Juniper Ridge

This was an impulse buy at Whole Foods. A very calming, meditative tea. Reminds me of a really nice incense perfume—balsam, a very light floral, a feeling of clean. But not cleaning product, thankfully.

Bagged
Aroma when Dry: spicy, cool, earthy, herby
After water is first poured: spicy sweet sage, hints of mint
At end of first steep: bright sage notes, laced with mint
Tea liquor:
At end of steep: woody brown
Staple? Yes medicinally
Preferred time of day: as needed medicinally
Taste:
At first?: earthy,creamy,crisp, spicy sage woody notes, mint in close
As it cools?: notes open, layer, get thicker, creamier
Additives used (milk, honey, sugar etc)? No
Lingers? yes, mostly the earthy, silky sage notes

Second Steep (5 min)
At first: Earthy herbal water
As it cools: sage notes thicken into tea again

Third Steep (8min)
Earthy herbal water
Fourth Steep
Earthy herbal water

Not only did I want to try this one because of the SEASON but because I’m divvying my stash and paying some forward and will send the rest of this to Azzrian

I cold brewed this and it’s not too shabby cold, but I do like it even more hot!

See previous notes

This will be my last logged tea before leaving florida tomorrow for my cross-country road trip and move to Seattle, Washington!
Living in the Pacific Northwest has been my dream since visiting 2 years ago, and now it will be my home. 
My boyfriend and I are making the drive all the way from south Florida, and plan to stop in Roswell, NM, then the Grand Canyon, then California and Yosemite, and then most amazing of all, onto the Redwoods!! I will finally see them for real. I also cannot wait to see Oregon,  which I feel so connected to even though I’ve never been there.
My plan is to study the forests and determine my place in the environmental and forestry field. There is nothing I love more than the trees and forests, and I want to be near them always.

A friend of mine brought this tea over who funnily enough got it from a friend in Seattle, while the tea itself comes from Oregon. 
The magical scent of this tea alone immediately makes it the best tea ever. It is the tea to end all teas for me.
It smells like a forest, and burning a Frasier Fir candle at the same time transforms my room into one. I cannot wait to be in a real forest and to drink this tea among the trees.

What was even more special about my first time having this tea was that my favorite song ever came on my pandora while drinking it. The song is When I Grow Up by Fever Ray http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4F-CpE73o2M&feature=youtube_gdata_player
When I hear it, I understand why I am alive. I know where I want to be and what I want to do. 

I can drink this tea forever.
I can’t explain the tree flavor other than its lovely, and has a lemon-like concentrated end.
Its super calming.
I also feel a special energy from this tea. Sort of like when I’m sitting on the ground leaning against a tree, and I get this incredible relaxed and happy feeling in my back. Its hard to explain.

This is literally, my Cup of Tree. 

West coast!! here I come!!!!! Woohoo!!!!

This is a really soothing, nicely fragrant tea. It comes in tea bags, which I rarely use, but they don’t seem to detract at all from this tea. The mint is strong, but balanced with the sage. Naturally caffeine-free, it’s the perfect tea for evening relaxation.

This is very nice. The overall taste is very minty and crisp, but I also taste a hint of peppery warmth … not super spicy or anything, but just a hint of kick toward the tail. The sage gives a nice earthy tone to the cup. Very nice to curl up to as I am preparing to head to bed … it’s SO late! What am I doing up?

SIPDOWN – been drinking this nearly all day! :)

Backlogging this refreshing cup! Actually…I had two…see other notes :)

I forgot how much I like this…actually…I’m going to up the rating! I needed this after a crazy day! Whew! White Mint, Sage, Pine…lovely! I want to bathe in this!

Tasting this tea immediately reminded me of the scent from the juniper trees my parents would always buy as part of the Christmas tradition of decorating a ‘Christmas tree.’ While the taste of the tea is fairly mild and the aroma is unique, it does have one unpleasurable side effect: headaches. Never once have I prepared this tea and come away without a mild headache coupled with moderate unease – the kind you get when you’re sensitive to anti-histamines. If you can sample this tea without any ill effects, I’d say more power to you. For me, I can’t handle this particular brew.

Backlogging from a day or two ago. This is a delicious and unusual tea. It does have the expected “piney” or evergreen flavor, but it has a subtle sweetness that was unexpected. I would recommend shorter steeps or lower temps, since it got sort of sludgy on me.

This has an extreme pine needle and mint aroma before, during, and after infusion. It’s an orangish-gray-brown color.

The taste is pretty good…mostly mint…a little bit of something else…so I am thinking that’s sage but it’s not the prominent flavor…the mint is. I like it!

