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This is the first loose leaf I’ve had in a long time. That’s kind of depressing! Anyway, we went to a coffee shop in downtown Charleston for breakfast this morning and they had a handful of loose Rishi teas. Of course, being morning and the fact that I am very predictable, I picked the Earl Grey.

As usual with this kind of situation, it wasn’t my optimal tasting conditions so I’m giving it a rating but I’m not sure if it reflects exactly rating I would give it under different circumstances. Basically, this was a pretty tasty Earl but it didn’t really stick out as particularly mind-blowing. I noticed the tea base as a bit different, and looking at the description now I see it was a Yunnan, which I tend to enjoy. It’s apparently a bit polarizing, probably because the bergamot is pretty strong, but as I’ve mentioned before a strong bergamot flavor doesn’t usually taste perfumy or musty to me. It started to get a tad bitter toward the bottom of the pot where the little bits of leaves had been steeping for a while (the glass infuser in the pot at the coffee shop had fairly large holes), but never so bad that I couldn’t finish it. A pretty decent Earl, would drink again.

This morning my stomach was feeling kind of ucky, but of course I didn’t have access to the lemon ginger teas I would usually drink in such a situation. The selection of Tazo bags in my hotel also didn’t include any with ginger, but I grabbed this one for the soothing spearmint in it.

Overall, not horrible. Not especially flavorful, but lightly minty and at least it soothed my discomfort. I’m out of that hotel now, so probably no more Tazo for a while, but it will still be a while before I’m back home. On it goes…

After three days of bagged Earl Grey it was really starting to wear on me. I’ve been trying to ration my sachets that I brought with me but today I had to bust out Paris. Mmm, I can’t wait to get back to my tea stash… I miss it so!

Yet another tea bag from today. I was intrigued by this one because I think I would like lotus tea but I have yet come across one. I would have preferred not a decaffinated green and not a teabag, but so it goes. I have no idea how hot my water was but it was probably too hot, and I steeped it some unknown but fairly short amount of time. I got some flavor out of it, and that definitely improved as it cooled, but I was definitely wanting more. It wasn’t bitter, just light and a bit floral. Unfortunately tea bag + paper cup is too much paper flavor for me in my tea, so that also doesn’t help the situation. Still, I definitely want to try more lotus scented teas in the future.

Still on the road, this time for another conference, which means a lot of tea slim pickings at the hotels. This morning I had a bag of this and it really wasn’t half bad. Sure, I wasn’t really paying close attention to it much, but I remember being pleasantly surprised. I like very bergamotty Earl as long as it doesn’t get super astringent and bitter, and this tea fits that profile. I guess the tea bag was pretty fresh, too, because I didn’t have problems with it being really weak like some people, nor did I have it get bitter on me. Yeah it wasn’t super exciting, but I’ve had way worse.

First, Happy New Year, all! Second, my notices page is broken and I can’t get to it… anyone else?

In another effort to stave off tea deprivation, I’m having a big mug of this tea this morning! I’m going to fly through the sachets I brought with me for this trip if I keep this up…

Yesterday I had a killer headache that I think probably came from a lack of any tea that day, so this morning I found the biggest mug I could and made a cup of this. Mmmm.

Hi Steepster! I miss you. Being incredibly busy and lots of travel isn’t really conducive to sitting down with a cup of tea. I’m back home at my parent’s house and I decided I wanted a cup of tea tonight. I brought some sachets of this with me, and it seemed appropriate. There’s no kettle in this house, and I’m not about to use the microwave, so boiling water in a pan it was. No clue how long I steeped it for, but it came out nicely anyway. I do love having the Harney sachets for traveling since they seem almost fool-proof under any conditions.