Granville Island Tea Co

blech. no thanks.

travelling tea box A!

and in other news – this is the 975th different tea that i’ve had (to pull a shmiracles), if steepster is to be believed.

**also in other news i totally lost my train of thought because someone’s facebook status made me laugh a lot. You know how there are words out there that people clearly don’t know what they are…how to spell them etc.. and you kind of shake your head and go with it? Well i never though i’d see the day that obstacles (a fairly “easy” word) was spelled wrong. Oppsticals. And yes..sometimes people have learning disorders and crap..not mocking the world but this was clearly from one of my friends who doesn’t know the word is obstacles, rather than her being unable to spell it properly. like my friend who thought it was “for all intensive purposes” instead of “intents and purposes” that sort of thing.

….holy tangent batman. So anyway…this tea? reminds me of i think? it’s palais de the’s toffee tea. I think? there’s something i’ve had that reminds me of this. The tea is not really buttered rum, and it’s a bit on the astringent side. it might fare better with a little cream or something but i prefer teas that i can drink straight.

Yes! I’m loving the creamy lemon today. That’s just what I wanted this evening and considering I was just looking to get closer to a sipdown, I was surprised by how tasty this is.

So I asked for recs because I knew I was going to Granville Island and OMGSrsly told me that THIS was the one to get. And I listened.

Then I came home and read her reviews and… Umm… “This tea is something I should hate”, and “Oh yeah. This tea won’t be getting a great rating from me even though I repurchased 100g today. I’m really undecided about it because it is everything I dislike, yet it’s so refreshing I keep drinking it. Weird, I know.”

Hahaha. It’s a good thing I didn’t read that first!

I am enjoying it – it reminds me of Lemon Chiffon, without being creamy. It’s just lemon, a little bit of creaminess, and a little bit of zing (from the orange peel?). I’m halfway through my 50g now, so… I may re-stock before I move! More bedtime options are always nice, and the baby might like this too if I iced it.

It was also pretty cheap too. I think maybe $4 for 50g? I think that’s good.

Very similar to a Cream of Earl Grey but a bit better!

Goodbye Granville Island Blend!

It’s raining out here like crazy, which reminds me of living in BC, so it seemed like a good time to finish the bag off. It was ok, but I won’t miss it.

Sipdown (98)

This was supposed to be my homesick blend, but I’m not actually homesick – I just left it out of my storage so it was easy to grab and I wanted to get closer to sip-down because the type of bag it’s in doesn’t fit in as well with the foil zips everything else is in.

I oversteeped it. It’s not my fault. (Well… it is) I was looking at a Pride&Prejudice card game kickstarter that is super adorable. Even if I never play it, it’s totally worth $5 for the digital version that I can look at. http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1898617831/marrying-mr-darcy-the-pride-and-prejudice-card-gam

Also, this Werewolf card game looks really awesome too: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1680252891/werewolf?ref=thanks

Man, I can see how people can get sucked into so many awesome projects…

oh! And this tea still tastes ok! WIN! I have no idea how long I steeped it but it was definitely over 5 minutes!

I really shouldn’t like this tea. I guess I didn’t expect to? And I don’t deserve to because it was an impulsive buy and those are supposed to bite you in the butt.

But I do.

It makes me think of a Ceylon, but I guess there is Assam in there too; both black teas make a strong showing, and then the vanilla and pomegranate make their appearance, bow, and leave centre-stage. This tea wants to be astringent, but it isn’t. Just enough to make me stop and pay more attention to the flavours, which isn’t a bad thing at all.

I think I’ll drink this one when I’m homesick. ;)
(for wherever “home” is. I was only in Vancouver for 5 years. The on Vancouver Island for 3. Then High Prairie for 3. Kamloops for 4?)

I guess I’ll drink this when I miss Vancouver. :D

Total impulse buy. /0\

I went to Granville Island because I hadn’t been there for years and then I thought this would make for a nice souvenir tea to drink when I’m in Ontario and so I scooped it up. The prices for 50g are really reasonable!

