Fauchon

funny…. i know i’ve already reviewed this tea, but poof! it’s gone. maybe the steepster renovations ate it?

this is a lovely blend. it was a surprise gift from MissB. months ago that i save.

an almost bitter black with a smooth almond rise that doesn’t run you over. i love the whole rosebuds in the blend… i don’t get a lot of floral notes, but they buds are lovely to look at.

i enjoyed it tonight with turbinado and cream. i think my initial problems negotiating with this tea may actually have been the sweetener i was using? it’s much more settling with turbinado than agave. interesting.

i do love this tea.

thank you again for this present B. even though it was months ago now. =0) still makes me smile!

wrote my last exam. blanked for the second half of it. the prof is fascinated by my final project…. column A column B situation? sigh. either 3 weeks of break…. some sedate keener studying and this tea was day 1 of ’it’s done’.

this is a different spin on french tea! fauchon and i called a truce today and i wound up with the tea manifesting as i believe it should. entirely ENTIRELY different from dammann freres, mariage freres and nina’s paris……

a bittersweet marzipan cake. an element of green to it. more nuanced than the others, as opposed to robust. it has a disconcerting thin element to it. now i know that tea isn’t supposed to be thick, and yet somehow i have lots of french teas that somehow carry weight?

just a different evolution in my tea repertoire…. a new volume to add, and a very gracious one at that.

thank you MissB for this celebratory cup. i’m going to keep playing until i’m sort out my steeping parameters =0)

very graceful, very smooth, very new!

Ok, back to a bit of normalcy. This one (#55) isn’t the most scintillating of my Fauchon teas, but it is pretty tasty. I like apricot and citrus well enough but I am honestly a bit meh on this one today. Probably I should cold brew it. I could also just be having a bad tea day. :P

So I’d be lying if I said that I haven’t been drinking this one all out of order for my chronology lately. It’s been “coming up” in the list for a while now and there were a number of teas I thought I was going to have to skip because they were at home (but then I actually drank them this weekend). I never got around to writing a tasting note for this any time recently, though, so it’s still in order.

All of which is to say, I apparently like this tea quite a bit. The flavors don’t quite stick out at me, but It’s fruity, it’s rosey, it’s just a pleasant blend that I enjoy enough to reach for it fairly frequently. Funny how some blends get like that! I guess it’s a good thing that the blend I reach for frequently is one that I have a large amount of, although it would probably be good to reach for some of the other 100g tins occasionally as well!

Dreaming of an evening in France on this snowy morning in Ohio. Sigh.

This is very nice, although I think perhaps I didn’t have enough leaf because it’s a little weaker than I have come to expect from Fauchon. I could smell the rose and fruit in this but I hadn’t looked up what else was in it before drinking it. I definitely got a lot of orangey citrus from this, so that’s good. Nicely rosy, and the bae as a really yummy cookie-ish note. Really it’s just something that I often find in rose and/or bergamot teas that comes across as sugar cookie to me, and I think it’s really the way the flavoring is interacting with the base. Very pleased with this one as well.

I’m going to do a tasting note for this one (#56) now, even though I actually drank it a couple of weekends ago, because it’s a home/weekend tea, and it’s Monday, so if I don’t retroactively write this note it will get lost in the rest.

The reason that this is a home/weekend tea is that it has an Assam base, and is way to strong/astringent for me without additions. It does, however, make the best Hong Kong-style rose milk teas. I used a recipe from Lupicia that I always keep on my fridge. De-licious.

It’s over 80°F here today, so it’s been a mostly iced-tea afternoon. This is one of the teas on my chronology, although I’ve had it fairly frequently and out of order throughout this project because often on the weekend I am limited in my selection. That and apparently I’ve been feeling rosey lately.

But now is it’s time, so I am having it again. Today I used Lupicia’s Royal Milk Tea Recipe. It came on one of their newsletters this winter and I clipped it out and put it on my fridge because it really makes the best milk tea. (I reproduced it in this note for Assam Calcutta Auction: http://steepster.com/dinosara/posts/219625). This time I didn’t heat the milk, added 2 tsp of sugar, and I shook the whole thing with an ice cube to make iced rose milk tea, and let me tell you, it was delicious! Just like getting an iced rose milk tea in Beijing. I forsee doing this often this summer.

Side note, I went onto Lupicia’s site to see if they had the milk tea recipe on there and it’s there but not easy to link to and makes a ton of tea at a time instead of just a cup. ANYWAY, the “featured” recipe on their main page (http://www.lupiciausa.com/v/static/enjoy-tea/tea-recipes.html) is for Marshmallow Peach Tea… tea with marshmallows added? You be crazy, Lupicia, although that does sound kind of awesome anyway.

I have become very glad that I bought a tin of this despite my general dislike of assams, because it makes the most awesome rosey milk tea. I love having it in the morning when I’m taking an easy morning, like this morning was. It would probably make a great base for a rose milk bubble tea too (one of my faves).

Also, if you have a Ravelry account, and you wouldn’t mind helping me win a contest, can you mosey over to this link and click the “agree” button (at the bottom of the post) on my owls (midway down the page): http://www.ravelry.com/discuss/malabrigo-junkies/2858677/51-75

Voting ends at the end of the day today!

