THE O DOR

This is the famous tomato tea, which I have been intrigued by for ages and never been able to find on stock even in places which usually have it on stock – who knew that tomato tea sold out? Ysaurella came to the rescue and sent me this sample and I could (finally!) try it. Thank you, Ysaurella!

This is a very unexpected tea : flavoured darjeeling, with tomato and lemon. Recently I was talking of vegetables which fruits (tomato, pumpkins, peppers, avocados, etc) and vegetables which are fruits (rhubarb). Tomato is indeed a fruit, in my country a popular jam is made with tomatoes and I know someone who snacks on tomatoes as if they were apples (or carrots, now I think of it). So of course, tomato should have a chance to be something more. And it is very typical of Thé-o-dor teas that they experiment with it (and also typical that they could make it work).

I am not usually a fan of darjeeling and apart from Arya Rose d´Himalaya I do not recall ever having a flavoured darjeeling. I was very very careful brewing this, water was perhaps a smidgeon too cold, and used a timer for 2 and a half minutes. It was still a bit astringent, though IMO a desirable level of astringent for the flavours – but this is going to be indeed a tricky tricky tea.

The dry leaf is beautiful, and smells of hay-ish tea, lemon and tomato with the lemon being more noticeable than the tomato. While brewing the scent changes, the ripe tomato becomes the predominant flavour and I worried I was going to like this after all. The liquour thankfully has a more subdued, less liquid somehow (oh the irony), tomato note, lemon becames again noticeable. The non-verbal parts of my brain like it and do not care what it is. The verbal ones are still trying to figure out how came this works, but works indeed.

This is the strangest tea I ever tried, and amazingly it is good. It tastes not like an experiment or something meant to just shock, but well, it tastes perfectly finished, an interesting very eccentric tea which is so smart.

I just got a very nice surprise with this tea – expectations are funny things! Ysaurella had kindly sent me a sample, and just last night she had reviewed it, and led me to expect more lavender. She in fact compares it to another lavender tea I also had, Gryphon´s Earl Grey Lavender (a very kind sample as well, this time from LaFleurBleue). And for once Ysaurella and I have diverging opinions – I prefer Mademoiselle and find it less lavender-ish.

I confess I might have mistreated this when brewing, and did not pay too much attention to how long it steeped. I think it might have steeped too long or too hot, it has a small hint of astringency but one which seems to bring out the bergamot. I get the lavender only as a background soothing things. The bergamot is a great bergamot and the base tea just right. Love it, it might be the one lavender earl grey for me.

PS – maybe it is water alchemy? I notice bergamot teas seem to react so differently to different tap waters! Though with my tap water usually it´s violent rebellion not improving alchemy.

Another Earl Grey ! I love Earl Greys ! This one is so beautiful with lavender petals mixed in the blend and it smells soooooo citrus incredibly citrus, not very lavender.

Let’s say right now : it won’t be my staple Earl grey.
I prefered the lavender Earl grey by Gryphon Tea company.Having said that this is a lovely tea : the tea base is very nice, the bergamot is nicely blended – my “concern” is more on the lavender side, it was too much for me- it’s not overpowering but a little to much for my taste.
Anyway I cannot reproach this tea to have too much lavender…this is the purpose of Mademoiselle ! I was just expecting maybe more bergamot rather than lavender, thats’ all.
Probably just a question of taste, really because this is a great blend as most of the Theodor teas :)

ok, I think I have now in cupboard a lot of Vanilla teas : vanilles des îles (MF) Phénix (MF) and this one now.

On my packet (sent by Theodor shop on line) it was requested to brew it at 85°c so did I and to do a quite quick steep (3 minutes) so did I too, I am not a tea rebel !

To me Celebration is really much more on the vanilla side rather than on the chocolate side – and this is a brilliant vanilla (oh joy !)

