Golden Moon Tea
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Well, I forgot I tried this one a while back. Some additional notes…this is extremely dark post infusion! Extremely! I think the Citrus and Cinnamon actually help it out a little bit. It’s a mellower tasting pu-erh, thank the tea-gods! I think I am going to keep it at my original rating, tho.
This is a weird smell…almost like something turning funky in the frig…but the more it cools you can smell a hint of cinnamon. The coloring is neat…a reddish brown on the verge of black. It’s bold but even in taste. It’s growing on me…
This is a ceylon black tea. And you can see the black tea and smell it. I steeped this up for a a little while. And this tastes like a good black tea with some sort of sweetness. This is pretty good and not bitter. Perhaps I need to steep this abit longer to get the full flavor?
This is one of those teas that falls into the “eh” category. A take it or leave it kind of tea.
But frankly, right now, I’m pretty happy to be drinking tea. I really haven’t had ANY since January 1st.
I actually have three different kinds of Jasmine Pearls in the house, thanks to takgoti! I figured I’d try the Golden Moon one first, before I try some high-quality takgoti versions.
The look of this tea is gorgeous! Pretty little pearls, a beautiful blue-green with yellow strings interspersed. So soft and silky to the touch. The pearls smell like a juicy, floral jasmine. They’re extremely fragrant. Each pearl has jasmine seeped right into it. I couldn’t wait to see what these leaves would do in the water!
They unfurl beautifully once the hot water touches them. I was a bit disappointed that they didn’t unfurl more than I thought they would. Most of them were still somewhat rolled by the time my timer rang.
So I poured, and the wet leaves smell like a milder version of the dry. And the infusion smelled delicious, with a rich, heady jasmine scent. A sweet green smell underlying it as well. And such a pretty light yellow! Similar more to a white tea than a green, actually.
The light color should have tipped me off to the taste of this tea. Because it’s very light, especially when hot. The jasmine doesn’t really come through until the aftertaste, and the forefront of the flavor is definitely a Chinese green taste: a bit bitter and vegetal, maybe a bit mineral-like.
The problem is just that the tea is just too flavorless and unexciting. It’s not that it’s a bad tea, perse. It’s just I wanted a fuller tea taste, and more body. Not necessarily bold and brisk and strong, like a black. Just more rounded and interesting, especially on the jasmine front.
In short, the tea is weakness. Maybe a good introduction to jasmine, but I don’t see it winning any awards. I’m sure that there are better jasmine pearl teas out there.
Second Steep
So I decided to steep this a second time, at 3:30 minutes, and the same water temperature. The leaves opened up a little bit more, but still didn’t completely unfurl. Odd. The juice was around the same color as the first time, except with a bit more of a honey tone. The tea had a bit of a thicker mouthfeel, and much more sweetness. The sweetness became a bit overbearing after a while, though, with the jasmine only appearing as an aftertaste. After the tea cooled, it seriously began to taste like Juicy Fruit gum. I don’t know why, or how. But it was bizarre. More of like an aftertaste of Juicy Fruit. Like you’ve chewed it for too long and you spit it out, and then your whole mouth feels like it.
Really odd.
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That’s too bad. It might really step up in the second steep if you feel daring, though. I think I’ve run into a few that are like that.
Too bad indeed. I’ve also found that jasmines open up a lot more as they cool down. Did you find that with this one? Anyhow, I hope the ones I sent meet you well. For its ubiquity, jasmine tea seems to be difficult to get right.
I think I might steep it again, just to try it… and yes, it definitely got better as it cooled. I thought I mentioned that… but I guess that didn’t make it into my review. :(
Apparently [after a re-read] you eluded to it, but I was just too dense to pick up on it. My bad.
the scent of the dry leaves is VERY inviting, its sweet and floral with a hint of malty-ness. the tea smells less floral that the dry leaves. the tea is am amazing amber color. the flavor is nice, and peppery. i really like that peppery taste! the end flavor is a malty honey taste that rounds this tea out nicely. i added 1/2 of my normal sugar toit because the pepperyness is prefect for me. this is very good with a bit of cadbury milk chocolate :)
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this one is very sweet and candy like. you can taste the burnt sugar flavor in it mixed with the flavor of the tea. so far most of my GM samples have not disappointed me in the least! (besides that jasmine pearls) i don know if i will be getting a larger package of this but i will miss it when im looking for that burnt sugar flavor i love.
