Harney & Sons

This is so extraordinary from the moment I opened the container. I actually got this for my husband, who loves the Spiced Ethiopian tea we normally drink. It’s such a pain to clear the basket of the leftover leaves, so I bought this in sachets. It arrived today and I decided it was a good night to try it. Wow! Am I ever glad I did. It’s fabulous.

205/6min – It smells of cinnamon and oranges and the taste is the same. The real magic, however, occurs as this tea cools and an entirely new flavor profile emerges. It becomes sweeter and sweeter as the temperature drops. My favorite point is when it’s just lukewarm and tastes like a sweet and spicy cinnamon delight. It’s really a great tea!

This is another sample I received with my recent H&S order. I don’t typically enjoy bagged tea and unflavored decaf teas always seem bland. This tea, however, was different.

The fragrance of the tea is somewhat biscuity and peppery. The flavor is clean and crisp with a fair level of astringency but then has a subtle, lingering sweetness. It’s a nice contrast.

This now makes three decent bagged teas I’ve had recently from Harney and they’re starting to change my mind that all bagged tea is awful.

The leaves are dark and crumbly. The fragrance was unexpected. My initial thought was raisin bread. As I tried to dissect that further, I realized it was malty, yeasty and had notes of fig.

After steeping, the fragrance simplifies. The flavor is malty, slightly sweet and had a high level of salinity. I’m not getting much of the smokiness that has been mentioned quite a bit with this tea. I can see how this tea would take very well to lemon or light cream and sugar. It has a bit of a weak finish. However, as the cup cools, it develops more body and character.

Overall, it’s not a bad tea but it’s also not at the top of my list.

I received a sample of this in silken sachet form with my most recent order from Harney & Sons. (I didn’t realize how much I had ordered until I started unpacking the box. It was like a circus car full of clowns.)

When you first open the packet, there’s a burst of a bright and fruity fragrance with a bit of tang. This was a perfect representation of pomegranate at its most ripe state. The sachet was full of bright green rolled oolong nuggets.

Upon steeping, the leaves plumped so that the bag was almost bursting. The fruity and nutty fragrance was strong and wafted from my desk; no need to get your nose into this tea.

The tea brews to a very pale champagne color and the fragrance in the cup is even more nutty.The tanginess of the pomegranate compliments the butter and nut oolong very well. The lingering aftertaste of the fruit was a little surprising since it wasn’t overly prominent in the tea.

Usually the free samples from H&S don’t do much for me but this one goes on the reorder list!

A delicious blend that at first comes off like just plain hot water at first but let it cool and the flavors start to shine. It was very creamy and lightly sweet. It tasted similar to fresh rice pudding. I just can’t adequately describe it.

This is an interesting oolong. I’m not great with matching the names, so I didn’t realize this was also called the Red Robe, which I do like. It’s nice. The liquor is a beautiful reddish brown and the tea is robust. It’s definitely a roasted tea, nutty tasting, quite strong for an oolong. It has a sweetness to it that’s hard to pinpoint. 195/3 min.

I received a sample of this with my one and only Harney order a few months back. It had been sitting in my drawer at work waiting for me to pay attention and today I decided to. I love mint, I love lemon, but I am very concerned about the two of them together. The dry smell is all mint, and honestly, the bag looks like it just has mint in it. What form is the lemon supposed to be taking? Am I confused?

The liquor is once again all mint in smell – Smells very much like any other mint teabag. When I’m desperate for a quick mint, I tend to turn to my $2 box of 24 from Superstore since I find that most mint teas are created equal, at least when it comes to bagged. The liquor is a swampy looking greenish brown. It is in a blue cup, to be fair, but it’s ugly looking. : )

First sips are…unimpressive. I get an initially mild mint taste, more like flavoured water than tea. I find the strength grows as it sits on my tongue, but that’s not a quality of the tea. As I go on, I get more of a lemonish hit at first, which turns to mint but it always has a watered down feel. A thinness of flavour, if that makes sense. For what this costs on the Harney website, I’m quite disappointed. This seems like something I could find in a grocery store under a no-name brand for much less. And maybe with stronger flavour. It’s not bad, per se, but there’s nothing impressive about it. Not an exciting cuppa for the Royal Wedding day. Though i did have some delicious Detox for breakfast…

What lemon flavour I do get is a bit bitter, as well. Not sour, but more like the taste of a lemon rind (if you’ve had the misfortune to taste one). This is not my friend.

