15695 Tasting Notes
Geek Steep S2E25 – The Music of John Williams
This is the tea that I picked for my pairing of The Raiders March from Indiana Jones’ Raiders of The Lost Ark.
This may be controversial to say, but I’m not even really a big fan of the Indiana Jones movies – though don’t get me wrong, they are good movies. However, despite that this composition ALWYAS makes my list of top scores. Not just by Williams but, like, in general.
While this song obviously conveys a feeling of adventure, I think for me it more speaks to a sense of optimism and excitement for the future. I think of it kind of a symphonic “hype song” if that makes sense. So I wanted my tea pairing to really be in line with, yes, that kind of jungle/archeological vibe that is so paramount to the Indiana Jones series but also this feeling of bright eagerness and joyous adrenaline for whatever is coming next.
Queue this yerba mate blend! For years now I have equated the taste of yerba mate and guayusa to reminding me of “the rainforest” and so I think there wasn’t ever going to be a more perfect tea base for this musical pairing. It works with the movie and that association, but also just has a general feeling of being fresh and out in nature. The particular nail in the coffin for why this blend specifically was the fact it has this really great, natural and vibrant fresh tropical orange top note that fits that happy/joyous pre-adventure energy feeling I wanted.
I’m very pleased with how this combination came out!
Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgncJgSbbck&ab_channel=matt484991
Geek Steep S2E25 – The Music of John Williams
Gongfu!
So, this is the tea that I chose for my pairing of The Imperial March.
This was both the easiest and the hardest of my three song selections to pair for this week’s episode because I had such a clear idea of what I wanted to convey. For me, The Imperial March is basically the epitome of villain music and holy shit do I love a good villain song. While the composition is simpler than some of William’s other works, the marriage of ominous suspense, intensity, and power truly gives me chills whenever I listen to it.
Immediately a black tea came to mind, but it was going to have to be something really full bodied and intense that could perfectly hold its own in order to match the strength of this march. This is probably my favourite black tea White2Tea has ever released. It’s got so much body with the most pleasant astringency to it, and the more medicinal, herbaceous umami profile is something that I haven’t come across in nearly as unique a way across other vendors. The session was filled with notes of dark leather, bitter cacao, brandied red fruits, oak, camphor, and tobacco and an overall dark, dense fruity undertone. With age I find the herbaceous quality has settled and more fruitiness is coming out. It brings a little brightness, but still has all the complexity, intensity, and nuance that I crave from this tea!
I learned how to play this song as a kid when I was in marching band, and one of the most badass moments I ever felt in my life was with a bass clarinet strapped to my neck during the two to four bars where I got to play the main theme. As a preteen, for those short seconds I felt unstoppable and this pairing channeled a small part of that feeling of “grandness”!
Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/Cd3szTCutLn/
John Williams Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7HF4JG1pOg&ab_channel=JohnWilliamsVEVO
…and because gongfu sessions take more than just a single song to finish, I have a music pairing not related to John Williams as well.
Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW0IyBopbp8&ab_channel=MediumBuild-Topic
Geek Steep S2E25 – The Music of John Williams
This episode was an incredibly fun one! I mean, I always enjoy our episodes but I think this was the most excited I was to record in quite a while because we went all out with our pairings not just for this “fandom” in general but for specific compositions of William’s.
The only con, really, was that we recorded about six hours before I was going to be on a flight to LA – so I was really in that sort of pre-flight nervous energy mode where I had completely washed all my dishes and done all my laundry and just didn’t want to start anything new at all. So I kept my tea pairing as simple as possible for recording – a bagged tea that I would be able to sip while dirtying the fewest amount of dishes possible! It was kind of just a nice bonus that there’s a musical motif to the ENG/FR name of this blend.
It’s a good tea and I’ll write a nicer tasting note about the flavour some other time because I think there’s something pretty interesting and unique here about Stash’s decision to take such a novel type of pear and bring it to grocery shelves. For now, I think it suffices to say that this one does really taste a lot like pear but in a sweet and juicy sort of way, and where I actually don’t hate the green tea base as much as I would’ve expected to.
