Dinosara

Today was an early morning and it’s going to be a long day. It’s also going to be a day mostly without tea… how am I going to survive?!

I decided to take this one on the go with me this morning sine it’s such a fortifying tea. Doesnt mean I feel awake right now, but at least the tea is tasty. This is quickly becoming my go-to Earl, which is saying something for me because I have so many of them. This one really stands out from the others in a good way. More than that, although I love plain Earl Greys I don’t often find myself reaching for them out of my own cupboard, I guess because none of them really grabbed me. But this one I look at the pouch and think, “I want that tea!” A sure sign of a keeper.

I thought I would try these oolongs again before I go to China to get a reminder of their flavors, and what I might want to look out for. I know I’m going to be completely overwhelmed, so I’m trying to restrict the actual kinds of teas that I will specifically look for while I’m there. I’m hoping I can also discover a some teas I’ve never heard of while I’m there, so keeping all the varieties straight in my head is going to be tough. :)

This is a nicely balanced floral and vegetal oolong. It’s got a smooth texture throughout the sip, and then there’s a light astringency and a sweetness to the aftertaste. I don’t find this one particularly creamy or buttery in flavor this time. It’s light and fresh and floral and pretty springy, which is appropriate for the warm, lovely weather we’re having today.

Also, I am completely obsessed with the new Frozen Planet penguin livestream webcam. It’s of the penguin enclosure at Sea World San Diego, and there are a lot of penguins in there! They are hilarious, and I love watching them while I’m working. My favorites are the Adelie and Gentoo penguins. Fortunately my screen is big enough that I can have a small window with them open at all times.

There is something that is just so caramelly and sweet about this blend. Maybe it’s the tea base, maybe it’s the red fruits flavoring that’s just really rich. This tea always surprises me because the leaf looks so… not inspiring of confidence. Tiny tiny pieces of tea that look like they belong in a tea bag. A lot of times those teas can get bitter (or just too strong for me) quickly because of all the surface area. But not this tea! I brewed it at four minutes this time, and there is not a hint of bitterness. I’m wondering if I shouldn’t use more leaf, though, because I could still go for a somewhat bolder flavor. Definitely enjoying this cup, though!

Another tea I have little to say about at this point. I love it, it’s one of my faves, and you can see other tasting notes to see why. Short story is that it’s chocolatey, almondy, caramelly, and has a nice black tea base that plays well with the flavors.

I feel like I’ve been leaning toward black teas lately, especially my favorite flavoreds, and today I realized that it might be because in a few weeks I will be in China and I subconciously think this will mean no more black tea. Of course it will likely not because I am going to try to pick up a couple teas including a gongfu black right when I get there so I can have them for my 3 week stay in Beijing. True, I won’t have flavored teas except for florals. I am glad I’m at a much better place in my tea journey than if I was taking this trip last year… at this time last year I didn’t like (nor was I interested in) any unflavored teas at all, really, and a trip to China would have just resulted in lots and lots of jasmine teas. Fortunately that’s no longer the case, and that’s definitely due to swaps on Steepster and Teavivres samples, which have been like a mini course in Chinese teas. Now my biggest problem is fitting it all in my luggage…

Dealing with idiocy this morning, and you know that means a nice, comforting, tasty tea. I love the combination of bergamot with red fruits, and when you add in vanilla and caramel? Yum. I’m really enjoying this one today, and it’s reminding me that I need to pick up samples of the rest of Kusmi’s bergamot-based blends.

Mmmm. I guess today is a day for old favorites or something. I haven’t felt like adventuring to a tea I hadn’t tried before. Just the smell of this tea steeping makes me think of Paris and the Dammann Freres shop. And of course of Laduree, where I buy my macarons (which reminds me, I still haven’t been to the Laduree in NYC! I can’t believe I forgot it was there).

Man, now I want to go to Paris.

The caramel notes in the Indian Nimbu this morning got me really thinking about this tea again. It’s obviously really made and impression on me! Not much more to say; still loving it.

I had this tea with lunch today, and it certainly was tasty. Having a tea with a meal is not the best time to suss out all the flavors, but I do think that the 1 minute steep time worked out for me well here. I used a fair amount of leaf (about 2 “perfect teaspoons” for a 12oz cup) and after 1 minute at first I thought it didn’t look like it possibly could have steeped long enough because it looked so pale, but the scent persueded me otherwise. Definitely nutty and lovely.

I don’t know why we always go birding on Sundays, it makes Mondays so much harder. It’s always so fun but sooo exhausting. This weekend it was because Saturday wasn’t a very pleasent day here.