This is by far my favorite genmaicha so far. I’m sad to say that even the version I purchased from the local Japanese market pales in comparison to this.

So nutty. So green. So full of in-yer-mouth goodness. I need another cup, stat.

Thanks to ashmanra for sending me a sample of this so I could face my fear of roses in tea.

Since this was in a sachet, I can’t say much about the tea prior to steeping. Once prepared, the fragrance was of vanilla, carrot and banana, with the faintest floral note. I may be carrying the wedding metaphor too far, but the overall aroma can be summarized as clean linen.

The tea was pale amber in color. The taste was on the grassy, vegetative side with a slight astringency- but no rose. (Yeah!) While it’s a blend, everything is so well balanced that it doesn’t come off as noticeably “flavored.”

The ingredients list includes coconut and almond, but these didn’t present themselves until the cup cooled. However, they lingered providing a pleasant aftertaste.

This may turn out to be one of my favorite H & S teas. (Which would figure since I just placed a large order and didn’t include this one.) I hope they keep it around past the Royal Wedding this weekend!

Home from work, dinner finished. Time to relax with a good book and some of this luxurious tea.
All I can do is blame it on QuiltGuppy. She got me to try it. I am not a decaf guy, I like the full effect nature has to offer, but it just doesn’t matter with this one. It almost makes you feel
guilty and grossly under attired while drinking it. I have visions of a butler, bringing it on a tray.
“your tea sir”
Yep, my tea alright. :)

tea friend   /tee/frend/
–noun
a person who gives assistance, support, advice, samples, camaraderie and anything else needed, all for the betterment and sharing of tea experiences.

I have been fortunate to make some good friends on Steepster, in he last two weeks, friends have allowed me to try some amazing rare teas, and some more common teas that get high marks from the membership here. I was so glad to get to try “The Jane Austen Maffia” a while back and now, I am in the “Vanilla Comoro” Club a last! Thanks to QuiltGuppy, last night, late, after a cup of Vanilla Bean Nilgiri, I ended my day with VC.

Simple, sensible, and elegant are the words that come to mind. For me, the tea was a perfect balance of two complimentary factors. The vanilla was not creamy, not carmelly, not overdone or perfumy in any way. It was just right. To top it off, the black tea (although decaffinated :( came through as well. Nothing else. Simply elegant. I felt the urge to repour the tea from a trusty home cabinet mug to a nice china cup and saucer.
If the loose caffeinated version is this good, I am about to become a Harney customer.

I am making my way through a lot of teas KTT kindly sent me on the Hoppitea Swap. This one came with a particular recommendation to not brew it over 2 minutes – well, it went a few seconds over that but not too much. I was going to divide the sample into two small teacups but accidentally poured too much so made just my very large half liter cup.

And this is very pleasant, though maybe a bit heavy on the cassia – which btw it is not cinnamon. Really. Truly. It´s cassia and pretty distinctive, though yeah I know cinnamon in the USA almost always means cassia and not the other (real, from my point of view) cinnamon. Cassia being sharper seems to go very well with the tang of this – I can detect fruitiness, but not plums specifically. If it has hibiscus ground in ( color and acidity) it is in a just right dosage It is a winner for me!

Today was a day for roasty toasty teas! This was the first, enjoyed with youngest daughter who really e joys this one and chose today’s tea. Golden Snail reminds me of Emperor’s Red from Premium Steep, but is perhaps a little more roasty! Delicious plain, though youngest took it with mik and sugar. I hope they restock this one. It has been a favorite of a lot of people.

