t enough leaves left for a small pot if I didn’t.

Didn’t hurt it any, though. If anything the blueberry flavour is even more clear, making me wonder if I’ve actually been making it too weak before?

The first few sips tasted a bit odd, mingling with the lingering aftertaste from the white cucumber. Dill/cucumbers + blueberries = bad match. Just saying. Half a cup down now though, and it’s helping considerably.

I need to get some more blueberry tea. I’ve never met a blueberry I didn’t like. Now I get to explore various brands and shops that are more readily available to me than Adagio is.

Kitch3ntools inspired me to make me a little pot of this. It’s yummy! I’ve checked my local shop and they don’t seem to have any blueberry tea at the moment. There is a shop in the city where I work where they might have some. I don’t like their coffee grinders in the shop, though. I can’t actually taste the coffee pollution, but it’s enough that I know they ideally shouldn’t be there. It’s a snob thing.

So I’m drinking this while working out some guidelines and tentative travelling teabox planning (and wondering if maybe, just maybe, I’ve lost my mind). I’ve got nearly ten people so far, myself included, so that should be enough for it to be fun. Once I’ve got the guidelines worked out, I’ll start collecting addresses and plan the final route.

In my organisational eagerness, I oversteeped the tea though, and now it’s got a slightly bitter finish note. It’s still good, though. Just a little… drier.

So we’ve had the Almond Avalance and the Peach Pandemic seems to be winding down. I saw (I forget who you were, sorry! Suzi?) someone mention that they wouldn’t mind it if the next big trend be something with blueberries. I support that. Blueberry Blitz, yes please.

I’m getting more and more fond of this one for every time I have it. I thought the first time that the blueberry was nice but subtle, completely in contrast with everybody else. I had a cold at the time. The next time I tried it I was getting better and there was much more blueberry flavour in it. Now there seems to be even more. I’m worried about what might happen if I keep drinking this. ;p

Mmmm. Good morning tea when you’re on holiday. (Now for that NaNo wordcount. cracks knuckles)

I think my tongue must be recovering.

I tried a second steep of this yesterday and then I thought the blueberry flavour was as dominant as everybody else said it would be. Then I made another pot today (to wash down the icky rooibos) and thought that was pretty heavy on the blueberry too. Encouraged by yesterday’s success, I’m trying a resteep of that again now.

It’s weird for me though. I’ve never had much luck with resteeping black tea before.

I think I’m getting close to making this my ideal blueberry tea, if it hadn’t been for the fact that it’s the only one I’ve ever had, so I can’t really compare with anything.

The European Adagio store has a very limited selection though, and that one order I got from Adagio was definitely on the extravagant side, so it’s not something we’re going to repeat a lot. If ever, in spite of the good experience I’ve had with it.

First the media was all over the blueberry, proclaiming it the healthiest food ever and claiming that it could do practically anything from curing the common cold to granting eternal life. Then the media was all over the story of how the blueberry had been completely overrated health-wise and how it wasn’t even remotely as healthy as everyone had thought and people were all up in arms over how they had ‘wasted’ money and energy on eating all those blueberries that apparently had absolutely no value.

Erm, excuse me? Just because it’s not miracle-food doesn’t mean it’s not healthy. It’s fruit. Therefore it is healthy. And also, they still taste lovely. So exactly what the problem was, I have no idea.

Me, I have never ever met a blueberry that I didn’t like. (Except if they’ve gone mouldy) Therefore it is not only puzzling, it’s downright alarming and weird that this sample tin looks like it’s never even been opened before! I must have somehow missed it when I tried all the other sample tins (I bought it as part of the sampler set).

I can find the blueberries in the scent of both the dry leaves and steeped tea. It’s there, it’s easy find, it smells natural and it’s not overwhelming.

The tea tastes nice and sweet. Fruity, but subtle. It’s like I’m getting black tea and then the blueberry is a sort of afterthought. The weird thing is that while I earlier proclaimed the strawberry tea from Whittard’s of Chelsea my ideal strawberry tea because I could actually taste real natural strawberry, you would think that I would find this one somewhat bland.

But the blueberry sort of builds up as I drink and the more I drink the more I can taste the blueberry. And I like that. I wouldn’t say no to a blueberry tea that just said PA-SHAM! and then there was natural blueberry flavour all over the place, but this is quite nice too. It tastes very well-balanced.

EDIT
I’ve read the other reviews on this now and WOW!!! O.o I’ve had the exact opposite experience from everybody else. Others have found it a strong blueberry flavour while I found it a bit more subtle. I’ll have to try this again as soon as I’m snot-free, I think. And buy some blueberries to remind myself of the exact flavour.