Cold Brew!
This is another one of the new cold brew teas from this summer! Honestly, this is the kind of profile that I was surprised that DT hadn’t explored in this format before. I’m really happy with final taste we landed on though! It’s incredibly smooth for a black tea without any astringency or bitterness at all, but still with solid body from the black tea. The taste of the lemon is very classic and traditionanal “RTD style” lemon that you might get from something like a Pure Leaf or Brisk lemon tea, but I think with a little more clarity to the lemon notes. A little sweet and very simple and straight forward.
I know that won’t be for everyone, but I don’t think you can argue that when you think of the standard iced tea available on grocery store shelves that a lemon black tea is almost always what pops into your head first. Like, we called this one Classic Lemon for a reason. It’s a staple flavour that is enjoyed by a whole lot of people across North America; and when it’s good it’s really good.
To me the obvious question about this tea is how it compares to Southern Lemon, which is another newly released tea from DT is also just a lemon black tea. Aside from the fact this tea is specifically intended for cold brewing while Southern Lemon was not developed with that style of steeping in mind, I would say that Classic Lemon is definitely the sweeter of the two. There’s no sweetener at all in Southern Lemon but there is a VERY LIGHT amount of stevia in this blend. Additionally, this blend is very round and “polished” tasting while Southern Lemon does have some faint astringency/texture to the mouthfeel and more body from the black tea and the lemon notes in that blend are a bit more like a lemon oil with more aroma compounds. So, they have some distinctions, for sure!
Personally, I do like Southern Lemon more just because I don’t mind that it’s unsweet and I’m at a point where I usually prefer at least a little astringency in my teas. However, I think the mood I would be when I would pull out this tea versus Southern Lemon would probably be really different, and so I’ve actually got both in my cupboard right now so that I can have that option situationally.
Tea Photo: https://www.instagram.com/p/CeW8dVruGun/
Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuxdtgSd5qo&ab_channel=SUSTO-Topic
Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.
Cold Brew!
So right before my LA trip DAVIDsTEA released this year’s cold brew collection! I wanted to wait to review them until I could retaste them, and then of course when we came back from LA I was sick (still kind of am) so I waited a little longer after that…
But here we are!
First big thing about this year’s Cold Brew collection is that the line up was completely differently formulated so that, instead of the 2 Hour steeping time of previous years, these cold brew teas will brew up very quickly and can be ready to drink using room temperature or cold water within ten minutes time. I am of mixed feelings on this because I personally think one of the best parts of cold brewing is being able to start something in your fridge in the morning before going to work or right before bed and then having the freedom to just forget about it for eight plus hours until you’re ready to strain and drink it. Like, the long form nature of cold brewing is a selling point to me.
On the flip side, the quicker steeping time was customer requested a lot and I don’t want to hold back on doing something that a lot of people are asking for just because I have a different personal opinion. Also I have spent a lot of the last year drinking cold brew formulations from other companies like T2, Twinings, and Fortnum & Mason and I would completely be lying if I said that a part of me hadn’t at least partially fallen in love with the “quick cold brew” method of steeping as well. I don’t really make the 5-10 minute steeping cold brews a lot on a regular basis as part of my normal tea drinking, but I do use them a lot for travel when hot water might not consistently be available or when I’m sick and don’t have time/energy to wait eight hours before getting that refreshing cold cup of tea…
So, I see it now WAY more than I did even just six months ago.
But onto the taste of this cold brew! Honestly, it’s my favourite of the three of them. I didn’t want to develop just another straight peach tea because DT already has a lot of those for people who like that flavour, and we’ve even done the simple peach profile in the past with Southern Peach in the old cold brew formulation. So I thought a nice way to twist it would be the addition of passionfruit! It adds a great kind of tangy acidity to the ripe peach notes, and a lot more initial brightness/lively character to those top notes. It’s super juicy and I think a great balance of sweet and tangy. The tropical edge isn’t too strong, and the two flavours just play off each other really well. Sometimes it reminds me a little bit of Five Alive or some of the other peachy tropical fruit juices of my childhood, and I like that softer nosltalgic summer vacation sort of throwback feeling as well.