After being on the road all day taking eldest daughter to the airport in Raleigh, NC and then shopping, shopping, shopping (not buying, looking and getting ideas at antique shops for an upcoming project and getting new running shoes for hubby) and drinking Coke, I was fantasizing about tea by the time we were on the way home eleven hours after we left home. (On a related note, did you know that if you buy the glass bottle Cokes at Sam’s that are 12 ounce instead of eight and they say Hecho en Mexico, they have sugar instead of HFCS? I know, I know, just sayin’)

I wanted real tea, tea that would grab me and make me know I was alive! Tea that could hold up to cheese toast with mustard without wilting, yet not require additions. This is what I decided on while hubby was driving, having no idea of the raging tea lust going on right beside him.

I opened the tin and gasped. SERIOUSLY? Am I really drinking that much Golden Snail? (Answer: yes.). But the rich chocolate aroma hit and I swooned. It was just like holding a dark chocolate candy bar in my hand. Oh joy! Lots of nummy noises later, youngest and I are on our second pot, cheese toast devoured, doing same to a bowl of Kerrygold Dubliner cheese cubes.

It is so good to be home.

I had a friend over today who is a former coffee drinker turned tea lover, and specifically good black tea, like Queen Catherine, Vanilla Black, Emperor’s Red…you get the idea. I was really eager for her to try this one. Indeed, it was a hit! It is easy to forget just how assertive this tea is, with its rich cocoa notes and smooth body. It has been sold out for a while – here’s hoping they find a new batch just as tasty for us to buy! Speaking of which, have you seen the new tea listing,on Harney’s website? Wild Wuyi Black! I can hardly wait! Fujian teas, especially Wuyi mountains ones, are my favorites!

A friend and I shared a pot of this today. It was her first time tasting it, and she really liked it. She said that as a former coffee drinker, she likes the depth of flavor this kind of tea has. Although it was advertised as a replacement for Mao Feng when it sells out each year, it has more of the character of Hao Ya A to me, but at less cost. This is a staple for us now! So smooth, so flavorful, no milk or sugar needed!

This was a delicious treat on this beautiful day! The flavor is so roasty, toasty, malty, bread-y, dark, and rich. But it is sweet! Nary an addition necessary to make it an amazing cup. Paired it with Lindt’s Dark Chocolate with a Touch of Sea Salt bar. Not the whole bar, of course! Just some squares…. :)

Golden Snail was, as I predicted it would be, the winner today at tea party! In fact, that is what my guest said as soon as she took a sip before trying anything else – this one is a winner. So true. I am loving this tea! You know, I think I like it even better than Keemun Mao Feng!

This was my guest’s favorite tea today! She really loved the roasty, toasty flavor of Golden Snail. Her eyes grew wide when she sipped it. I have been trying to think of a little gift for her, so now I know exactly what to get! An extra tin of this little beauty will be going on my next Harney order.

Hooray! My tea box arrived today! I was most excited about trying Golden Snail.

First, the tin is gold instead of the usual black, as is the tin for my Chocolate Mint. The tea was in a foil pouch and as soon as I opened the pouch the most delightful aroma met me! It was so honeyed it is hard to believe it is unflavored. We brewed it using our usual parameters for black tea. The steeped tea smells just as amazing as the dry leaves. It has the same rich body that makes me sigh with happiness as I bring Golden Monkey to my lips. But the taste was very similar to Emperor’s Red to me – sort of a Golden Monkey/Emperor’s Red Cross, which means that this is AWESOME TEA! I drank mine with no additions and it was so smooth. I can’t wait to have it on tea party day paired with our snacks. It is going to be luscious! Roasty, toasty like JacquelineM says of Emperor’s Red, and thick caramel sweet body like Golden Monkey.