Fauchon

Sipdown, 186. I’ve been saving the rest of this sample until my new rose black got here so I could compare my myriad rose black teas. I feel like at this point I have possibly sampled as many versions of rose black as I have of Earl Grey, and that is certainly saying something (ok, I just checked, and it is not even close, haha).

Unlike the rose tea I just had (In Nature Teas), THIS is a very rosey tea. This is loukoumi (aka Turkish Delight) rosey, rosewater rosey. I love it, of course. I also love that the black tea doesn’t just shrink into the background, but is robust and pleasant at the same time. The only reason I wouldn’t restock this one over others is that it is next to impossible to get in the states, but otherwise it is very nice.

Sipdown, 191, and sad to see this one go. I sometimes have an issue with vanilla and rose together (although I love them both on their own), but not with this one. It is delightful. Each flavor is strong enough to stand out and yet they all meld together and play off each other so well. Hopefully I’ll be in Paris in July, and if so I will definitely be stopping by Fauchon for some tea.

http://instagram.com/p/X5N4psIc8l/

Fixed this one up to match the other Fauchon teas on here now, it was bothering me because I was searching “an evening” and it left out the an. All better!

Steeped this for less time by accident, more focused on studying. I think it worked out better though only being steeped for 3 minutes. It tastes far more like blood orange and apricot now.

Sipdown, 198. Decided to go for this since I knew it was tasty; I thought I might have two servings of this left but apparently I’m bad at judging becaues it happened to be a sipdown. Also, I’ve decided that I have a new cupboard rule: now that I’m below 200, I will be allowed to order tea when I get to a point where my new order won’t increase my cupboard beyond that. So if I want to order 5 teas from a company I have to get down to 195 first. My next goal is 196 for a Butiki order, but I also will have a swap coming in that time, so I’m going to try to go lower in the meantime.

I kind of overleafed this one a smidge so there is a slightly too-strong note in there, but it is still delicious. Yup, when I go to Paris hopefully this July, I will definitely stop by Fauchon for some tea (and lets face it, delicious candy!).

Thank you ToiToi for sending me this sample! It tastes like Salted Caramel. It’s sweet and slightly salty, with a bright ceylon base that gives it a toffee-like edge. I’ve had a lot of caramel today.

I’d initially forgot this sample at my parents’ when I went off for school but they mailed me a card with an encouraging message and some of the smaller tea bags that I’d left lying around the place. I say this all the time but parents are freaking awesome.

It’s been a while (10 days) since I made a tasting note here. I know this is a long time because Cavocorax changed her profile picture since I was last on. It’s a big deal.

Edit: This tea has a lot of caramel flavour! When I steep this for less time and drink it lukewarm it’s more syrupy and salty-sweet and less like a solid piece of toffee.

Well I might as well go ahead and try my last sample of Fauchon courtesy of ToiToi. I went onto the website to see how this was different from their four red fruits tea (besides the addition of [happy] colorful flower petals) and clicked on the ingredients list, and then was surprised to see green tea also listed among the ingredients. Whoops! Hope I didn’t ruin this cup. I don’t see much green tea in the infuser post steeping, so maybe it’s just a pinch.

This smells very very fruity in a very “red fruits” way. Currant, cherry, strawberry, raspberry, they’re all making themselves known. Fortunately, what little green tea there is in this blend did not affect the flavor by being scorched. Nope, this is powerfully fruity with a bright lemony zing (the real thing that makes this different from four red fruits). This is something I have come to realize about Fauchon teas… they are powerfully flavored. Flavored to the MAX. They fortunately also have relatively robust bases that keep them from being all flavoring and no body. This is pretty tasty, and a lovely fruity tea. Will definitely pick up Fauchon teas whenever I get the chance.

Thanks again to ToiToi for this sample. Am I torturing myself with more French teas (with names like An Afternoon in Paris) that fuel my desire to go back to Paris? Perhaps. But I want to try them anyway.