The tea base is so delicious, so smooth, so mellow, there is none bitterness, none astringency here.
I can get the hazelnut without problem, a rich hazelnut.
I get much of the malty chocolatey notes in the liquor scent but not that much in the beverage itself except in the aftertaste.

hummmm c’est trop bon, j’adooooore !

First : I updated the tea description as it was false, the previous description was the Inachevée de Constantinople one ! So I can understand why Keemun note was mentioning he cannot find almond and peppermint, there is none in this tea.
Héritage d’Istanbul is clearly a flowery tea on a double tea base : green and black.

I steeped it 3 minutes at 75°c as requested by Theodor, it sounds low but it was really ok because I can still detect a hint of bitterness.Very light but there.

The way the flowers comes is really lovely, very smooth : jasmin, lotus with a peppery note, this is pleasant and elegant.

I am not bewitched by this tea, it’s pleasant but even if I’ll keep exploring it a little, I don’t think I’ll rebuy it.

I may be a nice iced-tea as well.

Thank you cteresa for sharing some of this lovely tea with me.

The mix of orange flowers with the dark assam is first very lovely and the scent is peppery and fruity.

Once steeped, the scent of the liquor is mainly peppery, spicy.
Theodor requests not steeping it too long (3 mn) as it is an assam I strictly respected the advice.As well, this tea shouldn’t be brewed too hot, 85°c are really enough.
The taste is definitively spicy : pepper for sure, nutmeg (very present) and cinnamon but fruity as well with a very natural and pleasant orchard peach.

This is a fantastic tea, very original but not original to be original only : not something stupid like creating a fish and marmelade tea! Original to reveal spicy flavours working perfectly with a lovely peach, really.

This is a tea who works on the same basis as Mandalay from Mariage Frères, I do agree with cteresa, the spices are the honour guests in these 2 teas and without these guests the ambiance would be so annoying ! They are totally different, as Mandalay is not fruity and works with Rose and Vanilla.
I love both, this one as Mandalay is a keeper.

Soooo this is going to sound a little weird, but… I made this one iced! Cold-brewed for about half a day, in preparation for a garden party tomorrow where we’ll be having iced tea (but I wanted to make some non-alcoholic iced tea too, for the non-drinkers…)

Thinking it would be interesting to offer a champagne-esque non-alcoholic tea to guests, I added barely a shot of fizzy lemonade to this and… what do you know, it tastes like a sweetened, floral champagne — what I imagine champagne tastes like for those who aren’t so susceptible to the kick of alcohol! (I definitely am!) If you get the chance, try this one cold, too!

Another tea brought back from Paris, specifically from the lovely little THÉ O DOR shop near the Trocadéro Metro stop. Out of the way and adorable, I was served by a very friendly lady who took the time to open lots of caddies of tea for me and chat to me about each one even though my French is a little rusty! She recommended me this, as I asked about flavoured white teas, and it smelt so decadent in the tin I just caved…

That said, I find that the leaves smell more like champagne than the brewed tea does! Maybe it’s because it’s fresher-smelling, and you don’t often drink champagne hot? It’s flowery and with an unmistakeably sharp fruit scent that seems to call the sharpness of alcohol. Light body, very fragrant, I find the champagne flavour is mostly in the aftertaste, which is really quite nice and subtle, builds up after a few sips. And strangely I can’t detect any one distinct floral flavour like rose or anything — that’s an indicator of how well-blended and harmonised the flavours in this are! I can’t find any specific details on the contents but there are yellow petals amongst the leaves.

Very smooth, only sliiiightly dry, which makes a nice change — most alcohol-flavoured teas I’ve tried were strong black ones. This goes down much more easily :) A nice tea, but not quite my own “Jour J” occasion tea!

Adding another note, because I can not believe I missed the nutmeg| Duh, it´s so definitely there as well, adds a background, some solidity to the peach and pepper.

I am liking this a little bit less this second time, but I think I brewed it too hot and well Assam is a tricky thing for me.