I haven’t had this tea in quite a while so I thought I would try it out again. I’m not a big darjeeling person, but this tea is an exception. The bright lemony citrus really complements the base, and the caramel just sneaks up at the end of the sip, adding a sweetness and just making the whole thing pretty delicious. I think this darjeeling may appeal to me because the added caramel flavoring tends to recall a darker black base. Still really enjoying this one and it’s reminding me that I need to stop by the Harney store more often… this was a tea of the day there that I never would have chosen to sample on my own, but I didn’t say no to a free sample and was surprised by how much I liked it.

And then there were two (sachets, that is). I enjoyed a cup of tea this morning to get me going for the day, so now I have only two sachets left. Crazy!

In other news, the Williams Sonoma in our mall recently closed (sad face), and I found out when I was there today that a Teavana is opening in its place. My reaction was literally “aauuughhh Teavanaaaa!” At least I will be able to refill on Amandine Rose easily now. I am interested to see how this store plays out as far as the upselling goes.

I got another sample of this tea not too long ago from brandy3392, so I’m happy to be able to try it again. I think this was possibly the second-ever milk oolong I had had, the first being ATR’s, and so my experience was so limited that I’m not sure if I could really judge this one properly. After trying a bunch of milk oolongs I’ve never had one that has come close to ATR’s, probably because that one is actually an insane Tieguanyin, not a Jin Xuan or similar. I’m not sure if “Quangzhou” refers to the varietal or just the location of origin, because all I can find out about it is that it comes from the Wuyi Mountains. It’s a name of milk oolong that shows up at a lot, though.

Anyway, I steeped this one according to package directions this time, which was about 1-2 minutes longer than I normally would steep an oolong. The steeped tea smells floral, but also distinctly like buttery vegetables. And there’s definitely a milky creaminess there. I’m not sure I’m digging the four-minute steep and I would probably drop it back down… I tend to prefer my oolongs a little lighter steeped which doesn’t bring out the vegetal flavors as much. This tea is also fairly drying/astringent… I’m having a serious case of dry mouth right now! As the tea cools more and more of the buttery creamy flavors come out. I can see why people like this one but it’s not really for me, at least not in giant-cup-of-tea form… I will save the rest for my gaiwan and see how it fares in there.

I wanted to revisit this one and see if a second cup was consistantly as tasty as the first. I love the scent of the dry leaf on this one… the bergamot smells so sweet, not just bright and sharp.

Mmm, this is a great tea for bergamot fiends. Oh so bergamotty but not bitter or astringent. The bergamot is a nice blend of citrusy and floral, though today perhaps edging to the floral side of things… not a problem for me! The black tea base is rich and lovely and right up my alley. Looking back at my other tasting note, I think I added a bit more leaf than I did last time because I was on auto pilot… this tea only calls for 3/4 tsp per 6oz, so this cup was even stronger than usual! It is really strongly bergamotty, but still no bitterness to speak of. I should try to remember to keep the leaf amount lower for this one because I think then the base is more prominent and I like that balance a little more. Still, this may just be one of my favorite Earls.

Wow, this one is unpopular on Steepster. I didn’t expect that since it’s one of the Tea Spot’s signature blends and top sellers, but you can never tell. I received this as a free sample with my last Tea Spot order. This tea intrigued me because I love rhubarb, but I am not really a fan of strawberries in any form (including flavoring) other than fresh, so I wasn’t jumping to try it. But I get to anyway, I guess!

The dry leaf smells pretty candy-ish, but at least in a way that smells like the flavors it claims (sweet strawberry and tart rhubarb) instead of some generic fruit candy flavor. At first I thought of strawberries, but as I smelled it more I was more convinced of a rhubarb aroma. Steeped it smells like a pretty good blend of the two, with some underlying creamy notes. Some people are getting vanilla, but me, not so much… it actually reminds me more of these odd rhubarb and custard hard candies I bought in England one time.

The flavors remain pretty candy-ish and give the sensation of being sweet even if the tea itself is not sweet. I do get some of the fresh, slightly grassy, somewhat buttery dragonwell in the main part of the sip. The whole thing really does remind me of a strawberry-rhubarb pie when you cook down the fruit in sugar and it gets almost painfully sweet. All in all I enjoy it much more than most people here, though I won’t be needing to buy any more once I’m done with my sample.

I think I probably really bug Ricky here on Steepster because I’m always emailing him about merging duplicate entries, heh. This one happens to have two entries, and even though my pouch uses the other variant on the name (“Organic Cream of Earl Grey”) I chose this one because it has more entries. Well, they should be merged soon anyway.

