Blue Teapot

Decided to try out one of the teas my parents apparently purchased the other day at the Blue Teapot.

This is my first tea from there, but as this is a rooibos — a tisane I’m pretty sure I don’t like — I won’t make any snappy judgements on the company itself.

Anyway… I don’t really like it. The blueberry flavor itself is very nice, the sweet sort rather than the tart as some blueberry flavors can be. At the swallow it does taste like I actually swallowed a blueberry. The problem … is the rooibos base. It’s heavy and medicinal. It takes over the scent of the tea, and has a very medicinal like presence all throughout the taste. Honestly, it’s making me feel rather nauseated. I suspect this is the reason why I hated Birthday Cake rooibos so much from David’s. The problem’s the rooibos, not the sweet flavor.

It’s a shame, because the blueberry itself tastes quite good, but I just can’t get over the taste of the rooibos itself. I don’t think a shorter steep time will fix this, as it seems if I steep any shorter I won’t get much of any flavor at all.

Bottom line, if you don’t mind the medicinal-like taste of rooibos and you like blueberries, pick this one up! :)

Christmas teas were half-off the last time I was at the Blue Teapot store in Vancouver, so I picked up this seasonal blend. It has a very smooth white tea base with a surprisingly nutty flavour and it’s not even the least bit vegetal in flavour like many Bai Mu Dans can be. The fruity apple flavours are subtle but they work so well with the base that there’s also a dessert-like quality to this blend. I’m not picking up much in the way of pepper though I don’t think the tea is really ‘missing’ it. Very yummy.

Makes like the best latte!!!

Such a nice refleshing blend! Love leaving a mouth full of tea and letting the taste linger on my tongue!! And the price is so good for nice quality loose tea!

Has a suprising spicy afternote, first time I had it I steeped for too long, so the second time only steeped it for a min and added a bit of german rock sugar, loved it!!

A quick backlog for this one. It’s rather appley with a mixture of sweet and sour tones and crispness. There is nothing that separates this apple tea apart from any other but it does make a tasty mid tea treat.

Finally finishing off this tea – I’m making it a mission to use up the older teas in my cupboard.

This tea smells quite delicious and unlike many blends it actually manages to replicate the flavour of real raspberries to a good extent. Unfortunately there’s just something a little ‘off’ about the flavour that I’m not liking. Maybe it’s the oddly herbal undertone it has or maybe it’s the fact that it could stand to be a bit sweeter and more chocolaty than it is. Whatever the reason it’s just not working for me. I’m glad I just got a little sample of this tea rather than a full 50g bag which is the amount I usually buy teas in.

I’ve discovered that this tea is lovely with a teaspoon or so of honey stirred into it, which turned the tea into a sweet, fruity treat that could easily take the place of dessert. Apples and honey – so very Turkish. ;)

I bought this on my Boxing Week trip to Vancouver (I picked up a lot of tea during that time). I don’t normally drink many fruit tisanes but this one caught my interest being that it’s an apple-based tea instead of the usual berry-based ones. And even better – no hibiscus – whoot!

The apple flavour, predictably, is the strongest component of this tea and drinking it make me think of biting into a crisp, juicy Macintosh apple. It’s naturally sweet and there’s a faint hint of something spicy underneath as well. It’s a very ‘warm’ tea that, for me anyway, dredges up memories of Thanksgiving and Christmas time.

The last of this tea that I had. Not amazing, but satisfying at times.

No notes yet.

No notes yet.

Backlogging from yesterday.

Thanks go to Jillian for the chance to try this tea :)

I have got to say, I love the color of the liquor: dusty, antique rose. The disparity of the primarily rose aroma and hibiscus taste threw me a bit but it was still enjoyable. Pleasantly tart with a lingering aftertaste of roses, it made me want some candied rose petals to munch on. I’ve never had candied rose petals but I suspect they would go perfectly with this.

That’s it for this tea folks. It was a decent tea (and great iced) but not one I liked so much that I’d want to repurchase it.

Not really much more to say about this tea – go read my past tasting notes if you’re curious. :)

I brewed up a big pot of iced tea which used up a good portion of the tea I had left in the canister.

When I brew iced tea I tend to add the usual amount of teaspoons per cups of tea and then brew it a little longer than I would with a hot tea, usually at a lower temperature too. Then, while it’s still hot, I usually mix in a bit of honey to sweeten it and then I leave it on the counter to cool to about room temperature and then I stick it in the fridge.

Sooooo excited to try this one from Blue Teapot as I am very new to Blue Teapot Teas! This one is colorful blend-wise and smells nice and floral and woodsy. I can taste the jasmine and cherry primarily. It has a bit of a woodsy aftertaste. Not what I expected…but then again…not real sure what I WAS expecting…and I am not saying that in a bad way…it’s a tasty tea…the flavor just surprised me, I guess.

There’s such a mix of teas that I can’t really distinguish any particular kind. It is a nice looking blend though, with jasmine buds, and calendula and rose petals. No apricot though, oddly enough.

It seems a bit odd, but I’m getting a sort of spiced apple scent to this tea, both dry and wet, though when it’s wet I can also pick out the ginger. There’s even a bit of it in the taste although that might be rooibos. Definitely not a conventional chai flavour, but I don’t mind some variety – the same-old gets boring after awhile. One thing I especially enjoy is the bite of the pepper at the very back of the tongue, like a delayed reaction.

I’m so in love with my new tea strainer right now. This is one of the finer-textured teas in my cabinet so before I’d always ended up with a thick layer of ‘sludge’ on the bottom of my cup. No more! Now I can enjoy its toasted herbal nutty goodness without spending half an hour picking leaf bits out of my teeth afterwards. :D

Sometimes I think this smells like cough medicine, sometimes I think it smells like apple cider; it changes for sniff to sniff, which is quite odd. It also brews up a surprisingly dark reddish-brown colour for a rooibos-based tea.

Each taste seems to be divided into three distinct parts. First there’s a bit of vanilla-ish sweetness right on the tip of the tongue, this quickly fades into a distinct, but not overwhelming, peppery bite. Then the aftertaste carries the distinct tart-earthy flavour of rooibos.

It’s interesting and I’m leaning toward liking it, though like most rooibos teas this one will have to work at it a little to gain my affections. ;)

The flavour to me is a combination of vegetal, nutty, and baked, and it’s on the verge of tasting like one of those “good for you” herbal drinks – but not quite. I don’t mind it but I feel like I want something a bit ‘more’ in it.

Why are there so many frickin’ twigs in this tea? It’s not supposed to be a kukicha! Interestingly I’m tasting an almost nutty undertone to the apricot flavour, right now.