I’m not sure where I got the strong idea that Fauchon’s teas were not reviewed well; I looked again and some of them aren’t but most of them have few if any reviews. Well now I just feel stupid for missing out on the Fauchon sale recently. Anyway! When steeped up this tea powerfully reminds me of another tea but I cannot place it. Maybe it’s just the vanilla, which is super strong in the aroma.

Wow I just had an intensely sweet sip and I’m not sure where that came from but it was delicious. When I first started sipping this it was like, ok, powerful vanilla flavor, pretty decent. Now it’s like… guh. Vanilla! Rose! A hint of bright citrus! The flavors are so thick and lush it is like you are being immersed in them. This tea is not playing around. I’ve not always had success with vanilla and rose in the past for some reason, but here it plays out so well. The vanilla is rich and sweet, the rose is heavy and luxurious. The orange doesn’t have a starring part but it plays backup well, preventing this tea from getting too heavy. The tea base is hearty enough to stand up to it all and not have it feel weak or without depth.

Man, now I really feel stupid for missing out on the Fauchon sale a few weeks ago. Well, more reason to go to Paris.

Thanks to ToiToi for this sample! I have to say, I have been interested in trying some of Fauchon’s teas because the flavors look so up my alley, but I haven’t primarily because they haven’t gotten great reviews here on Steepster. But getting some samples from ToiToi of a few Fauchon teas was optimal! I decided to start with this, a simple rose black tea. This one actually has no reviews yet! Also I went on to their site to add another tea to the database and saw they have a new tea: Rose and Litchi (lychee). Be still my heart! I want that tea so badly.

This tea smells strongly of sweet sweet rose candy. Not just rose but candied rose. You can tell that this is not going to pull any punches in the rose department (yay!). This is quite nice! Strongly rosey, and thankfully a tasty black tea base as well. Keemun perhaps? It’s a bit malty and has that “chinese black” taste that I can now seem to identify. As sweet as its smelled, the flavor is less sweet but still rosey in a rose candy kind of way. Anyway, this makes me more excited to try the rest of my samples, and makes me want the Rose et Litchi tea even more!

While the jasmine is quite strong and floral in this blend, the caramel is a lot more subdued, almost hidden in the flavours. The base tastes of both ingredients in it, black and green tea. I’m less fond of green tea so I could wish THAT were a little more subdued. It’s definitely got that ‘green’ flavour to it and I’m glad I steeped it at green tea parameters rather than my usual black tea ones. The floral aspect of this, though I usually like jasmine a little, I don’t like it this much so I don’t quite know what to do with the rest of this tea because I don’t think I want to drink it after this pot.

You know, this is the first pear tea I’ve tried, I think, that has actually tasted like pears to me. Real juicy pears. The tea base is bold and doesn’t back down, but the flavour is strong enough to keep up with it and complement it quite nicely. This is the first Fauchon tea that I have tried, but so far this is pretty good.

I like it as a dessert tea. It’s pretty good and sweet.

Thank you, ToiToi!

When I was in Paris, I was not really SUPER into tea but I knew of Mariage Freres and I honestly think it was a good thing that when I stared at the Fauchon things at La Grande Epicerie de Paris I did not even notice tea because I was entranced by chocolate.

If you have never been to Paris and are obsessed with food, it is basically the coolest place ever. Especially if you want to see things you consider commonplace like marshmallows treated like an exotic luxury.

So of course I love this and I cannot find any way to get Fauchon over here…it’s like when they closed their NYC shop they gave up entirely on North America. And of course I am already in love with this tea.

I was a bit cautious about steeping it for 4 minutes but it was so good. Such a smooth black tea, and the orange flavor tastes so real. I just ate an amazing orange last night. I was surprised at how pink the flesh was, and found out from a friend it’s a cara cara orange! I never had one before, it was sosososo good. I never get oranges unless they are blood oranges, and that one was just mind changing.

This tea definitely tastes like that, I think that might be a combination of the orange and blood orange flavorings. I don’t get the tartness of blood orange but there’s that different sweetness they have. There’s just a little apricot in there too, but it’s mostly orange.