I made this a little bit too hot and I think a little bit too long – should have been 5 degrees (real degrees that is ;) Kelvin or celsius) and one minute less. It is, like a lot of Théodor teas, a forgiving tea. Though I think due to it being brewed hotter than my first attempts, I am finally getting a hint of the apple mentioned on tea description.

This is a masterfully well blended flavour tea – a great smooth green tea base and then a blended mix just in proportion of evocative flavours. No flavour is really dominant, this is not a one note or predominant note tea, but different flavours seem to work at different levels. The mint is the first thing, then the rose and apple and the date last. I do not detect the almond, but sweet almonds are not very strongly flavoured anyway.

A truly well done tea blend – and a very elegant one as well somehow.

PS – to add, it resteeps very well! Slightly different notes on resteep, a little bit more rose and more date and maybe the elusive almond, maybe not. I expected a lot more mint because the spent leaves smell so minty, but not so much on the taste. But a definite two steeps blend.

This is a tea which has been having rotten luck at my house. Whenever I make it I get distracted while doing it, and do not give it much enough attention. Ysaurella, to whom I had sent some in a swap did a tasting note before I ever got to it. Poor neglected tea!

Even today, I used water which was too cold – should have been a bit hotter. But even so, since the result was so nice, here goes. This is a tropical fruits oolong. Site says “pineapple, red passion fruits, mango and bergamot” and it is a nice touch to distinguish between the passion fruit type – I suppose their red is what we call purple passion fruit and which is indeed the better and pricier kind of passion fruit (green passion fruit grows better in our climate, it´s the only one which will grown on the mainland and produces tons more but is just not nearly as nice).

The oolong is not too dark, not too green, not too large, not too small – and not too noticeable underneath the fruit. There are some filler petals – rose and something else. There is bergamot in this tea but it might possibly be the most subtle use of bergamot I ever noticed (of course, uses of bergamot I never noticed would be more subtle even ;). For me the main note is passion fruit, with a touch of bergamot second and only then mango and then I take on faith there is pineapple. It´s fruity, smooth, and I think it would be delightful cold. I love passion fruit with its inherent tartness and funny how the bergamot seems to amplify it.

Ok, I think I have found the diabolical twin of Wedding Impérial :it’s a capricious tea…. grrrr This is my THIRD steep already and I have the eyes focused on the clock.
I’ll stop at 2 minutes, not more !
However we should use a very small amount of loose leaf otherwise it turns bitter.
Awwwww yes ! 2 minutes are fine !

Let’s back to the beginning : Cocotte is a tea with tomatoes, I would say flowering tomatoes and tomatoes + lemon on a darjeeling base.
The dry leaf is admirable because of course very original and because it smells like a garden of tomatoes and fresh GOOD tomatoes (I mention good because often now there are just stupid tomatoes on the market, without any taste (bref des tomates franchement dégueulasses- no other way to say :) ) – These tomatoes are tomatoes.
I was hesitant about how to prepare this tea especially because normally I add a rock of brown crystal sugar and with this kind of flavour, I was unsure.
Anyway Tomato is a fruit and gets naturally sugar so I finally added my rock of sugar.
After my brewing adventures, I have to say 2 min are perfect for me, the tea is just amazing, delicious and so original.A slight astringency remains but tolerable.It tastes like fresh tomatoes with a flowery taste and a hint of lemon.

I think I need to continue to play around this tea because maybe the tea base is not my favorite and it may count in the way I would prepare the tea next time (by a potential colder brew) but really I am happy to have bought this tea.

I won’t rate it right now because I may steep it too long (5 minutes) and it is a little bit astringent and bitter.
Will try with 3 min but having said that I am sure I will love it asap I’ll get a correct brewing because even with astringency and bitterness, it is wonderful !

