Tea Embassy

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So good. Really quite strongly sweet.

Mmmm… this was very good. Definitely a top quality Yunnan.

Thanks Melanie for the sample!

Sipdown, 174. I got tired of this one fairly quickly today. I think in some cases teas with actual nuts in them sit with me poorly; I enjoy them initially while drinking but after a full cup my stomach starts to feel off. Maybe it’s the nut oils coming out or something. I do love a nut flavored tea, but I think it has to be all flavoring and no nuts for me. Oh well.

Well the off taste of my lips is fading so I decided to try this one today. I got this in a swap with PositiviTEA, thanks!

The dry leaf smells almondy and coconutty, but in kind of a generic way. I’ve had almond greens and coconut greens but never an almond coconut green! Steeped, this smells more coconutty than almondy, and that plays out in the flavor as well. I’m really not getting hardly any almond from this, though I suppose there is some almond sweetness in the background. The green tea is kind of generic but inoffensive. Overally this is decently tasty but I get more coconut macaroon from it than almond cookie.

As an aside, I think I am going to overhaul my tea ratings. Most things will be dropped by about 10 points probably because I think my ratings skew high. 70-79 will now be the range for decent teas that are pretty tasty but not too special. Thankfully if you adjust the ratings on the ratings page it doesn’t make all your old notes pop to the top of the dashboard, unlike changing the rating by editing the tasting note.

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I’m doing this one from memory, as I’ve been so stupid to accidentally lock the drawer of my desk at work. As you may guess, I don’t have a key to open it and the sample of Wedding Cake rooibos I received from Dustin is in it. Darn! Hopefully someone will be able to open the lock next week.

Anyway as Dustin I find the tea’s to be similar in that they both have a powerful almond smell and flavor. I think because the rooibos in itself is sweeter, it blends more into the mix than the green tea base of Almond Cookie, which is a pity. Although a very good rooibos, it isn’t as interesting as the Almond Cookie Green in my opinion.

I’m not really sure how I could have been so stupid, but I posted this note accidentally with Amaretto of Davids Tea.

I received a generous sample of this tea from Dustin. Thanks so much!

This tea smells very amaretto-y, a smell I find infinitely comforting. Although the taste also is rather amaretto-y or almondy, it isn’t over the top. Generally I’d associate almond and amaretto flavors with black tea bases. I would have thought a green tea base too delicate to carry such a flavor. In reality that doesn’t pose a problem. Actually the green tea base provides a rather neutral base, due to which the almond/amaretto is more noticeable than it otherwise (probably) would have been, without tasting artificial (like some other fancy flavors).

PS: After relocating this tasting note, I’ve had a look at the ingredients. I wonder if I can actually discern between the taste of almond cookies and amaretto. They rather belong together. Anyway after reading the ingredients, I can imagine that what I perceived as amoretto-y is rather the combined flavors of almond and coconut. After all it’s very long ago that I’ve had amaretto and then I’ve never had it by itself, but always with either almond cookies or stratiatella ice crème.

This is a brilliant night-time herbal that is completely free of chamomile! Almost as good as T2’s Sleep Tight.

I bought this today on a whim from West Point Market… SO GLAD I DID. I am a Earl Grey freak and this one is amazing. It has a blend of white tea and black tea and healthy dose of bergamot. Another tea to add to my ‘must have in the cupboard’ list.

I LOVE jasmine tea and this tea in particular has a sentimental spot in my heart. Years ago there was an amazing guy I had casually mentioned my love of jasmine tea to. Being the thoughtful man that he was, he picked out a bag of this jasmine tea for me on a visit to the Tea Embassy and gave it to me on our first date. I had forgotten that I had said anything about it and was impressed that he made note of such a small detail in our conversations. I remember that tea tasting better than any other jasmine I had experienced. It was clear and crisp and strong. Such a pure jasmine taste and I believe it was my first loose leaf tea experience too!

Recently I went to the Tea Embassy and picked out a bag of that same tea. I took it back to the home I share with that man, who I still think is just as amazing (if not more) and the family we now have. I’m excited to try that tea and see if it holds up to my memories of it.

When I open the bag, the dry tea has such a strong jasmine smell to it almost like I’m sticking my nose in a flowering jasmine bush! The instructions on the the bag say to steep for 2-5 minutes and I did only two for the first steep. Wow, it’s still just as bright and crisp as I remember. I can’t taste any tea, just jasmine. It almost borders on the line of soapy in it’s intensity, but I have always like over the top floral flavors. It isn’t bitter like some jasmine teas I have had, but now days I’m much more careful and aware of over steeping unless I have to walk away from my steeper for a while (which is what happened on the second steeping). Second steeping was a little tongue puckering in it’s intensity, but adding cream and sugar made it an enjoyable drink again. I adore this tea and am glad to be reunited with it! To me, this tea is love.