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Argh, this is the one sampler I no longer have and I never tasted. Some relatives came over during the holidays and I prepared this tea for them and they took the whole pot. And they complained that it smelled great, but lacked flavor. I’ll have to reorder this one day.
its a good one, deff a good sample. if ur a hardcore caramel fan than this one isnt going to satisfy but it has a very nice flavor to it.
I just finished watching a Modern Marvels show on tea ( http://bit.ly/11xMMn ). The History Channel is so cool. Anyway, it made me want something more on the green end of the tea spectrum so I rooted around in my samples and pulled out this one.
Okay, this bag? Has like the most minuscule amount of tea ever. One gram. One. For the way I make tea, this isn’t even half a cup. Even using Western style brewing, this isn’t even half a cup. Shame on you, Golden Moon. That’s pathetic.
I went ahead a brewed up a full cup of this but I’m honestly not expecting much. The resulting tea is less pale than I expected but the taste… Initially all I could taste was hot water and Splenda. I did not, however, add Splenda to this. It just tasted like I did (and while they say it doesn’t, Splenda totally has a taste). As it cooled, the Splenda taste became a bit like… well, something a little more flavored than Splenda but I can’t get enough of the taste to figure it out. Maybe honeyed soybean water. Which is probably the chrysanthemum (the honey taste) and the white tea (soybean water). The chrysanthemum dominates but the white tea pokes out more if I slurp but slurping also brings out a weird vegetal bitterness.
The more this cools, the more actual taste I get but I’m underwhelmed. The aftertaste I’m left with once my cup is done is that of Splenda-ed soybean water. So perhaps it is a good thing that I had such a tiny amount of leaf in my sample packet. Because I don’t think I’d like this taste at all if it were more intense. At the same time, maybe if there were more leaf, I’d get more depth to the flavors and not be left with a Splenda-like aftertaste.
I did a second steep of this one (@3mins) to see if I could find anything like what others have found (or anything at all redeeming) and all I got was soybean water with a little Splenda. I decided I didn’t need to experience another whole cup of that and poured it out. My rating is based on the first steep.
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AWESOME!!!
^ in reference to the show, not the measly amount of tea.
What is this splenda business anyway? Some sort of artificial sweetener or an herb or some such? I’ve heard (or seen rather) people talk about something called stevia, which I’ve gathered must be some sort of herb.
@Cofftea, it really is an awesome show. Even if a lot of it is about Lipton and CTC teas, not orthodox.
@Angrboda, Splenda is an artificial sweetner made from sugar so it is supposed to taste like sugar. It sorta does – closer than other fake sweeteners out there. But I’m not a big fan. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Splenda
Okay, thanks. I’ve been wondering about this for a while, having seen both and getting them mixed up a lot. I’m not familiar with either. No clue what artificial sweetener is like over here, except you get them in little tablets. I expect it’s probably more or less the same. I prefer real sugar myself.
Sugar rules! :)
Indeed. :) If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it. Unless you’ve got diabetes. In which case it’s broken.
…or something.
I can buy stevia leaves in the market here, at spice and herb shops. Putting a couple of leaves in a cup sweetens the tea, it’s not a sugar taste, I can’t really think how to describe it. The local organic market also sells stevia in a liquid form – that has more of an aftertaste though.
Awww that you didn’t like this, and that’s SO WEIRD. My sample packet had around a teaspoon and a half, and I dumped the entire bag in. My version was buttery and floral and naturally sweet-tasting. I can’t stand artificial sugar… wow. Totally different! Oh well, there are many white teas under the sun! Did takgoti give you any of Samovar’s Bai Mu Dan? Cause that tastes really delicious.
Yep, I have some of that one – I’m looking forward to it!
Haha, you should try Harney & Son’s Bai Mei. I thought this one was decent, Bai Mei was way worse than this. I have about half the packet left, want it? :D
I don’t recall how much I had in this sampler, but it definitely wasn’t enough to ration it into two servings.
You make it sound so tempting! :P
Comes with ♥, ★, rainbows and a complimentary red balloon as well! =D
@Angrboda Yer funneh.