There are quite a few of DT’s older cold brew formulations that I like a lot. Berry Burst and Aloha Colada immediately Spring to mind for me. However, this is the first one that I’ve actually been a part of the development for – and I know that makes me biased, but I do think this one gives those two a little bit of competition. At least in terms of my own preferences, anyway!
Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.
So the day after that awful day where I just couldn’t smell/taste next to anything, I started to feel a bit better. Still not great and noticably still sick. However, the improvement was a stark contrast to the previous few days. I also could taste again as my congestion had cleared up considerably, so I started to venture a little outside of the “sick tea” realm into some closer to regular style cups of tea…
I picked this one because, with the heat from the ginger, it still feels a little bit like a “sick tea” but it’s more nuanced than most of my go to under the weather teas, and it’s something that I also drink a lot more just for enjoyment. The taste was still a little muted from my normal tasting abilities, but I tasted the tart berry notes, heat of the ginger, and that sweet kind of undertone of maple. It was a nice cup, and after a week of feeling just gross I sort of was back to feeling some semblance of normal.
Cold Brew!
I had online Dungeons & Dragons for a couple hours yesterday and this is one of several teas that I prepped in advance to get to drink during the session. I made it pretty strong with two of the little sachets steeped since I always find one of them to be too thin. When you steep it that way it almost because like liquid Jello mix though. The liquor is sort of thick and a little bit syrupy and the taste is this really saturated and sweet watermelon/strawberry kind of blend with just a little tang to it. The finish doesn’t really taste like mint so much as it just feels very cooling.
Regardless, I appreciated having it to sip on!
This was the last tea that I drank on that day this week where I just could not taste or smell anything and it was again really shocking because there are so many strong flavours in this tea that I should have been able to better taste. However, it wasn’t a total write off of a tea cup because I could still feel the eucalyptus and it still worked somewhat in terms of decongestion even if I was missing out on the flavour of the tea.
Sipdown (1688)!
So, one of the hotels we stayed at in LA had this sort of “Tazo Tea Bar” in the hotel rooms with some different Tazo tea bags. I obviously brought all of my own tea with me for the trip, but I realized there were a couple flavours in this bar that I hadn’t actually tried and so, being the good tea taster I am, I pocketed one of each that I had yet to taste.
Queue a few night ago, when I steeped this one up. It was on the same day that I drank the cold brewed Tea & Toast from Bird & Blend, and if you’ve read that tasting note then you know I was experiencing some pretty major congestion related issues with tasting. So, I sipped on this cup and I could VERY FAINTLY taste hints of orange and the sweetness of the licorice root in the finish but it was very much just a shadow of what I’m sure the tea should have actually tasted like.
So, my efforts to build a more comprehensive familiarity with Tazo’s selection were a little bit for nothing. I will have to try to find another tea bag to pocket elsewhere and taste again in the future…
Cold Brew!
I had a bit of a panic-y kind of moment a few days ago where basically every single tea I drank in the tea and any food I consumed tasted like practically nothing. In the case of this tea, I got the absolute lightest hint of tartness on the sides of my tongue. Almost imperceptible. I thought that maybe I had lost my taste/smell since that’s a pretty common Covid-19 symptom. Since I hadn’t been affected by that with my first few days of heavy symptoms I assumed I would be fine in that regard – it was a massive relief because the idea of losing my taste/smell when so much of my job relies on it was…
Well, horrifying.
So yes – I drank this cold brew and it was panic inducing. Thankfully, I think I had just reached such an extreme level of congestion that that was what was causing my poor sense of taste because literally the next day, though definitely still stuffed up, I was able to taste just fine. It was a massive relief.
I does mean, however, that I definitely need to make this again on a day when I can actually taste it.
