15695 Tasting Notes
This tea came up in a conversation with Marika earlier this week and that prompted me to steep it up and give it another taste. I remember my main thing with the last cup was that the flavours were all excellent and the tea felt very balanced/well crafted for the average consumer but I personally wanted more rose…
Well, with this cup I felt like it actually struck the perfect level of rose in the taste. It was sweet and fresh and brought a lightness and delicate/elevated nature to the more ginger and fennel forward mix of spices. Rose and ginger is not something that I’d have really thought of together, but I liked the weird mix of the two – with the sweetness of the fennel acting as the bridge flavour!
Another new flavour from the summer menu!
I wanted this to be better than it was, and it kills me a little bit that the thing that I felt needed tweaking was the ratio of pineapple because I fucking love pineapple. It’s my favourite food!! This is a pineapple, tamarind, coconut water and palm sugar boba mix but it comes off mostly as pineapple – the type of sweet but tart and tangy pineapple that you’d get from the juice in a can of crushed pineapple or pineapple rings. Very concentrated and strong.
I guess what I expected was more emphasis on this light and refreshing coconut water, to be more summery and fresh feeling. Instead it gave me tiki vibes and more sweet cocktails on the beach – not unpleasant at all but just a shift from my expectations based on the visual of the drink. I barely tasted the coconut water, and the tamarind just seemed to play into the sour tang of the profile.
I feel like I’d need to try this again with my now adjusted expectations to get a better sense of if I’d enjoy this or not – and there are a lot of other summer teas on the menu to taste through still so I don’t know if I’ll end up getting to a retaste.
Sipdown (1405)!
The look of this matcha was a bit of a duller green and it didn’t froth well so I got the impressed it was probably not super fresh, but it did taste pretty good. Smooth/no grit to the texture with a slight sweetness to it and a fresh and floral body flavour. Reminded me a little bit of lilacs and snow peas, and I was a little impressed and taken aback by how pleasant the taste was despite the off appearance.
Plus side of owning so many teas is that when you randomly find yourself craving a coconut and berry blend you get to then answer that craving with “ok, which one should I make?”. I chose this one because it was the quickest in my stash to find, though I did add a little bit of coconut agave both to boost the coconut and sweetness level to match where my cravings were. The raspberry was such perfection – soft and sweet with the tenderness of flaky raspberry turnovers or other types of pastries. The buttery coconut notes contributed to that for sure, and the black base here is so full bodied and malty with a nice mild astringency. Good texture.
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.
This was at the tail end of the little “green tea blip” I went through last week where I was just spontaneously craving greens. Because it was at the end, I feel like I was less excited for this cup than others I had in the same time frame – but it’s still a really nice green tea with clean and fresh notes of crisp lettuce and a little bit of that playful fennel to the undertones. It’s flatter than it used to be, but still solid.
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!
Drank this one this afternoon because I wanted something robustly juicy but caffeinated and it ticked all the boxes. This might be a weird comparison, but as I was finishing the brew I thought to myself that it sort of reminded me of a very good peanut butter & jam sandwich, but without the peanut butter or the sandwich.
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 Sipdown (1406)!
Pretty light/mild as a cold brew – but I think I like it more than way than steeped up hot. It’s got a little more of a nutty streusel vibe going on, with notes of almond and brown sugar/pastry, and I found that tasty. Ginger is still present, but weaker than the almond notes. Doesn’t really read as “gingerbread” because of that – I’d expect more ginger and probably more body overall. Kind of a fun “Christmas in June” type of send off, though!
Cold Brew!
Such a light and effervescent lemon lime blend – though it leans more lime. It feels super refreshing and playful, and those light but sweet notes of citrus are balanced by the herbaceous finish of the cilantro. I’ve always thought this was super well crafter and balanced, and its brews like this that make me thankful I bulk purchased before AQ2T closed up shop…
Cold Brew Sipdown (1407)!
This was a free sample from my order with Paru – I wasn’t expecting any free samples, let alone the two they included, so I was appreciative of both.
I thought this was pretty nice but I have to admit that, of everything I’ve tried from Paru so far, I found this the least interesting. I guess that makes sense; for a tea company to have mass appeal you definitely need some “safer” and more commercial blends and this felt like it fell in that range – a nice, non-complex and solidly executed mix of cooling and herbaceous mint with fresh, light citrus. It was very, very refreshing as a cold brew and easily brewed up without fuss. I knew what to expect, and it met those expectations well. I just personally have been more interested in exploring the more unique and innovative blends from Paru.
There’s a customer for this though, totally!
Grandpa Style!
Yesterday I steeped up these absolutely gorgeous Huang Shan Mao Feng leaves grandpa style in my pretty new Pieces of Porcelain cup!! It’s the perfect size for me to bowl brew or steep grandpa style in & I foresee it getting some great use during work from home days!! Thank you again to Masters Tea for gifting the tea; I found it very light and fresh, which made for a perfect vegetal cuppa to sip on this hotter summer day!!
Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/CP6B72pA16R/
Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nxV3vuxM2k&ab_channel=BIRP%21BIRP%21