@Ricky They’re magically delicious!
Tak, thank you, one does one’s best. :p
Delightful oolong with a nice honeyed flavor and notes of apricot.
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My humans agree. This tea satisfied their longing for Oolong: http://lyt-tea-reviews.blogspot.com/2009/12/review-golden-moons-imperial-formosa.html
My first tea of 2010. Go me. No specific reason for having this one. Just because I can.
This smells nice. Fresh, citrus-y, lavender-y and a little… sweetly spicy (probably the lavender again?). The taste doesn’t quite come across to me as rich as the smell. The lavender is more pronounced and the citrus not quite as juicy as I’d like. There is a little tingle left on the tip of my tongue that matches up to the sweet spicy smell. I do enjoy that.
The overall taste is smooth and a little sweet but a nice, warming finish. I might have enjoyed this brewed longer for a more robust taste, though. But I think the lavender will always hold it back just a little for me. Don’t get me wrong, I like lavender EGs, but I think they do best to gentle a not-so-good EG. Have a bad EG? It’s gross. Have a bad EG with lavender? Suddenly it is much better.
I think I would have liked to see what Golden Moon could have done with a straight EG. But at the same time, the few sips of EG I had at the London Tea Room (stolen from the husband) were really what I wanted in an EG. Strong bergamot with a juicy, fresh taste. And this one just seems a little pale in comparison to the memory of that one. That being said, this is a pretty good EG. If I had a tin of this, I don’t think I’d have any problems drinking it up. But it’s not the fresh-squeezed-EG taste that I’m really wanting.
I did have enough for the husband to have his own cup. He is a fan, he says. He also compared it to the EG he had at the London Tea Room (which was Rishi) but says this one is sweeter and has a hint less citrus. That’s probably because of the softening factor of the lavender. Anyway, I think he’d be happy if we had a tin of this laying around.
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I would have definitely drank this had it been in my cupboard. Get tippy w/o getting tippy:)
I’m really excited to try this when the GM sampler shows up. I think I’ll like it.
It really is an awesome sampler. They’ve got some really great teas. They miss the mark on a couple (sencha and the organic green come to mind) but I’ve got at least four teas that I want full tins of and I still have about 12 more teas to try! I really wish other vendors did a full catalog sampler too because it’s really awesome.
I wouldn’t mind having a tin of this either. I actually like it because of it’s lighter bergamot flavor. Agreed, it’s more fun with a full catalog. Sammmmoooovarrrr!
I want to try some other teas before I start on GM because I’m afraid that this is going to be one of those things I want to see all the way through without stopping. Looks like I’ve got some serious tea drinking to do over the next couple of days. I’m fine with that.
@Ricky Hah. I sincerely doubt that’s going to happen, but feel free to keep dreaming!
@takgoti You are ridiculous. I’m not sure why but that idea makes me laugh really hard.
@takgoti- I agree! I get on “kicks” very easily. I’m going to have to force myself to drink my Den’s and O-cha matcha between my mandarin matcha or it’ll be gone before I know it.
@Micah Hahaha! Well, I mean, not like all in one day. Now you’ve got me laughing too.
@Cofftea The biggest danger with me is that I overload myself with something and then I get sick of it. Luckily with GM I don’t see that being a problem since it’s 31 different teas, not 31 of the same tea. I think it’s more my completionist side kicking in than anything else.
I had a nap earlier, which means my brain is pretty worthless right now. Decided to have some of my GM samples in the ever popular endeavor of cleaning out my tea pantry so I can order some tea.
This smells pretty. Sweet. Nectar-y maybe? Not floral, but sweet and not really fruity but maybe not… thick enough to be nectar. Faint honey? Something. Eh. It smells good.
Brewing, it smells a little musty, dry and sweet. Not bad. Not concerning. Seems nice. It’s very light in my cup and I can’t really get much smell from it. But sipping it is quite nice. Sweet with a little of the musty taste that I smelled when in the pot. As it cools, the sweet musty taste turns mostly just sweet with maybe a hint of hay or something… . No briny taste, no real vegetal taste. Just delicate sweetness and flavor. This makes me think of a sweeter version of Rishi’s Snow Buds. But softer and less like a green (which is ironic because this is considered a green and Snow Buds is considered a white but there you go).