I am plowing through this 2oz bag I got! It smells very similar to the Tea Embassy’s Almond Cookies Green tea, which is also being drunk at record speed. Both have a powerful almond and coconut smell and that strong smell carries through to strong flavor once brewed. Both are quite delicious with this one being non caffeinated! I didn’t understand why it was called Wedding Cake until I went to a friends wedding the other day and had a slice of cake. I was floored by how similar the cake tasted to the tea! My friend said it’s vanilla cake with almond frosting. It was delicious, just like this tea. The rooibos is a bit drying as it tends to be, but the fantastic taste distracts me from that most of the time. I think I’ll make a permanent spot in my cupboard for it in the non caffeinated section.

Definitely not a fan of the strongly flavored fruit teas.

I LOVE THIS TEA!

I first tried this at the Smith-Byrd Tea House in Prattville, Alabama. They have this wonderful endless tea policy! The tea pots are only two cup pots, but you can get unlimited pots of tea and you can ask for a different flavor whenever you like! They said that this is so you can try (and hopefully buy!) several different teas, and that is exactly what I did! But I digress.
This tea is delicious! To me, it tastes exactly like an almond cookie, almost like marzipan! My mother on the other hand thought that it tasted more like almond extract. This is a very sweet tea. I needs no sweeteners. The texture of this tea is incredible as well. The flavor is so full and bold that I feel like I am actually eating a cookie! I love it! Some people may think that this tea is too sweet, but I think it is perfect!

This tea is also good for a few re-steepings. I believe I have re-steeped it two times without it loosing flavor, but generally I only re-steep it once because sometimes the green tea gets a little bitter. Over all, this is a fabulous tea!

A most superb Oolong which is subtle yet a distinctive flavor and fragrance.

This tea smells fantastic in the bag! I wanted to grab a spoon and chow down. I got a lot of almond and a little coconut when I sniffed it. I may have brewed it too long, or maybe it was a combination of what I had just eaten, but the first couple sips tasted bitter. A few more sips into it as I was deciding if I should dump it and try brewing again, it started to taste less bitter. I added a little sugar and a few sips later it is tasting pretty smooth. The almond and coconut go together so perfectly that it’s a little hard to pick them out individually in each sip. I find the aftertaste has a slight bitterness to it that is pleasant with coconut on the end. True to it’s name, it is much like an almond cookie and is delicious to the last sip. I may have found a new almond tea love!

Note: Their website currently calls this just “Hao Ya A” but when I got the package of it, it is labeled “Guangxi Hao Ya A.” It’s description is that it is their highest quality of Keemun.

A good Keemun is one of my favorite black teas. But I am very particular about my Keemuns. I have sampled many supplier’s Keemuns, from standard grades on up thru 2nd and 1st grades, to Hao Ya A and B grades. I find that while high grades typically look more refined and have a more uniform leaf size, usually a small size, it doesn’t mean their flavor is always superior in my opinion.

A really good Keemun has that unique flavoring of a hint of smokiness mixed with pine/oak nuances and some hints of fruit notes, followed by some notes of chocolate. It’s hard to describe but once you take a good one, I find it not replicated in any other tea.

I pit this particular Keemun Hao Ya A against 3 other Keemuns I found enjoyable from previous samplings in a blind taste test which I and my wife took part in. I equalized all the parameters, side-by-side cups of equal size, same hot water source, equal steep timing, equal sweetener (sugar, I’m not a hard-core tea drinker of black teas who omits sweeteners). This tea came out as our number 1 pick of the 4 Keemuns. It’s leaf quality was not notch and it’s flavor profile was really very good. This is one I could recommend fully to those who love a really good cup of Keemun.

I went for a pint of this today with a bowl of cereal (in almond milk) and…more chocolate cake. The stuff looks like but packs quite a wallop still in the caffeine department. It’s a gold-tipped Yunnan hong cha to the core.

I don’t know if I got a bad batch of this tea or what, but it barely tastes like anything at all, even when I adjusted the steeping time. Unfortunately, I was disappointed.

THANK YOU TEA EMBASSY FOR SENDING ME THIS SAMPLE! (more like full size bag lol..yay!)

But awe man. I must’ve effed this up a few different ways. I either over-steeped, over-steeped with too much tea to not enough water, or had the water too hot. Cause I think I scorched it and it went bitter bitter bitter. :( Trying again later tonight, but you know what? It was still drinkable after what I did lol, so that tells me its still a pretty damn good blend.

Our favorite!

It’s been awhile since I’ve had a Zhen Qu gold-tipped Yunnan. The last one I tried was – dare I say it? – a year ago. That one was sheer and utter perfection. This one was…almost perfect. With a liquor color like leather and a taste like honey and cream, how could it not be close to perfect? Hard to pinpoint what it was missing, but it wasn’t much. Truly an excellent Yunnan Gold.

Full Review: Pending on www.teaviews.com

One of the most delicious teas I’ve ever had. I love the marzipan and the creamy texture. It’s sweet but not too sweet. I often want green tea with a little more kick, so the mate is perfect. The coconut is subtle and mixes well with the cherry. I brew it a little on the weaker side so it’s more soothing.

I’ve enjoyed this tea many times.