Thé-o-dor is a brand which has some interesting multiple takes on the same “ideas” – for example Adèle H and Mélange de Galice are both black teas with peach and are totally totally different. If you check the brand´s description of this Celebration it is:

CELEBRATION
Flavoured black tea with major notes of chocolate, vanilla and hazelnuts

as compared to their Thé du Loup

THE DU LOUP
Flavoured black tea with major notes of hazelnuts and notes of chocolate.

I had and finished and loved to pieces Thé du Loup. But it was sold out, and I was advised this instead and OK, I will try it.

This tea smells incredible – like a rich thick dark chocolate mousse drenched in Frangelico and yeah, a little bit of vanilla as well. It is very rich in little cocoa pieces, cocoa husks I think and I think there might be vanilla bean pieces in there as well – when brewing this up keep in mind to up the dose a bit, since the cooca husks will take some of the space of the tea itself.

Brewing it, following their 95 º advice with some trepidation but being unintentionally careless with time (they advise 3 minutes, it was closer to 4, and let´s not check which side of 4 minutes it was) this is an extraordinarily smooth tea. No bitterness or roughness at all, a very smooth base. It tastes less potent than what it smells, but the scent is so rich, so evocative I am not sure any tea could really live up to it. It is more about the chocolate than the hazelnut, and the hazelnut is almost liquorish, sweeter than in Thé du Loup.

I think when comparing similar teas of a similar quality, the first one tried always has an advantages, we are always comparing the second to the first, which somehow got canon status due to having been first. Maybe that is why I prefer Thé du Loup, do not know for sure. If you are likely to prefer something sweeter, then this; if you would prefer something “drier”, then Thé du Loup.

And I am amazed at how the same company does two very good flavoured teas with almost the same flavourings but which manage to have quite different personalities (and wonderfully smooth but different bases).

This one is a part of my Theodor order arrived on Saturday.
I ordered it because I love la galette des rois ! The Epiphany cake (do you call this a Twelfth-Night pancake or cake in English ?)
This is a black tea flavoured with marzipan.
The dry leaf scent is absolutely fantastic, this is an amaretto tea ! and the colours are so beautiful : red and orange small petals of flowers are mixed with a beautiful dark tea.
I was wondering if the taste would be as nice as the scent…the liquor scent is very promising and taking the first sip…release ! yes!!!!! it’s so good ! this is a liquid marzipan, with the perfect taste of a bitter almond.
The tea base is really smooth and mellow, no bitterness at all, no astringency, it’s a so sweet tea.
You know I am a sucker for almond teas…so it may be because I love so much almonds that I love it so much but I do really think this is blended perfectly with a wonderful and ideal tea base (I would like to know what it is…a Keemun maybe ?)
I am so happy to have bought 100g of this one !

At the very first sip, I didn’t like this tea.No personnality at all. I found this weird, as even if I don’t have a very large experience with Theodor, I know I never found any of their tea bad.
I decided to let the cup cooling a little and retried.
This is really better even if probably this oolong tea base is light bodied.
Flavours of mango and exotic fruits are not too strong and absolutely natural.
Tea base and flavours are working perfectly together. Having said that I need to give a precision : mango and exotic fruits are not my favourite fruits so my rating can be affected by my preferences.
This tea is really more than decent, it’s a good light tea for an afternoon but it wouldn’t be one of my staples.
I think it could be drank in the evening as well.

Thank you so much for sharing some of your Theodor order and this tea with me cteresa

I am lucky today, when I opened my mailbox I have seen a lot of advertising papers and behind Santa Claus ! not himself but he took the appearance of the Postman and left for me : my Theodor tea order, cteresa’s swap envelope and Terri Harplady’s second swap box !
Yes !!!! Now I am embarrassed because I have so much teas I cannot decide which to begin by.

So after one hour turning around my teas,I finally decided to drink this one first.

