Art of Tea

The dry leaf smells like fall and apple pie, so I probably oopsed on having this one on a warm spring day. I guess with a name like AppleTEA’ni my brain just assumed it would be more like the alcoholic beverage (bright and apple-y) and less like Thanksgiving dessert (apple-y with spice).

That being said, while it isn’t a bright apple cuppa like I thought (and it is mostly my fault for failing to read the ingredients carefully enough this morning) it’s tasty. It’s like drinking a spiced tea with natural apple flavor. The cinnamon and ginger really carry this cup in a way that I enjoy. And the green rooibos just binds everything together without making itself actually known. The whole thing together is actually strongly reminiscent of a mulled apple cider without being quite as sweet, and I could very much see myself using it that way.

Verdict? It’s a good tea, just not as a replacement for Pucker and Vodka.

Backlogging (which I don’t normally do). I had this today at World Peace Cafe in Atlanta, GA which is a vegan restaurant run entirely by volunteers. I decided to try the Citron Mate for it’s advertised restorative properties because I had just finished spending four hours in the woods hanging out with beavers, opossums, owls, eagles, and turtles and stuff (Chattahoochee Nature Center), and I was pretty exhausted. It worked, it tasted like lemonade and kept me awake through a late rehearsal.

ARG, my tea package had incorrect steeping instructions! Kind of suck when I only have a 2-3 cup sample size, so there wasn’t much room to experiment to help out fellow tea peeps who are interested in this tea.

The tea was so bitter and undrinkable at 185F for 5 minutes, I dumped the steeping instructions completely. I steeped another round at 175F for 2 minutes and I found this tea too bitter for my tastes. The green tea was quite savory and bitter like dandelion greens. The jasmine? Pretty good. The blueberry aftertaste? Very tasty! Oh poo, what a dilemma!

Full Review on my blog, The Oolong Owl http://oolongowl.wordpress.com/2013/05/10/jasmine-blueberry-from-art-of-tea-tea-review/
geeze, my first pour out on my blog.

This one smells subtly grape-like but it’s really hard to see/locate the black tea – most of it’s white tea. I understand that they probably did it this way so they don’t overpower the white tea with the black tea but again I’m having a hard time locating/see the actual black tea!

The flavor is very much a white tea tasting base with lovely grape-like notes and rose hints, as well. It makes a great gulping-cold-brewed tea and delicious sipping-white/blended tea as well!

Purely delightful!

Backlogging several cups and sipdown, too! I really liked this!

I can’t believe I haven’t written a tasting note for this tea yet! I’ve had it many times, but I guess I haven’t been in the mood to write anything about it. Today I’m TRYING to be productive and make some progress on a paper and another assignment.. but I’d much rather read or nap instead!

It seems like every single time I drink this tea, I keep expecting there to be a stronger flavor. It could be that the scent is so strong that I’m expecting a cup that’s insanely creamy and tangy.. but each time it’s a little bit watered down. It’s not a bad cup at all, it’s just not what I expect every time I brew. It’s quite soft and smooth, but not terribly silky. The oolong remains in the background and the vanilla and the citrus are what I really taste. The citrus is quite interesting because it’s not tart, but a bit bitter… the kind of bitter that I don’t like all that much. It reminds me a little bit of unripe oranges. I think the vanilla is the redeeming flavor in this blend.

This makes a very pleasing cup. I still have a whole bunch of this tea so I need to drink this one more often! In the future, I think I’ll buy a smaller amount of tea as there are other oolongs that I like a bit more… but this one is still delicious.

backlog sipdown!

sooo this cup of this tea? no thanks..but the last cup was delicious. So either i had a cup with more star anise than the first one or i did something wrong this second time. I don’t think i’d stock this permanently in my cupboard as a result of having two vastly different experiences. Thank you tastybrew though for sending this my way!

Sipdown 2!

This is such a pretty tea! When I opened the bag, I caught a whiff of mint, but I didn’t smell much else. I appreciated that the mint was subtle enough for me to be able to taste non-mint ingredients in the blend. The first steep had lovely floral notes from the roses, but sadly I couldn’t detect them in the second steep. The white base was very mild, but present, in both steeps.

Thanks to GiggleGoddess for sharing!

Odd. Not many tealogs for this tea? This one won an award!

A summary of this tea could be “An Earl Grey white/green tea blend” however there’s much more going on, as there’s a bit of floral and sweetness from the white. Grassy, vegetal, and crisp flavors from the green, with a slight hit of bergamont. A very nice tea for peeps who love a light, citrus green!

Full Review on my blog, The Oolong Owl http://oolongowl.wordpress.com/2013/04/29/liquid-jade-from-art-of-tea-tea-review/

Sipdown, 181.

Man, I have never suffered from seasonal allergies until I moved here. Which is so weird because I grew up not too far away, so I should be immune to these plants. I’m going to blame the non-native sakura cherry trees planted around here; I discovered an allergy to cherry blossoms last year around this time in Beijing, and I certainly didn’t grow up with those. Guess I should never live in DC.

I steeped this at a slightly cooler temp than last time because I had a touch of astringency then. I think that took care of it. This tea really has a pretty unique flavor, and while squash seems to be part of it I’m not sure it really captures the whole thing. But it’s also hard to put my finger on what is going on here. I guess it is kind of like a squash with butter and honey. Ooh, maybe delicata squash? With the skin on of course, so you get more of those vegetal notes. Pretty interesting tea!