This makes me miss France :(

I am trying to finish a lot of teas I got around, for de-cluttering purposes and as trying to justify going tea shopping one of these days. Still had a bit of this left, brewed up a new cup. A very generous helping of tea (this is pricier than all of my Mariage Freres mixes, even Fujiyama and Lapsang Souchong Impérial), one sugar and some milk. Drinkable stuff but not wow.

Just adding a new note because this time I got another distinct note which I had never identified before, besides the chocolate and vanilla : almond, a subtle sweet almond rather than a strong bitter almond undernote. It´s still a sort of meh tea though and even for me, who likes “delicate”, the base tea is a wimp.

Meh.

Just bought it yesterday and tasted it while watching the documentary of Senna from F1, lovely.

my favorite tea, no doubt.

This tea is amazing! reminds me so much to paris this winter!!!! one of my favorites

I’m personally not a fan of teas like this, but this is an enjoyable, full flavoured, smooth, desert tea.

No notes yet.

It still, if not quite sucks, disappoints its promise and smell. No, it´s not at all bad. And it just might be unfair to compare its taste to its divine (no kidding) scent, but even ignoring the promise of its scent, it still taste uninspired. Ingredients seem to be top quality, it smells (seriously, trust me on this) marvelously. But no matter the variations I make, it makes for a not nearly awesome cup of tea. Oh well. Bye.

I am still trying to love this, this is probably the most expensive loose-leaf by the weight tea I have yet bought, I am not quitting! I will crack a way of making it that I will love it. Somehow I refuse to not believe in the promise of its smell. I must just be doing it wrong.

This time I upped the dosage a lot. Still with milk, because it does seem to be the sort of tea which needs it. And this is awful of me to even think it, but what this reminded of, most of all, was Nesquik. A lot of vanilla with some underlying chocolate. I loved Nesquik, but way back then, now I like chocolate with more oomph.

This smells extraordinary, perhaps the most appealing tea blend I ever smelled. Smells very rich, of chocolate and vanilla and some other things, so fabulous I had to buy a bit.

And now I am brewing it for the first time, I am a bit disappointed. I brew it precisely how I do with my other chocolate teas (MF´s Wedding Impérial and Yumchaa´s Caramel Sweetheart, I love both of these) and it is the wrong way, I must up the dosage or something, try it without milk, because frankly using the same process as for the other chocolate teas, this one was sort of wimpish. It tastes mostly of vanilla, lovely natural vanilla. Some chocolate taste afterwards, but the milk and sugar mask everything else. The base tea seems like maybe it is some delicate-ish Ceylon.

Not a bad tea at all, but a bit too delicate for what its smell promised. I will try it again to see if I can crack the right method for this one.

So, this tea is old. I bought it a couple years ago somewhere in Paris. The ingredients list says it contains green tea but that isn’t really highlighted anywhere else. Interesting.

I am having a weird experience with this tea. It was really fragrant dry, but once steeped I don’t smell any bergamot. It tastes a bit smoky, and quite woody as the description mentions. And I don’t taste any bergamot! I really don’t think I would have any idea this was an EG if it wasn’t labelled as such.

Okay, I decided I wasn’t enjoying this and re-tried, this time steeping longer. About 4 minutes. Now I get a bit of bergamot at the end of the sip but the tea is bitter. Strange! I can’t decide if it’s that this tea has gone a bit off (it’s old but not ancient) or if it is the tea itself. Oh well.

This tea is complicated and high-class. I rated low because, to be a bit cliche, iti s not my cup of tea. I don’t usually go for the floral blends, and the lavendar in here throws me off. Also, I am not a huge fan of the citrus.

That said, the vanilla pulls thruogh nicely, and the tea underneath is clear and vibrant. I can taste the ceylon a bit, but whatever the Chinese black is, it comes through stronger. The first waves of flavor are the vanilla tones, followed by a quick burst of lavender, followed by the tea flavors, then some more lavendar. It is smooth and buttery, and the lemon really finishes strong.

I rated a bit lower than I might have because I don’t like it as much, but higher than I might have because it is clearly a nice tea.