(Don’t buy teas based on souvenir value. That’s tea purchasing rule #17.)

So… this tea? Well there’s definitely darjeeling in there – I can tell because it’s bitterish. There’s also some fruity notes too which help to make it more enjoyable. And it is enjoyable, although not necessarily memorable. We’ll see if it grows on me.

I’ve tried drinking this tea with and without milk and I definitely think it’s better with. I was also a bit disappointed that there weren’t more white chocolate chips in the blend although it did smell quite chocolatey. However, the chocolate flavour was quite subdued, I found although the milk helped bring it out. I do appreciate that the company uses a nice high quality base for most of their flavoured teas, but in this instance the flavouring itself could do with some improvement. All is all I found this blend to only be okay.

Another sipdown!

So I came home and had packages from Momo and JustJames! So, with that and this sipdown I’m at 160! Let’s see if I can get that down…

Meh.

(Over ice. Loads of honey added.)

Mmm honeybush. I’ve only tried flavoured honeybush teas thus far and I’ve really enjoyed all them. Some more than others. I’m so excited I discovered honeybush since I don’t care for the taste of rooibos at all. I was surprised to discover honeybush is actually much more popular than rooibos in South Africa.

This is my first cup of the day. And it’s 9:30p. This tea is great when I stand in front of my tea cupboard staring aimlessly and not being able to decide what I want. It’s great other times too, but it just works perfectly when I don’t even necessarily feel like tea. The scent alone can change that.

I left work early today and went to visit my “AB mom” and her husband, both of who have become special to me in the few years I’ve known them. He was diagnosed with cancer a few years ago and it’s gone and come twice now. I’ve chatted with her, but not actually seen either of them in a few months, so I decided to take off from work and drop by to visit. That soon became five hours of visiting, which was actually amazing. In just a few months so much had changed, and I am so, so happy I took the time to visit and catch up today.

This is lovely and spicy and sweet all in one. The mixture of cloves, cinnamon, and orange peel is nothing short of amazing. I’m so happy jessiwrites introduced me to Teaopia’s Market Spice which encouraged me to find more. This is such a great cup of tea. It seems holiday-like but it worked perfectly for my morning tea today.

My next trip to Vancouver I’ll be stocking up on this for sure.

i thought to try some teas today and of the 14 teas, i liked this, versailles lavender, and plum oolong the most.

of the 3, i liked the scent of this best.

yes, i would buy this! thanks Nicole for this sample :)

Sipdown!

Thank you to Nicole for this sample!

I was beginning to feel like my palate was broken today because none of my teas were tasting how I imagined they should (or how the previous reviews made me think they should taste), but this one is good!

I don’t know why I assumed this would have bergamot, but a quick scan of the ingredients and I find I am wrong! Despite my longing for that flavor, I still am enjoying this tea!

It has a deep tea taste, but is still light and citrusy at the same time. Has a hint of a flowery note in the smell when I take a sip, but I’m not picking any of it up in the taste.

I’ve never understood what people meant when they said “astringent” in a tasting note, but this tea makes me feel like this would be an accurate description for this tea for some reason. Hmm.

Still getting the same super sweet aftertaste, but I’m thinking that might have to do with the soy I’m using now, rather than the teas. Not pleasant.

Pretty good!

EDIT: After reading other reviews, I feel I should add to this… Can’t taste the strawberry, but another reviewer also said don’t add milk to this and like I said I (mistakenly) added soy to this, so maybe that’s why I’m getting the weird aftertaste. I can’t break myself of this stupid soy habit! I need to stop it! With blacks I mostly want to smooth it out and make it able to drink quicker. I guess I could use ice instead! Ha!

Repeat after me… Londonderry… NOT Londonberry. :P I read my friend’s handwriting wrong and had a different idea of what this tea is. I see there are strawberries so I guess I wasn’t completely wrong.

