Sandy

I found this one at Wooly’s here in Mount Isa. I brewed it with half a cup of milk and half a cup of water for 2 tsp as directed. It is a pretty well balanced chai and the licorice adds enough sweetness that I didn’t feel the need for any other sweetner. I think I’ll cut back on the milk next time I brew it though. Even leaving it to steep for a longer time the tea itself was weak. I have high hopes for this chai, we’ll see how it goes.

I also found this one at the T2 store. This tea smells like Big Red but not quite at powerful smelling as Harney & Sons Hot Cinnamon spice. The box recommends brewing 2-3 min at 95C. This is actually a pretty good but doesn’t have the punch of the aforemention H&S tea. It does tase of cinnamon and has some low background heat.

I found the T2 shop while I was in Brisbane for the day. The box recommends 2 tsp per medium teapot and to brew 2-4 min at 100 C. The dry leaves are mixture of darker CTC leaves and some lighter larger leaves. The dry smell is of blended black tea, I couldn’t really pick out any specific scents. The wet leaves aren’t that different. I have brewed this one 3 or 4 times now cutting back on the brew time, tea amount and water temp. There is too heavy an astrigency from the assam in the blend for me for a higher temp or longer brew time. After all the experimentation, I am left with an adequate tea. It is fine but doesn’t have enough complexity to elevate it above most bagged teas from the grocery.

I am drinking this one as my afternoon pick me up at work today. It does the job pretty well. If you ever wanted to drink roses, this may be you tea. :) It also reminds me of turkish delight but it doesn’t have any orange or pistachio flavors, maybe it is just the vanilla making the rose taste sweeter.

Normally I get mostly rose from this tea but I have just hit my office jellybean stash and I am getting more of the vanilla notes. I take this tea plain but now I think I may have to experiment with sugar and maybe even milk in the future.

This is the last of this tea in my stash. I can’t believe I haven’t added a note about it before. The smell of the dry leaves is very chocolatey, the leaves are dark and of good size with large cocoa nib chunks. When brewed the chocolate smell is there but more in the background, it is a pleasantly smelling tea. The tea is a dark orange/brown. The taste is sadly lacking the chocolate that is promised in the smell of the dry leaves. I tried brewing for longer, adding milk or sugar or milk and sugar and it was still an ok tea but lacking the chocolate promised by the aroma of the dried leaves. I had to leave early one day so I stuck what was left of my pot in the fridge. I poured myself a glass later that afternoon and low and behold there was the chocolate. I think for a better alround chocolate tea experience I would probably go with Florence but if you are looking for chocolate ice tea this is a good one.

So yesterday was my first day back at the office after a 4 day break. I was going to drink this tea yesterday but when I got to work I noticed I had leaf but no mug or strainer. It was a very sad moment. I ended up just drinking plain water most of the day. It is a shocking and sad tale of woe, I know.

Anyhow I managed to get everything here today. It remains a nice tea not one I crave or worry about the state of my supply. Most of the time it exists in my cabinet like an unlined movie extra, today it may be the supportive but plain girl in the crowd.

I bought this sample over a month ago but it has been sitting in my cabinet after the feijoa scare. I found som courage this am and brewed it. The kawakawa is very large leafed and peppery, the only other elements in the tea are lemon grass stalks and dried ginger. I am glad I finally tried it because I really like it. There is a heat and a sweetness to it that are similar to a chai. I can imagine that with a little honey this would be one of my favorite teas when I had a cold. I think it will also work for the times I want something like a chai but don’t want the caffiene.

A fragrant brew. The jasmine and rose combine for a sweet aroma. I did not enjoy it the first time because I unthinkingly treated it like a black tea and it was bitter. It really does need to be treated like a green when brewing. It’s taste is reminescent of an oolong. It has a natural sweetness along with the floral notes. It is a lighter flavored tea, I like it as a stand alone drink in the office or after a lighter meal.

I agree with Miss Sweet this is a very accurately decribed tea. I am drinking it this afternoon sans anything. I didn’t really pick up the lemon until I read about it and held the tea in my mouth for a second, my first impression was more of light honey notes. This is a very lovely tea.

I drank this one last night. It is very fragrant and lovely. The flavor and aroma is mostly rose but is is softened by the vanilla. The vanilla, to me anyway, didn’t really have a distinct note in the tea but didn’t make the tea any less good. I felt very spolied. It is a light tea.

A very nice oolong. This one has been sitting in my desk drawer for awhile at work and this morning seemed like the day to sample. It is light and buttery and floral with the first steep. Even on a busy morning when the tea has grown cold it continues to have a lovely flavor. I think I even abused it with using a water temp that should have been too hot. I must thank Ashmanra for sending me this sample.

This tea is scaring me. I had Feijoa in icecream and enjoyed it. I don’t think I like it in my tea. If you haven’t heard of feijoa before http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acca_sellowiana

I think the distinctive odor of the fruit is what throws me off about this tea. It is the only thing I can smell and I don’t find it to be a particularly inviting smell. I can’t decide if it tastes bad to me or just unusually foreign. So I am not going to rate but just say you really should be a feijoa lover to enjoy this tea. I think I will leave my feijoa to icecream.

So I have decided that for me this is the perfect office tea. I like the tast both hot and cold. I like it with out any additives – no trips back top to the break room to grab sugar or milk. It is very forgiving if I forget and over steep.