This is the last of the three samples I bought at the shop last weekend. It smells really creamy, and it delivers. It’s possibly one of the creamiest EGC’s I’ve had, though it suffers a bit from the same faint, slightly pithy, bitter-citrus flavor that their plain Earl has. Not shocking, because that’s probably the base of this. The cream goes a long way to smoothing that out, but it’s not quite enough for me. Still, that is some super vanilla-y cream in there, with almost caramelly notes. Pretty tasty.

After I gave up on that last cup my mind started wandering, thinking about tea and tea shops, and it wandered right to Dammann Freres. Man, that place was amazing. My next thought was that I wanted one of their amazing teas right away. This tea contains some jasmine green tea, but it’s certianly not too jasminey… I am a little jasmined out after that last bomb.

I steeped this one a little hotter than I have in the past just to test it out at a temp in between black and green since it’s a black/green blend. I think it worked out well! No hints of bitterness or scalding of the green tea. I think there’s a bit more of the black tea base showing up this time, giving it a warmer low note to balance the fresh, fruity, floral notes from the rest of the tea. Ahh, DF, you always hit it just right.

When I was ordering tea from this company with my groupon, I wasn’t feeling super confident about their blends so I decided to spend part of it on this jasmine green because I thought, hey, at least that should be safe, right?

Apparently not. I knew going in from the photo that pearls these are not. I don’t know why you would have a plain jasmine green and call it “jasmine pearl”, but there you go. If I had looked more closely I would have noticed that the ingredients say green tea and “jasmine flavoring”, which may have been a tip-off. Most jasmine greens are referred to as just jasmine greens since the jasmine is added by drying the tea with jasmine petals, not adding flavoring to the tea once it’s dried. I mean, it could be a nomenclature thing but somehow I doubt it. In the pouch the jasmine smelled artificial and plasticy, and the steeped tea is not much better. Perfumy to the max. The two minute steep was apparently too much because there’s a slightly bitter taste to the whole thing. Perhaps a one minute steep would be better but somehow I doubt it because it’s pretty artificial overall. It’s not undrinkable, but I can’t imagine anyone who likes jasmine teas enjoying it (and those who don’t like them certainly wouldn’t!). Oh well, you live and learn.

When given the chance to sample a company’s Earl, I’ll always take it, so I grabbed a sample pouch of this tea as well when I was at the store. This one tends to have low ratings on Steepster because it is supposed to be super bergamotty… well we’ll see about that! I like a bergamotty tea as long as it’s deployed well. Sometimes excessive bergamot can mean astringent, bitter, pithy taste, but sometimes it’s just tasty.

I would say this one falls on the pretty tasty side of things. The bergamot is pretty strong, but it’s only a hint bitter (which comes out more as it cools) and it seems to play well with the base. As the cup is cooling down it’s really obvious that the bitter hint really is that bitterness that bergamot can impart sometimes because really, bergamot is a bitter citrus. Other than that, though, I think it’s a nice Earl for those who aren’t afraid of bergamot. I still think that Todd & Holland’s Double Bergamot is my favorite mega-bergamotty Earl, but I would drink this one again.

After the NYC Coffee and Tea Festival this weekend, the boyfriend and I went down to the Bleecker Street area to go to some record stores. And since we were so nearby… heh. My poor, long-suffering, non-tea-drinking boyfriend got dragged into the shop with me. My first time in the new NYC DavidsTeas! The sales people were almost absurdly chipper and friendly, greeting us the moment we walked in the door with samples. I looked around some but I’m still really on a tea-buying moratorium. Since I didn’t buy many teas at the festival I allowed myself to buy some of the prepackaged sample pouches since they were 3 for $5. This is one I picked up.

Upon opening the pouch there’s no doubt that this is mango tea, though the aroma is decidedly mango candy rather than fresh mango. I was surprised to see the steeping directions of 200°F for 5-7min because of the white tea base. I rarely steep any tea for 5 minutes unless it’s an herbal or I’m adding milk and sugar, but I took a deep breath and set the timer for 5 minutes. Steeped, it smells mango-y but also pretty orange-y, as well as some other nondescript fruits in there.

This is a super fruity tea. I wouldn’t say straight up mango as much as a tropical fruit salad. It’s sweet, it’s tart, it’s hard to tell there’s tea in it. It’s just getting tarter and tarter as it cools, and it’s a little tart for me for a non-sweetened, non-iced tea. It’s not bad really, it’s just not something I’m enjoying drinking much. Oh well, at least it was a small sample!

I added a sample of this tea with my last order from the Tea Spot, because why not? I’m always interested in various tieguanyins; you never know when a good one is going to unexpectly pop up somewhere.