It’s a pretty nice black, although I’m not really picking up on the strawberry/lemon flavours. Maybe I’ll add more leaves and try again tomorrow. :P

This is the other tea I picked up there. I believe he described it as a blend of many black teas, including vanilla and pomegranate. So naturally, it smells of Monk’s Blend. Well, Monk’s Blend with Assam.

The leaves are a mixture of orthodox and CTC, like Cream Irish Breakfast’s.

They list their steeping instructions as 2-3 minutes. I did four instead. Mild tea, makes me think of a slightly malty monk’s blend (Assam? Mild? I suppose it’s their tea ratios). This is definitely more of an afternoon blend. Nice, though. Liking it more than the Ice Wine, but I think that one might just require some special attention to steeping parameters.

The vanilla and pomegranate are definitely more hints in the background. But I think they compliment it well. Assam’s a bit drying on the tongue, but that’s to be expected.

Sipping this out of my brand new Dalek mug, which I picked up for ten bucks from Golden Age when I was headed back from Granville Island. The bus was passing it. I couldn’t NOT stop. Of course, I get in there and someone’s completely cleaned out the Doctor Who comics. NewWho I could understand, but there was NOTHING in Classic either. Just two division tabs with nothing between them. Sob. The only figures they had were Four and Newly-Regenerated-Five, as well as “Rassilon” (I ought to punch RTD) and the freaky-faced robotics from series five’s second episode. I thought for sure they’d have a 11-Doctors-Hundred-Dollar-Set stashed away, but alas. No Pertwee action figures for me.

Sitting at home drawing the Shalka Doctor comic, and contemplating my Oz and ComLit projects.

Hey! This is pretty good hot.

I added a spoon of honey (still trying to beat the sick!), and the lemon and citrus notes are at the front. Nice.

I still don’t care for the medicinal rooibos, but it is a refreshing tea even hot. Good for hydration. Hmm. Maybe I’ll ice some tomorrow and bring it to work…

Reached for this one again tonight since Cavocorax bought some but wasn’t convinced about my ‘review’. Haha.

This tea is a rooibos. It tastes like a rooibos with stuff in. Iced, it’s incredibly refreshing and hydrating, an I reach for it whenever I have a hot or uncomfortable day, or want to make sure I’m hydrated.

I like the orange peel in it, but honestly I mostly taste the rooibos. Not that I ervr have plain rooibos, but the tea is a bit woody and a little medicinal.

1 heaping tbsp tea, steeped for as long as you like in 1-1.5 cups of water, poured over a bunch of ice.

Ahh.

Yep, I’m drinking this iced. Again.

I ended up going for a walk with a friend, and I got so thirsty I bought something, drank it all, then came home and made a litre of this.

I’m most of the way through and still thirsty. Tomorrow will be an interesting day at work, that’s for sure! I have a feeling I’ll be heading out of the lab for a gulp of iced tea (ooh, which ones should I make!) about every 5 minutes.

It’s been warm here. When I went to get laundry supplies at 9pm, the thermometer in the car said “27C!!” as though it was a good thing.

The only way that was a good thing is it was 27C because it had cooled down significantly from earlier in the day.

Needless to say, I’ve been guzzling iced tea. I’ve had 4 cups each of Pink Passionfruit (David’s) and Pink Lemonade (Murchies), and now I’m having this rooibosy weirdness they call “Lemon Myrtle”. This is on top of my normal caffeinated drinks, although I forgot about the iced coffee I have in the fridge. Cold brew coffee is the only kind my body tolerates well, and I broke down and made some.

Anyways. Back to this tea.

It’s so freaking refreshing. I like it best when it’s seriously overleafed and steeped an “Oh shoot I forgot about that!” amount of time, but 7 minutes will do. The orange peel, lemon myrtle and rooibos combine to give an incredibly weird, medicinal flavour that I really like. You’ll note I haven’t changed my rating, because I still look at the ingredients and the loose tea and think, “I actually want to drink this? Ugh.” But then I do, and it’s just what I want, somehow.

Now that I have a giant canning jar full of this, iced, I will go back to washing my hang to dry laundry, in the hopes of using it as a swamp cooler to make sleeping bearable.