It is interesting how you can taste different things at different times. I didn’t prepare the tea any differently this time nor am I eating anything but today I can taste just a little smokiness in this tea. Maybe I should brew other tea and see if I pick up any nuance I have missed before. Maybe I have a new super power! (because I have so many old super powers)

Dry it has nice size dark twists that smell a little sweet almost like raisins and a little like a warm tobacco field. The wet leaves smell a little fruity, too. The cup brews a dark orange/brown and smells malty. The taste is mostly malty assam with a slight astrigency especially as the tea cools, but there is an underpinning of ceylon. The second cup I added a little sugar which I think brought out more of the ceylon flavor without losing too much of the malt. I tried a little milk after that and it became more malty again but lost it’s astrignecy. Overall a good breakfast tea, a nice break from the more ceylon based breakfast teas I usually drink.

I don’t know is I should thank Ashmanra for sending me a sample of this tea for now I love what I do not have. It does have a lovely roasty aroma. It is a dark color and the taste is of dark chocolate. The taste is so rich to me that it feels thick in my mouth than it really is, I think it has the mouth feel equal to a syrup. The second steep was just as wonderful. I am currently contemplating tempting fate with a third.

I have to thank Ashmanra for sending me this tea and waiting to have a tasting with me. Maybe my nose is broken but I really didn’t get much charcoal or smoke from this tea, dry leaves or wet. It does have a very roasted nut flavor and aroma to me with a slight sweet, floral note at the end. I didn’t enjoy a second steep all that much but I may have used too much water for my amount of leaf. It was a little creamy but it tasted more of a weak green tea to me.

I got a smaple of this and unfortunately only had enough for one cup after spilling the rest on my carpet. I would have liked another cup just to fully register my feelings about this tea. The first sip was very bergamot-y to me and I thought I was not going to like it. As I continued to drink it, the flavor mellowed. I don’t know if I just got used to it or I started picking up more of the floral notes. It wasn’t a bad earl grey but I don’t know that it will become a favorite.

I was drinking this one yesterday afternoon while it rained. I was planning on rating it then but got caught up talking to friends on skype.

This is a really well balanced chai. It has nice dark leaves, clove, cardamom, pieces of ginger. I didn’t have any whole star anise in this pot but the flavor is there. It is very fragrant dry and after brewing. It is a rich deep orange steep and takes milk and sugar well.

I was brewing a large pot (1L/33oz) so I ended up using 4 tsp of this tea and 1 tsp of a ceylon because I enjoy this tea and i am trying to conserve it bit. It didn’t make any difference to the flavor as when I have brewed it uncut before.

I find it pretty similar to Tazo but less peppery. A very enjoyable tea.

I am remiss. I have been drinking this for about a month and haven’t reviewed it. I thought I had. First of all I love the way it smells. It is effervescent. The citrus-y sencha smell of it alone was the reason I bought it. It is sweet and the aroma sits on the back of my palate like fizzy lemonade. It’s nice to look at, too, plesant green leaves that unfurl in the pot, yellow and pink blossoms and flowers add a nice color. It brews a pale yellow typical of green tea. The brewed aroma is not as intense as the dry but still lightly citrus over a green tea base. As a flavored green, it tastes more of the lime with a sweet edge from the mallow, chamomile, rose and sunflower petals than of green tea but the tea flavor isn’t completely lost.

It is a lovely light cuppa that I particularly enjoy after long sunny afternoons.

I would like to send a congrats out to Earl Gray and English Breakfast on their baby. Who even new they were dating? I drank the first half of the cup black since that is how I take most me tea and it was good. It is a malty, barely smoky, hints of bergamot pretty smooth tea. The package said best with milk so I added a little and it smooth out an already pretty smooth cup. It be thorough I added some sugar and it was the same tea only sweeter. It is a pretty nice morning tea.

I am not sure if I should thank Ashmanra for sending me a sample of this. It is fabulous but now I am an addict to a $200 a pound tea. This tea is worth though, it is that amazing. Just to look at it you think much of this little tea. It is nonuniform, some big chunks some tiny leaves, a nice shade of green but nothing special. The smell of the wet leaves was like toasted pine nuts or maybe sunflower seeds to me. The truly amazing thing is the transformative taste of this tea. It first hits your tongue as a mineral, nutty roundness and the as you swallow becomes some and citrusy and lingers on the back of your palate. As you inahle after you still have those lingering notes. It is so amazing that you simply want to meditate on this tea and the sensory experience that you have just had. I am quite simply hooked.

This tea scared me. At first when smelling the wet leaves it was smoky and reminescent of a puherh with a horsey, fishy earthiness. The fishy part is what had me worried until I took my first sip. This is a very round bodied tea. It does have a light smoky taste that I think comes more from the aroma than the tea itself. It also has nutty notes. Very pleasing all in all. Thanks to ashmanra for sending me a sample to try.

I have to thank Ashmanra for sending me a sample of this tea and joining me in our virtual tea party today.

I enjoyed this tea quite a bit. I took it black. It has a wonderfully smoky aroma and the first part of it’s taste is a laid back smoky flavor and then it smooths out to a honeyed finish. I rebrewed it this evening also with boiling water and steeped for 5 minutes. It still smells smoke but loses some of that in the taste and is sweeter earlier. I must say that I enjoyed it, as well.