This smells great! It’s like a combo of pine and orange or some kind of citrusy type aroma. Very springy and fresh! Post infusion aroma is pine/citrus/leafy/springy!

This is very nice! It’s fairly bold but smooth. There is a fresh-soap-like hint to it…not saying it tastes like soap…but it’s different/unique but refreshing and tasty. I like that much more than I thought I would. Mostly because it’s not as herbally-tasting as I thought it would be and more-so for the overall aroma…perhaps Aromatherapy! Ahhhh!

OH MY what a night I had last night! My coworker gave me some of this tea, and my husband and I had it last night. As I sipped the herbaceous and slightly menthol tisane, I grew very sleepy. I instantly fell asleep once I went to bed, and had the most vivid, intense, insane, technicolor dreams of my life!!!!!!!! I actually shot up in the middle of the night, woke my husband, and asked him if he was having the dreams of the century! He said, “No.” and went back to sleep! I followed him, and continued to dream, dream, dream!

When I woke up I looked in my herb books, but none of them recommended sage for dreaming. I guess I am my own special snowflake in this regard, because I never experienced anything like this! It did say that it was good for headaches – my husband had one last night, and I asked him if it felt better, and he said that it did!

I had one bag left over, and gave it to my other coworker! I am in no rush to go through that again!

No notes yet.

Thank you to Jaime for sending me some of this tea in my Secret Santa package!

This tisane smells like outside! Here in the Pacific Northwest we are surrounded by Douglas Fir trees, so I wasn’t surprised to read learn the Douglas Fir Tips in this were harvested from the Pacific Northwest (as well as Northern California).

I don’t think I’ve ever tasted a tisane made from pine trees before… this is a first for me. It is surprisingly good! It has a lemony taste to it. It also has a mint-like taste to it that isn’t quite mint. Like someone was trying to recreate the taste of peppermint and almost got there. It has a very crisp, clean and invigorating taste to it that tastes the way the air feels when we go for a hike in the forests of the gorge.

I like this a lot more than I thought I would! Thanks again, Jaime!

I chose this one for Afternoon Throat Soothing. If you are going to be sick around the holidays, why not drink pine needles!!!? :) It is doing the job admirably. I love the lemony gentle pine flavor. I plan to steep this one until I leave for the day, because something warm for my throat is making all the difference.

De-cupboarding the last of this that I got from Jaime. This seemed like the best time to do it. We – my brother and I – just put up the Christmas tree (well, actually, it was all him), but I did the brewing of this. However, I hogged the Santa Claus mug. Its just as foresty, minty, and Christmas-like as I remembered the first time. Perfect time o’ year for this.

I’m freezing today, and already drank up my allotment of caffeine. A friend that I work with gave me two of these little bags of tisane, so I thought today would be the day to try errr, pine needles!

Well I’ll be – it’s really good! It definitely tastes like a pine tree – sort of menthol-y but not quite menthol-y and lemony but not quite lemony and smoky but not quite smoky! It tastes like Winter. It’s oddly soothing. It’s making me very happy that my work friend thought of me and shared some with me :)

I took the bag out after 3 minutes, and I think it will be a pleasant resteep! I’ll let you know later because we are having a fire drill!

EDIT: back from fire drill! It makes a nice second steep, but the first is the best one with all the Winter Magic in it.

Thank you so much for turning me onto this tea! I grew up in oregon too, but i never would have guessed douglas fir would taste light and lemony like this. The box says there’s nothing in here but real doug fir needles – so earthy, lemony and my favorite part? when i brew it up I let it steep in the tea pot, and my whole house smells like a forest!

I thought it a good time to taste some Douglas Fir tea. Being from Oregon, we’re nowhere near short of Douglas Firs… but I haven’t tried it in tea form. Thanks to Jaime – a fellow Steepster pal – I was able to finally try some.

And it tastes like Oregon. And Christmas. I guess I would have a different opinion if this weren’t the verge of the holiday season. But…it’s late, and it’s Winter. And…well…I loved this pine-tasting shtuff. There ya go.

I found this “tea” at a health foods store in Louisville, Ky. I was looking for something different, and can you get much different than drinking a tea made from fir trees?

There are no brewing suggestions on the box, nor on the company’s website. So I tried it out for 5 minutes with boiling water.

Have you ever had a real, live Christmas tree in your home? This tea smells just like a Christmas tree, but with a little lemony edge.

The taste is very earthy, deeper and thicker than a nutty green tea; you can definitely taste the tree. There’s also a taste similar to lemon verbena.

Overall, I was pleasantly surprised at how good this tea is. I don’t know if it will become one of my staples, but it won’t be sitting in the cabinet forever, either.