Anyway, good stuff. Like it a lot. Sweet, delicate, gentle but flavorful. I’m a fan.
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Sounds delicious! I was really confused by their website with this one. It was listed as a green tea but they kept referring to it as silver needle in the description.
Do you think it tastes more like a green or a white tea?
To me, it tastes more like it is a white tea when cool (but I can see more typical green tea tastes when it is hotter but Snow Buds still seems more green to me than this one). But I’ve not had many white teas so I could be way off base.
(By the way, love Shipwrecks! I read it ages ago but had forgotten about it. I might have to bring it out for a reread now that your profile has reminded me of it!)
Yes! Shipwrecks is such a great book. I’ve read it probably three times and it doesn’t get old. I’d have to say that my favorite part is the last few sentences and how they capture the emotion of the entire novel. It’s so powerful.
holy honey! its has that distinct honey flavor with the back note the pear taste. the tongue feel reminds me of a juicy pear as well. it smells so much like hot honey. im very happy with this sampler.
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Ain’t it delicious? :D Glad you liked it. I have to order a huge tin of this.
im slightly obsessed with honey so the fact that it tastes like real good honey is awesome. were out of honey so this is holding me over for right now lol. i may need to get more :D
Right? It did taste like real honey! I just wish the ripen pear smell wasn’t as strong.
You are drinking a lot of teas that I have or have drunk lately! YAY!
@Ricky yeah the dry leaves were gross smelling lol and it was a strong pear scent but it tasted too good :D
@teaplz some of your reviews did help me pick out samples :D
I’m really excited to try this. Gonna have to break into the GM sampler soon.
i was reading through the reviews for this one yesterday and was disappointed, i am glad you like it as i am planning on trying it with my GM sampler :)
ok ive been wanting to try a jasmine tea for a while now and the sample was 0.99$ how could i go wrong? the leaves/balls smell nice they are not strong at all like i had expected them to be and there cute little pebbles :) they looked really cool opening up in the hot water. the smell of the wetl eaves and tea….they remind me of those foam tub toy blocks i had as a child that stick to the wall when their wet. i tasted it unsweetened and it had almost no flavor so i added my normal amount of sugar and well…it tastes like it smells…i dont think i like jasmine tea….i will try others because i dont want to compleatly close that door. the tea itself is yellow which i didnt expect either but it is very pretty.
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the future hubz LOVES this. he said it reminds him of his childhood when he used to eat the honeysuckle flowers at his home in VA.
Hrm. I’ve had pretty good experiences with a few jasmine pearl teas. I got my sampler pack of this in so I’ll give it a whirl soon and let you know how I think it stacks up? I’m not sure if the other GM sampler monkeys [teaplz, Ricky, and Auggy] have tried this yet.
:) i still wanna try a few more jasmine teas i just dont think this particular one is for me. im excited to see what you think :)
Now now, Auggy’s the real monkey :D * points at the pink monkey avatar *.
I haven’t tried any of the Jasmine samplers. I think Auggy needs to try this though, maybe this will be the 100/100 Jasmine :D
This one might cuddle with her at night instead of stabbing her with a spoon :D
I’ve only really had Adagio’s Jasmine Pearl, and that one’s a bit light if I recall, if you want some let me know. Though that might push you even further away from Jasmine Pearl =(
:) sure im willing to try any tea once ([email protected] is my email). the F.H. wont stop raving about this one he keeps going “mmm” after every sip lol
@ Kitch3ntools – if you and the future hubby like honeysuckle, you should try the Ancient Yellow Buds that I tried out this morning. Very honeysuckle-y.
I haven’t tried this one, but I did try the straight Jasmine, and I really liked it a lot. Very strong, sweet, juicy, and floral!
@LENA ill have to take a look at that! thnx :D
I think the only GM Jasmine I’ve tried is the vanilla and I didn’t like it, but normally I LOVE jasmine. I have a couple I could send you if you want to try (Teavana’s Jasmine Oolong, Lupicia’s Jasmin Mandarin, Harney’s Dragon Pearls).
ok this is the 3rd time im posting this lol these comments keep getting screwy
denisend id love to try those :) (kitch3ntoolsgmail.com is my email)
Hah, either you need an < / a > in there [hope this posts correctly] or something weird happened and the auto-formatting didn’t work. I wasn’t aware that this took html.