The dry leaf scent is really magic even if quite herbal, of course it’s a green tea…not so surprising- the flavours scents are lovely and I get first a dominant apple and a supportive rose .
I brewed it as required on my bag (handwritten notes behind the bag-I love handwritten notes even on tea bags): 85°C I found this a little weird for a green I generally never give much than 80° but decided to follow the instructions.
The liquor is really beautiful, a lovely pale green almost yellow.
There is NO astringency neither bitterness (release! I am so picky with green teas)
The green tea base is nice and mellow (yes, a mellow green tea…hurray it exists !)
The flavours are really mixed :apples, dates, rose, peppermint for sure. I am so sorry for not being able to taste almond, especially because I love so much almond teas.
For sure this tea reminds Orient as constantinople is the muse. It makes me think to Thé du Hammam (green tea base, rose and dates) but it is different, less fruity, more grave somehow.

While cooling apple and rose continue to dominate.

Thanks to cteresa for the sample – my first green mate/maté (in memory, at any rate!) I drank this a few days ago, but didn’t get a chance to make a note at the time. I liked it! I didn’t immediately become fired with the desire to find more mate teas and become one with them, but I liked the flavouring a lot and it all worked together well. Big fan of lemongrass here.

Funny thing though – I’d caffeinated up with my usual two strong cups of afternoon black tea before drinking this, and about 30 minutes later, was hit by a wave of sleepiness I found hard to fight. What was that about?

I have right now, two different rooibos mixes from two of my three favorite rooibos providers, both sultry mixes named in hommage to southern islands – this Baya which is supposed to evoke Île de Réunion, and Mariage Fréres´ Surabaya a hommage to Java. And suraBAYA and Baya, get it?

And they are totally different teas, while both matching the description of sultry rooibos. I made separate, previous tasting notes about Surabaya, just mentioning it because the coincidence is funny.

This Baya I had smelled but not had a chance to buy (strategic decision of picking other teas) a few months ago, and I had promised myself to get it next possible chance. It got here, and it was slightly different than remembered. The official word is that it is rooibos with vanilla, ylang ylang, nutmeg, jasmine. The more poetical descriptions of it also mention pepper and passion fruit. Pepper is not particularly noticeable at any level but indeed there is a fruity note which seemed pineapply-or-passion fruity (more likely) to me.

This was, to my tastebuds, sublime. Very intensely flavoured, maybe a rooibos for people who do not like rooibos, and an unlikely but unbelievably good mix of flavours. And perhaps more strangely, the flavours change in the mouth, there is a fruity like smell which you can feel in the front of the mouth/tongue, but as you swallow there is a vanilla-ylang sweetness at the back of the tongue and then also that touch of the nutmeg. A very interesting sensory experience, this tea seems to work at different levels. I absolutely loved it – the vanilla is strongly there and bourbon (reunion? how appropriate) vanilla, and the touch of ylang is a delicious addition to it. Jasmine is not too strong, but just a hint, melds with the fruitiness of the passion fruit (surely there is some?) and then a touch of something deeper which is quite probably the nutmeg. And a good, smooth (nearly undetectable except in that structural body) rooibos underneath.

I am not sure I love this better than Carpe Diem, another huge favorite Theodor rooibos – let´s see with acquaintance. I do love it better than Marabout which was also an impressive rooibos mix.

Ah, anecdotal, but this seemed to have a very efficient and pleasant digestive-help effect.

I just managed to order (with difficulty and problems sadly!) some new Thé-ô-dor teas from a local retailer. Cocotte, the famous tomato darjeeling was on my wishlist but out of stock. This was instead a rather random pick, but wow this is unexpectedly filling the wish for a strange surprising tea.

I would probably not have picked it if I had smelled it before buying. It smells like pepper, black pepper, with peach and some unidentifiable flowers and just a bit strange somehow. It brews slightly different, less flowery, all (to me, at this first acquaintance) just tea, peach and black pepper. It´s a complete (but excellent) taste dissonance to have the unmistakable strong black pepper with the peach, but it was coup de foudre, love at first sight (or first cup). That pepper and fruit, it somehow works (for me. I suspect this will not be everybody´s cup of tea). I think this is the cure to me being tired of nice polite flavoured teas which seem samey-samey and forgettable. No way anybody could confuse this flavoured tea with any other flavoured tea.