Today I wanted a lush French blend and was kicking myself for taking nearly all my Dammann into work. But I did have a little bit of this so I made myself a rose milk tea, since the Assam base is too robust for my taste buds. It was very rosy and very lovely.

It is so frigidly cold in my office that I am wearing my winter coat and my toes are numb in my boots. I wanna go home. Unfortunately I have to teach this afternoon, so I can’t go home until after that. And university facilities refuses to do anything about the lack of heat in the building. ugh.

I picked up this one at the Vente-Privee sale. Initially I was unsure about it because it has a 100% assam base, but I went for it anyway. It is occuring to me now that it is essentially a rose black tea and I already know I love Fauchon’s La Rose, so why would I need this one on a base I might not enjoy? Well we’ll see how it goes haha. This is also technically rose-lotus flavor, so there’s that.

It smells nicely rosey, and it doesn’t have any of that note that I dislike in assams (hard for me to explain what it is, there is just a note I don’t like). The flavor is mostly rose, but perhaps there is some lotus in here as well. Definitely floral overall. It’s a tad bitter for my liking (it’s got “bite”), but that could possibly be fixed with short steep time. Or I could keep it at home to have a nice milky rose tea on the weekends.

Overall I think I need to accept that I am just not a fan of teas from the Indian mainland (Sri Lanka is ok) and stop buying them, even in the form of bases for flavored teas.

Thennn we went on an American Horror Story bender (most of my pals have been talking about it, so) and I needed a big pot of no-caf tea for that, so some beloved Fauchon, yet more from Dexter3657, and all was right. (:

The rooibos is definitely present here, but it works well with the other aromas and flavors (it doesn’t taste anything like Butiki Coconut Cream Pie but reminds me of it in that it uses the rooibos flavor upfront, acknowledges it, doesn’t try to mask it). For some reason the taste just makes you think of crunchy orange fall leaves. There’s a sort of crispiness, a something-was-fresh-and-then-it-was-dried-and-now-it’s-disintegrating tone somehow. That maybe sounds gross but I don’t mean it super literally. It’s just a feeling. Fauchon is great at evoking complicated feelings through scent, at least for me. Hard to describe or explain.

The next two teas in my cupboard are actually sachets of Lupicia limited Hawaiian teas. Originally I was going to bring some in and have it anyway, but I forgot, and I like to save the sachets for traveling anyway, so I’ll just skip them. I know they’re tasty and when they’re gone they’re gone, so I don’t feel a need to use them up quickly.

Instead, I will skip ahead to perhaps my FAVORITE tea ever (#52). Today I decided that I would break my no-tea-gets-100 rule and just do it. This tea is perfection to me. Almondy, cakey, rosey, delicious. And, of course, it would have to be difficult to obtain. Next time I’m in Paris, I am stocking up. :P

Sometimes you just want one of your most favoritest teas to start the day.

I was surprised to find that I actually found the similarity stronger between this one and Amore (DF) than I had notice before. I guess there is more almond in the Amore than I realized. Anyway, this was full of almondy and rosey goodness, and it makes me very happy.

Guys, last night I had a dream that there was another Fauchon sale on Vente-Privee, and I bought another tin of this tea and one of Le Bonheur!

Sadly it was just a dream, but I figured it was a sign that I should have some of my faves this morning. Particularly this one, since it featured so prominently. This is just such a “me” tea. Almond and rose? Yes please.

This was SO DELICIOUS this morning. Tons of almond flavor, sweet and creamy. Almond cake with a hint of rose icing, that’s what this tea tasted like this morning. Without a doubt one of my favorite teas ever. Why do I have to fall so hard for a tea that’s so hard to acquire? If this tea ever shows up on Vente-privee I am so buying a stock to last me.

I am feeling tired and I was suddenly struck with a desire for my most favorite flavored teas. What did I reach for? This one, and Fleurilège by Dammann. My other thought was Caramel-Toffee by Dammann. I guess I should probably be rating them higher than they already are, somehow. This was super almondy today. Love it, and I will be heartbroken when it’s gone.

Thanks so much to MissB for acquiring this tin of tea for me and sending it along. I believe this tea appeared in their collection just after I left Paris earlier this year, and I was kicking myself the whole time. SO glad that I got some of it from the Great Fauchon Invasion of North America 2013, because this tea is outstanding.

First off, it smells like heaven. So much almond, with a hint of rose. This is a little like Teavana’s Amandine Rose, if that tea were more amazingly awesome. Sweet, almondy in an almond cookie/cake way. There is enough almond flavor to really say almond pastry of some kind, but it’s not quite marzipan-y. The rose isn’t strong (for me) and just adds a faint air of rosewater, or perhaps turkish delight. There are Greek almond cookies that are made with orange blossom water and so have a light floral note to them, and this is like those cookies if they were made with rosewater instead (which sounds amazing to me but my boyfriend would hate it, haha).

The base is smooth and fairly rich, and absolutely not bitter or astringent despite me steeping it at boiling instead of 95°C. So glad I have a whole 100g of this because I am in love!