Excuse my deleting. I was testing. Anyhow, HTML failed. Apparently it doesn’t.
And yet it totally absorbed the < /poop > I tacked on the end of that. Hmm.
I found a little bit of this hiding somewhere and there was only enough for 1 large cup. I had half of it hot and half cold. I must say I thought I would enjoy it iced but I prefer it hot in this case. It was still good and I would get it again. Sorry to see it go…backlogging…
This is very yummy! True melon! Straight, fresh cut, from a salad bar! Almost WIne-Like and sugary – naturally! YAY!
wow…this sounds like a winner!
I think I oversteeped but it was really, really good!
Based on the reviews it’s definitely a winner. Shopping cart-ed!
I think we should start a STEEPSTER Dictionary! LOL – Us Nerds are creating a whole lingo of our own :)
“needs more cowbell” MUST be included.
Indeed!
Ahhh, this tea is missing two points! Haha, descriptions are right on point.
Color me unimpressed. :(
I read Auggy’s review of this, so I went into this with a bit of trepidation. My first sencha, and it’s very disappointing!
Anyway, the leaves look pretty! Very needle-like. I haven’t seen anything like this yet (no Japanese greens for me so far). It… doesn’t really smell like anything. If I breathe hot air onto it, I get somewhat of a buttery note, but other than that… nothing.
So I steeped this one up, and I was really surprised at how light the infusion was! It’s such a ridiculously pale yellow that I did a double-take. Lighter than a lot of the white tea I’ve tried.
And the taste… well, it’s a bit non-existent. It’s like hot water, with some bitterness at the end, as well as some astringency. The smell is a bit buttery and grassy, but I’m not getting anything remotely like that in the taste. At all. There’s the faintest taste of sweet, but I’m really having to search for it like crazy. It just tastes like really odd, hot water. I don’t even really feel like I’m drinking tea, which sort of makes me upset.
I didn’t have tea all day, as I was out, traipsing about in the mall. And I went to Teavana for the first time! The store was packed out, and no one bothered me… but I tried their sample tea and nearly gagged. It was Jasmine Pearl mixed with Rooibos Tropical. Not only did the tea taste awful, but it was so ridiculously over-sweetened that it was a nightmare. DISGUSTING.
A disappointing tea day! Let’s hope tomorrow will be better!
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Yes, they put lovely things together to make them nasty and dump honey in it. Not good.
Sorry this was your first sencha. :( But on the plus side, things can only get better, right?
Ew. Ditto on the condolences as to this being your first sencha. They can be awesome, so hopefully you’ll drink one soon!
I happen to own that particular tea from Teavana, and it’s never been flavorful for me. Never tried it with sugar, but I’d just be drinking sugar water, I’m pretty sure. I’m throwing out the stuff I have from them, actually. Good riddance.
That sucks! I’m sorry that that was your introduction to Japanese greens because they are an incredible group of teas.
And Teavana can be a scary place sometimes. They have some great teas there – although you can usually get the same thing for a better price somewhere else – but, based on my personal experience, the blends they come up with just aren’t executed well.
I was going to say, haven’t you realized GM’s plain tea are generally pretty bland….then I realized I actually liked this Sencha. The first time I drank Sencha (Adagios), I hated it. You should try Den’s tea sampler for $3, they give you a variety of Sencha. It’ll be a new tea year soon! Yay!
@Ricky I totally agree. I’m getting to the point that if something is available at Den’s Tea and somewhere else, I buy at Den’s. Their quality and customer service are just that good.
@Micah I would have said that their blends are insane and disturbing but you said it much nicer. Thumbs up!
@Auggy Haha! Well, I can’t say that they AREN’T insane and disturbing. I guess I’m just skilled in diplomacy…. or something. =P
I definitely have hope for the Japanese greens! I could taste somewhere, under the complete blandness of it, that there could be something potentially good from sencha. And the cup smelled really good if I sniffed at it hard enough! Interestingly enough, when this hit room temperature, it started tasting sweeter. I HAVE NO IDEA WHY.
Ricky and Carolyn, I’ll definitely have to try that in the future, but right now I have too much tea to play around with!