It has dark twisted leaves with a pretty fruit smell. Steeping it creates a sweet oolong tea with a bit too much bitterness for my taste. One of the few teas I couldn’t finish.

Sweet lady Jasmine, with her pale smile, treated me well again tonight.
I’m thinking about moving into some Yellow tea in a moment, but this one was enjoyable in the mean time. Still can’t get over the scent – that alone might push me to buy a tin’s worth, and to keep an eye out for the same product from other brands.

A small note – the leaves are chewier and a bit less enjoyable than that of the Yellow tea. Comparing in my head those leaves to these, I can notice the quality differences. These leaves are just a bit more coarse, less refined. They’re not bad, necessarily – in my inexpert opinion, I’d put them at a 7 or, at a push, 8 out of 10.

I called my parents today. My mother wants me to post more things on facebook, because, strange as it is, that’s her way of making sure I’m alive and well. I told her, if she really wants to, she could check me out on here, because I post here more than on facebook. (I’m not much one for the trivialities of my generation…) When I told my parents what this site is, they laughed at me.
sigh Jasmine doesn’t laugh at me, no matter how lame I am. And onto Yellow tea!
…At 5:15 in the morning.

Better than I expected – I’ll give you that, Adagio, I’ll give you that.
I’m glad to see they didn’t totally skimp out of quality for the leaves. l can’t really gauge the quality, because I don’t think I’ve ever tried an amazingly superb white, but it was definitely better than the Peony I had earlier.
A smooth, mellow flavor. Went down very easy, and lacked the nastiness one often finds in cheap flavored/scented teas. While I can’t give the taste paragraphs of praise, I don’t have anything negative to say about it.
I love the scent. I’m rarely too excited by Jasmine scent, but this is just a gorgeous smell. I keep smelling my gaiwan lid… Wonderful. Like soap, or shampoo, or how you’d want your house to smell. Maybe I should use the spent leaves as a qausi-cologne. Would that bring in chicks?

Well, well, not disappointed. I got a sample tin of this (only because the five bucks would bring me to exactly $50, and grant me free shipping), so perhaps I’ll buy a 2 or 4 ouncer of this for treating guests. It’s pretty inexpensive, and a good sampler for people who want to ease their way into the world of white tea. And the scent alone… Ah!

All of my chai samples are gone. It’s a very sad day. This was an above average chai, but I much prefer Adagio’s Thai Chai. The coconut and lemongrass in the Thai Chai really make a difference. I made up enough chai last night for several cups and a travel mug for this morning. I’ve gone 100% traditional when it comes to making chai, so I can only make it at home…not the office. holds arms in the air al a Fiddler on the Roof TRADITION!!!! It was pretty sweet to be able to drink this at work. It’s all special and whatnot.

I’m waiting to see if Adagio does any kind of November special and then I’ll reorder a big bag of Thai Chai for the hizzouse.

A nice morning tea, but a bit overly fruity for me – I much prefer the apricot black from Adagio. Has a lovely sweet scent, though.

still one of my favorites – sweet and simple!

This is a really good, mild oolong tea…

Back logging, btws…
I wasn’t feeling to perky this afternoon, thanks to be a lady, and wanted something I knew would cheer me right back up. So I turned on some old Better off Ted episodes and brewed up a yummy cuppa Thai Chai. This time I happened to have coconut milk in my fridge from making coconut rice (which is delicious), so I added a bit in. Oh, I felt loads better afterward.
This time round, I picked up on way more lemongrass even with the added coconut. Also, the coconut milk messed with the texture a bit, not in a unpleasant way but not pleasing either. However, throughly recommend adding a bit of coconut milk to it and pretty much anything.
Has anyone else tried brewing a chai in coffee? I always order a dirty chai when I’m out, or am I crossing a line?

This is what I’ve been looking for in a chai for some time! I adore coconut and the hint of lemongrass, blended so well with the spices. The only thing I would change about this tea is to add more actual tea leaves, as I lost a little of the actual tea-ness of it.
I’ve yet to play with ratios of tea to water, or adding milk (coconut or otherwise) and will most certainly spend a lot of time perfecting this already damn near perfect tea (in my most humble opinion).
I will most certainly be drinking this far more often than is probably heathy.

I usually mix in a little bit of casablanca twist to add a minty note, but gunpowder by itself is still delicious

A little tarter/berrier than the other time I had it. I think because I used more leaf. I was nice and am sharing with DH and he commented on the blueberriness of this.

I’m sleepy so that’s all I’ve got.