This is from the super exciting swap box Dexter3657 sent my way! Yay! Thank you for letting me try so many Fauchon teas—couldn’t come at a better time (just discovered them last month and am in love).

I’ve only tried a couple other pear teas (Joy’s Teaspoon and Della Terra, I think?), and this one’s interesting because there’s a transformation in the type of pear from scent to taste. The smell is very sweet, like candy pear or pear syrup, but as for taste, after the upfront mysteriously smoky black tea flavor the pear comes in very juicy and fresh, with that clean “raspiness” fresh pear has. As it cools it tastes A LOT like fresh pear juice, and there’s a subtle woody tannin element from the tea that works like gangbusters with the fresh pear flavor.

That same general wonderful interplay between delicate but not disappointly watery black tea flavor and haunting, sophisticated scent is present the way it’s been in all the Fauchon teas I’ve tried (I’m totally hooked on that quality! Beginning to feel like it could be any flavor/scent whatsoever and I’d dig it if it came from Fauchon because of how it’d do that with the black tea base). Beautiful, and I know I keep using this word but I don’t know how else to put it, distinctly sophisticated. I really don’t know of another company that layers scent with delicate tea flavor the way they do.

Thank you so much! It’s so nice to be a little lovey dovey and starry eyed in the evening.

Thanks ifjuly for sending me a sample of this tea. I’ve had a couple of cups of this tonight. We all know that I’m not afraid to call it as I see it, but I’m choosing to reserve judgement. I’m getting some strange impressions tonight. Will drink it again in a couple of days and write something more constructive. For now – Thanks ifjuly – I learn something from every tea experience…
Edit – I know I was going to leave it for a couple of days, but the sample package was sitting on the counter, and here we are again. This is raspberry in the “scented – wafting in the air French sort of way”. I don’t normally read others tasting notes until I’ve tried a tea – my confusion last night would have been alleviated if I had read Dinosara’s note “It had a weird bitter note that was very sharp and I’m not certain wasn’t leftover soap aroma from the pitcher.” That is exactly what I was getting – and I too thought it was a soap contamination – but I’m pretty careful about that so was confused. I steeped today at a lower temp, and while I’m not getting as much of “that” it’s still present. I think it’s something floral I don’t like, and can’t recognize so my brain is saying “soap”. Dunno – this isn’t my favorite of the French teas, but I appreciate the experience. Thanks ifjuly.

My second time with this tea. I still am not really sure how I feel about this tea. I even think I will be lowering the rating. I will have to try this brewed cold and see how it fairs. I find the more it cools, the less intense the thyme taste is, so I will follow MissB’s suggestion at a lower temp for steeping and for less time. I like this tea, but it is definitely a tea I have to be in the mood for. Today was not really one of those days, so I drowned it with whole milk and some stevia.

Peach and Thyme… what a strange combination. Fear not though, we cannot doubt the French and their perfume combinations… right??

At first sniff: I smell the peach, delicious peach. I catch notes of the thyme, but not overpowering and the sweetness of the peach enhances the sweet parts of the thyme. Definitely not offensive and it definitely works well together.

At first steep: THYME THYME… did I mention you can really smell the thyme? Wowzers!! The taste is less intense, but with the sniff and the taste, you really can taste the thyme and it takes over a bit. The peach is the second note, which is a bit disappointing. It’s definitely a different tea. Although the French are on point with the smell of the tea, I’m not sure the taste is as good. I definitely would have been happier with a peaches and cream taste, rather than a peach gravy? With Thanksgiving and Christmas in the air, I could see this tea going extremely well with turkey dinner. It would be an excellent sweet component if cream and sugar are added.

I like this tea, I’m not sure I love this tea. I have 100g of it now and one beautiful fuchsia tin. I don’t feel badly paying 12.99 for it though because I definitely taste that the tea is quality. I probably wouldn’t replace it when the “thyme” comes. ha ha

I received samples of this tea from both MissB and OMGsrsly. Steepster swappers are the best. Tons of people our scrounging for Fauchon teas, and I get samples from two different people. The generosity here is just amazing.

I don’t think I can say it better than OMGsrsly did:
“So… this is weird. Weird but good? Good but weird? Something like that.”
I am really happy to have gotten a chance to try this. If it had been in my Winners store, I would have bought a tin of it. I think I’m ok with not having a 100g tin of it in my house, on the other hand, it is interesting enough that I will drink and enjoy the samples I have.
I’m getting more peach than thyme. It’s more scented than flavored (as I would expect from a French tea) – the peach is really nice and sweet, subtle but present. The thyme is more of an impression (hint of), but is nice with the peach. But it’s still strange enough that I wouldn’t drink it everyday.

Thank you so much ladies for sending this to me.

sigh. i was so excited when i found this at winners. i must agree with dexter3657….. mint, alas mint. and i say that LIKING mint for the most part! i actually think the issue is compounded by the blue mallow? but i can’t be completely sure.

i don’t taste raspberry, i don’t even smell it. i’ll try again before i apply actual numbers, because i wanted to love this tea…. i really did. and if i apply numbers now… they wouldn’t be happy numbers. (i’d like to try again before i go on record =0( )