The base is lovely, smooth but strong Assam. I am reminded, as I was by Mandalay, that chai is not just any tea with spices. This, like Mandalay, is a tea where a spice is essential, but without being in any way a chai.

I am slightly in love with this tea, unexpectedly. So lovely.

Now it´s getting hot I have been trying different ways to brew this up. This taste note is a DO NOT DO AS I JUST DID warning.

I liked this brewed hot. I wanted to try a cold brew, which I just did – 4 grams of tea (which is a lot of volume, I weighted it and surprised myself at how much it was), half a liter of cold water left in the fridge overnight and then strained. And it turns out: bitter. Either it was much too long or too much tea.

I get some citrus yes, but I get an acrid bitterness mostly which is not pleasant. I did not use sweetener and not sure it would have improved it anyway, it´s not tartness which often can be rescued and improved by sugar, it was a different type of bitterness.

Weirdly enough, the older the tea (strained) got the more bitter it seemed to me. Despite that, I did drink almost all of it – I wanted to test if it was really that bitter and try to figure out where I went wrong. And as an energizer it did its usual work! A different type of wake me up than coffee or tea, a smoother one IMO.

Thanks cteresa for sending this one my way.

There is certainly that signature rooibos medicinal taste here, but it’s not the worst I’ve had. The baked apple I’m getting as well. I’m not so sure about the toffee, though there is a subtle sweetness to it that could be the toffee? Overall a smooth tea, even with that rooibos taste!

I’m glad I got the chance to try this one out :)

A received a sample of this from Cteresa, thank you very much!.

Although this is arguably the best peach flavored black tea I’ve ever had, it still isn’t a favorite for me.

The black tea base is mellow and rather neutral. On the first steep the peach dominates nearly entirely. The vanilla notes stay firmly in the background, way back… The first steep is a bit too fresh peachy fruity to my taste. On the second steep the peach fades a bit so that the vanilla becomes more prominent. Due to that I actually like the second steep better (and that’s a first for me :-)).

Apparently peaches aren’t that much my thing or rather I prefer berries & vanilla to peaches & vanilla. As I do like peaches in itself, I think I’ll be looking to peaches in a more tropical setting next.

oh, wow, this is maybe the fruitiest green tea I ever had. It smells amazing though I worried it might be “too much”, like those scented pens or stationery when I was a kid. Brewed up it smells slightly different and at first sip it´s not cloying, but a very strong taste of peaches and melon.

I had to go check on the Theodor website what were the notes of this – the peach and melon are obvious and far stronger than everything else, though I think in retrospect there is a hint of the passion fruit. The website specifies it is vine peach which vindicates my nose, I did think it was vine peach. The melon is the dominant note here, though interestingly it seems to spread, move to the forefront as it cools – when I poured the hot water the peach was more obvious and also more present at first sip, then it started to get more in the background with each cooler sip. It´s still there on the last lukewarm sips but just as a background.

This is just lovely. I think this would make an excellent (though probably quite expensive) ice tea. And it´s very summery as well, a great tea to have, hot or cold, on a warm day (is spring finally here? cross fingers!). While Mélange de Galice, another peach Theodor tea, was a sort of summer dreaming tea to have in the darkest of winter, Pêché Mignon is a summery tea to have when summer is coming – or maybe that is just me being fancy.

This is going on the to-buy list for sure, though in practical terms, it might not happen anytime soon.

PS – second steep, using a little hotter water, a bit less water and a slightly longer steep also good. But less intense melon and more noticeable peach. Not sure peach is stronger actually, I think it is just that by the melon being more toned down you notice the vine peach more.