And yeah, Teavana… so much honey/sugar/something else. UGH. There was also an Amanzi Tea in the mall as well (http://amanzitea.com/) and they had a Rooibos Cream Caramel. It was overly sugared as well, to the point of the texture changing and becoming syrupy. EW.
I think I added this to the Golden Moon order I just put in… yep. I probably wouldn’t have if I had remember that this review was of a sencha from GM but I didn’t realize that. Oh well!
There will probably be a review of this by me sometime next week and, judging from yours and Auggy’s review, I won’t be impressed. =/
Aww, you should have just bought the whole sampler :D teareviewblog promo code for free shipping. I checked and it was still working a few days ago.
Consarn it!!
I’m going to go rush off and see it I can edit the order.
… I can’t. Oh well, life goes on.
Try calling?
Micah, oh POO. I hope you can still call them or something, because the sampler box is the bees knees.
@Micah Seriously if they haven’t shipped it already try writing them or calling. Golden Moon has some of the best customer service I’ve dealt with. They’ve helped me out in the past.
I did call them and they were wonderful! The tea sampler ships on Monday and I’m super excited!
Great! I’m glad. They are really one of my favorite companies to buy from.
YAY! Awesome! Oh my, I’m seriously super-excited for you! Welcome to the GM sampler set club, hehe! It’s been fun and awesome being able to share and drink a lot of the tea everyone else is having!
WHEEEEE! That made me ridiculously happy, actually. I love good customer service stories.
And had it not been for you, Carolyn, I never would have heard of Golden Moon. I have a tin of Sinharaja sitting on my desk that’s there solely due to you!
They’re based pretty close to where I live, so I seriously want to crash their office.
Hahahahaha! I feel like we are a cult that just got a new member! Welcome Micah! :)
Aww! Well, even if this is a crazy, creepy cult, I’m glad to be here. This website/group of tea fanatics has totally reinvigorated my love for tea. I had kind of slumped into just keeping a few favorites on hand and not even drinking tea everyday. Now I’m discovering new teas and companies and it’s wonderful! So thanks everyone! Glad to be here!
Aw, yay! That’s so awesome! I wasn’t in a slump but the folks on here have introduced me to lots of great teas and vendors it makes tea exciting again!
Goat sacrifices on alternate Wednesdays. Don’t forget to contact Auggy about picking up your complimentary Snuggie.
STOP IT, you dork!
Goat sacrifice, eh? I’ll bring the pu-erh knife!
I’ve got the pu-erh cake. =( I actually do! Well what’s left of it anyways. Welcome to Steepster, where friends help to run your wallet dry. Oh the irony!
We also have a complimentary matcha mill where you can grind up an entire Thanksgiving dinner into a tea!
I’m addicted to this stuff. Luckily my boyfriend was thoughtful and bought me a tin for my birthday :)
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the only reason this didnt get a 100 is because i wanted more watermelon flavor but its amazing! The dry leaves didnt smell too good and reminded me of adagios white pear so i was a bit confused. as soon as i poured water over the leaves it was all melon! <3 the scent of the tea is honeydew and watermelon rind where the taste is cantaloupe with the tea flavor. i LOVE melons all kinds so this is like a nice winter treat! i will more than likely buy a bigger container of this but i have 1 cup left in my sample so we will see (and i plan to resteep the leaves i used for this cup) every time i sip i find more things i like about this!! :D
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This is a watermelon flavored tea? YAY! Most melon teas I find are musk or honeydew melon.
It’s not watermelon-flavored. At all. Definitely more honeydew/cantaloupe, with a white tea flavor. There is a watermelon scent though, which is what Kitch3ntools meant.
Glad you liked this one though! :) It’s definitely delicious if you love melon.
i resteeped this last night…it was more white tea less flavoring. it was good, i just wanted that melon flavor again :) sadly i didnt get to finish the cup because i spilled it on my cellphone >.< i was being EXTRA clumsy all day yesterday so im really not surprised.
http://youtu.be/68LKEm2iuj4
Well, it’s not WHITE Licorice but I found a Licorice Song
Leave it to Grand Funk Railroad! I seriously haven’t heard this in YEARS! WOW!
I sort of went diving in the stash bin for this one…randomly chosen…finished it up. Not my fave but serves a purpose I suppose.