The leaves of this one are somewhat loosely rolled and they don’t smell super inspiring, just green, genericly tea-ish, and a bit floral. Steeped up the leaves really wake up and become interesting. There are a lot more magnolia-ish floral notes here, as well as some buttery undertones. The flavor is pretty vegetal with a nice floral overtone to it. A pleasant tea to drink, but it pales in comparsion to some of the TGY’s I’ve had the fortune to try.

This brothy, savory green might not be something I crave as a stand-alone cup, but it turns out it’s a great meal accompaniment. I got the idea after I enjoyed a green tea I might otherwise not have liked so much when I had it with dinner one night. The savory notes in this were great with my lunch (just a turkey sandwich). Usually I drink cold-steeped tea with lunch, and it’s often a very fruity one, so this was a nice change of pace.

I know, more Earl Grey Cream, right? I got my package from the Tea Spot in the mail last night, and I had to try this one this morning to test out my taste buds, which seemed off yesterday. Creamy-flavored teas were just bland! Well it seems like my creamy taste for tea is pretty much back. This tea is super citrusy, and sweet and creamy. It seems more sweet than normal today; perhaps it’s because this is a nice fresh batch. Definitely one of my new favorites, and I’m glad I bough a big pouch of it. And I’m glad it seems like I can try new teas today and not miss out on their flavors because of weird taste buds.

I wanted something creamy this afternoon, and this one fit the bill.

Drinking this now, I’m wondering if my taste buds aren’t a little messed up, at least for creamy flavors today. I’m not getting much out of this one, and that has never happened to me with this tea before! Maybe I shouldn’t have judged the Cream Earl Grey so harshly this morning. Man, this is weird. I haven’t noticed anything else lacking, just cream/vanilla. Lame.

This was one of the tea bags that came in our goodie bags from the NYC Coffee & Tea festival. I’m a bit meh when it comes to most pu-erhs… I don’t hate them, but I also don’t tend to enjoy them a ton either. I’m really not sure what made me decided to brew this one up this afternoon, and I almost regretted it for a bit when I was thinking if I wouldn’t be better off with a tea I loved after this morning’s disappointment, but in the end I’m happy enough with it.

The tea bag smelled straight up like hay and wood shavings. I’m sure the paper bag isn’t helping. Steeped, it has those same woody notes but overlain with a sweet magnolia aroma. It’s definitely a woody, oaky kind of puerh, reminding me more of the base notes to ATR’s Toasted Fig than some of the other puerhs I’ve tried. The magnolia lends a sweet, lightly floral note to the mix that’s rather pleasant but not perfumy or anything. Definitely better than I was expecting, but I can’t say I’ll be using the coupon on the back of the card.

This ended up being the only tea I purchased at the NYC Coffee and Tea Festival. Not much really grabbed me this time, and the one other company I might have bought tea from (and an adorable little gaiwan-teapot-thing) was chinese, so I held off because of my impending travels. When I tried a sample of this tea, though, I was pretty impressed. So creamy and vanilla-y! Even though I already have a bunch of a cream Earl Grey winging it’s way to me from the Tea Spot, I bought a tin of this and justified it because it is in sachets… traveling EGC!

Now to taste it under my steeping conditions (which for this first cup were boiling water for 3 minutes). The tea in the sachets smells very vanilla and cream, at a level where there is just about a caramel note to them. And of course the bright bergamot. The aroma of the steeped tea has calmed down a bit, but retains about the same balance of notes.

The flavor is a little odd. I mean, it’s not bad; there’s no bitterness or astringency to the blend, but the main part of the sip is just… flat. Like there’s very little there. There is a lovely vanilla-creamy aftertaste, but not much going on in the main part of the sip. Maybe I need to steep longer, or maybe one sachet was not enough for my 12oz mug (but that does seem to line up with their steeping recommendations on the website). Actually I apparently brewed it hotter than they recommend, so maybe that’s having an effect.

… Take two, this time brewed at 195°F for 4 minutes. I just couldn’t let my experience be dictated by that cup when I remembered it differently. This one actually wasn’t as good because the bergamot is more astringent and the lovely vanilla creaminess seems to have fled! I guess more leaf at my previous parameters is next. Ugh, I hate it when I can’t replicate a tasting experience that was so much better, even when following the steeping instructions a company gives.

… Take three, this time original steeping parameters in an 8oz mug instead of a 12oz. I checked, the sachet is 2tsp of tea, which should be for 12oz according to their instructions. Closer but not quite it! There is more flavor overall, including the bergamot and the vanilla. So close, but yet so far away! I’m going to have to stop these permutations now because my taste buds are getting overwhelmed by built-up astringency, but hopefully I can try it again later.