Surprise sample from tastybrew that i thought i’d have today. I have to say i really love the star shaped tea that is in this. They are super cute! I have to say this tea isn’t half bad. It reminds me of something that I just can’t place though. I’ve got a bit more that i’ll have to use to try and figure out what this reminds me of. Either way, happy to have tried this since i haven’t had a lot of teas from art of tea.

This tea comes to me thanks to GiggleGoddess! I have to say, I’ve never seen tea leaves quite like these. They are so so fuzzy, they look downy soft. They actually look way fuzzier than the picture on Art of Tea’s website. I was unsure of how much tea to use for this cup but I ended up using about half of the pouch that GiggleGoddess sent.

I feel like 195°F is kind of hot for a white tea, but that’s what they call for. Unsurprisingly there is a lot of tea fuzz floating around in my cup, and the liquor is surprisingly dark amber colored. It smells sweet and earthy, like fresh alfalfa hay and honey. This is pretty tasty. It’s definitely sweet, slightly hayish, but “darker” in flavor profile than most white teas I have tried. There’s also a slight vegetal quality to it, and I could be convinced of zucchini or some other summer squash. It’s nice and light, although there is a touch of astringency at the back of it that is kind of odd; I don’t know that I would want to steep it less, though, since the flavors are already fairly light. Perhaps at a cooler temp next time.

Thanks TastyBrew, for this surprise sample! This tea is a really nice vanilla black. The little white stars are super cute! I didn’t get that feeling, like OMG, I must have more of this tea, but it was good, and it gets props for cute-ness! ;)

Another poorly stored sample, but worth a go, right? This smells tart like hibiscus but I don’t see any of the typical pink tinge. I get some sour rooibos as well, masking what I would otherwise presume to be tart blueberries. At five minutes, this tastes mainly of smoke. Like there is a fire a few kilometres away but a bit of the smoke has blown in on the wind. No tart, nor sweet, nor blueberry at all. If I could get the aroma to match the taste I would be a happy panda.

At 15 – 20 minutes I can finally get some blueberry flavour in there but it is so dominated by smoke that I am not interested in continuing. This is my fault so no rating. I wish I had drank this two years ago when it was still fresh.

fruit-by-the-food tasting! mmm :D

Holy sweet spice! As TastyBrew said in her note to me on this tea, it’s kinda strange! Thanks, TastyBrew for the surprise sample! I kind of like this strange tea! I didn’t realize it was a puerh until I looked it up. The first spice that hits you is the cinnamon, but this tea has a whole lot more going on. It’s definitely spicy, but kind of in a chai sort of way, with a little heat. I think the chocolate rounds it out. It is not a subtle tea. Best when you need a little punch!!

Picked this up along with my Original Vanilla Custard Beard Papa’s. Great for walking around on chilly nights in LA! Not too strong in either lemon or ginger, just the right balance. And the sweetness from the honeybush rounds it all out. Good one!

I have not had the best of luck with the Art of Tea samples I bought back in November. Granted it also didn’t help it took them weeks to bother to send. This is the first of them that I have actually liked and I only have one left to try…

I didn’t think the jasmine was overpowering at all in this. Granted all the other notes for this are years old so maybe Art of Tea got the balance right finally. I’ve also had it for 4 1/2 months at this point. It’s a nice mix of fruit and floral, I think the blueberry was quite a bit stronger though with jasmine notes following.

This is one of my favorite teas. It was the first taste I ever had of Art of Tea, and caused me to buy multiple samples, most of which I liked quite a bit. The aroma of this one alone is enough to make you want to buy it.

Go get it. It’s smooth and tasty. One of the best oolongs I’ve ever had.

This was actually pretty good. I often want tea before I go running but don’t want anything too rich or heavy, but I don’t love fruity teas. This tea walks the line well. I’ll reorder this next time I need something from art of tea.

Drank some of this last night. It used to be a favorite.
It’s a beautiful looking tea, made from the more roasty oolong that I tend to prefer, but it’s not as peachy or wonderful as I remember it being. Probably cuz it’s been in my cabinet for…awhile…

A mint tea that I like! Woot Woot! I tend to get overpowered by mint very easily in teas, but I found a winner. This has a great rich dark chocolate flavor, a smooth mint flavor, and just a hint of the puerh base. I’ve resteeped it several times and the flavor stays nice and strong. Glad I snatched it up before it was gone.

This was another tea taken from the Traveling Teabox during its stop at my place. It might be that this sample is rather old and lost it’s flavouring, but I’m not really getting much beyond rooibos and bit of fruity blueberry flavour out of this tea. I can’t taste anything even remotely resembling cheesecake, which is disappointing, especially since this tea has gotten a lot of good reviews.

Sip down! Thank you to kittenna for this one. So I’m really enjoying the pear flavour in this one. I also really like the way that it smells. What I don’t seem to get out of this is anything remotely caramel. And, if i concentrate too hard on the taste, that weirdly rooibos taste comes to the forefront of things and ruins the good thing that I almost had going with this tea. Hmmm… Too bad. Just to have the chance to have this, but still not my perfect pear tea.