Coconut Cream Pie

Finished off the last of my sample of this from Ricky (thank you!!) and I must say it was very good, probably one of the best from 52teas (that I have tried, at least).

The dried tea itself is what appears to be the typical black tea base with small and large flakes of coconut. The coconut smell coming out of this tea is fantastic, it smells like sweetened coconut milk, creamy, coconut-y and delicious. I brewed the tea a few different ways, and none of them were bad, they just varied.

The first way was hot, five minutes, no additives. When the hot water first hit the tea, the coconut fragrance liberated, as it infused, the tea aroma took over the coconut. Unfortunately, this actually smelled a little too astringent and strongly of black tea, that I was afraid I would hate it. That being said, I added some milk. The milk mellowed the punch from the black tea, and made an actual coconut cream flavor. It legitimately tasted like coconut milk, which one would associate with coconut cream pie. Very, very good.

As the pot cooled (because I do not have a cozy and sometimes take entirely too long in between cups) I noticed that the astringency went away. So this time, I enjoyed the cup with no additives. I have to say that it was not that strongly of black tea, there is still a creamy almost vanilla flavor incorporated with the coconut and black tea that does make this creamy without any cream. Fears vanquished, still very good.

The final way, and how I finished my sampling today, was hot, five minute infusion, a pinch of rock sugar and some milk. The sugar made it sweet, very sweet, almost heavy with sweetness, but not unenjoyable, kind of like ice cream, or dare I say it, coconut cream pie. The milk cuts the astringency again and helps to meld all of the flavors, the vanilla creaminess, the coconut flavor, the sweetness from the sugar and of course the black tea flavor into one very delicious cuppa.

Overall, very good tea, highly recommended that if you like coconuts and you like tea, you will probably like this tea. Enjoy!

I received this in a swap from willworkfortea, thanks. It’s been on my shopping list for a while, but has now 3 times failed to be in an order, what was I waiting for?

The dry notes don’t smell much like anything other than a black tea, as it first begins to steep I do get some coconut smell, but after a total steep time it looses all the smell and smells like a black tea. :(

The taste is a nice smooth black tea, followed by a bit of cream & DELICIOUS coconut. This is the coconut tea I have been looking for. It’s also got that toasted coconut taste to it. I have the urge to buy some coconut milk to add to this. Oh yes, that would be so decadent.

I made this tea yesterday. I tried a sip with nothing added, and wasn’t very thrilled. I added milk and sugar, which seems to be the norm for me and 52teas. Unfortunately, right about this time one of my roommates started talking to me. We got carried away with our conversation. The tea MUST have been good because I sipped the whole thing down pretty quick, instead of getting distracted and letting it get cold. Unfortunately, all my attention was on the conversation, so I didn’t notice much about the tea. I remember it being sweet for sure, and I don’t remember any definite coconut taste, so I’m thinking the coconut is probably more subtle.

I would just make another cup to properly taste it, but I woke up this morning with a cold and I don’t trust myself now to taste anything very well at the moment.

I coldbrewed this, and while totally delicious and coconutty, the base seemed a bit harsh. Then I came over to Steepster and saw “iced latte.” While the tea isn’t strong enough for that, I remembered I still have a lot of coconut creamer to use up in the next couple of days so I poured a good bit in. For once, I’m drinking a tea where it doesn’t matter if the coconut milk flavor comes through from the addition!

Definitely better now, but I still get something that tastes oddly smoky. I only recently bought this and I haven’t kept it with anything smoky, so I have no idea what caused this. It’s not bad, just seems out of place. Entirely possible it was picked up in the bottle even though I have no idea what would have caused it. But with the creaminess amped up, it’s less noticeable. This is definitely more like just coconut cream, not really getting any sort of crust flavor. Well, kind of, I’ve resorted to the butter cookies again, so I am tasting pie after all, but not solely from the tea.

Definitely will give it a try hot soon, and then properly make it an iced latte.

This is a nice coconut tea. I don’t taste much cream, or any pie crust notes, but as a coconut tea it holds up pretty well.

I think I’ve realized I like tropical coconut notes (like in Buttered Rum, for example) better than bakey coconut, as in this tea. This one tastes like toasted coconut flakes and reminds me of a toasted coconut covered donut.

Most days I find it to be really tasty, but on others I can find it really overwhelming and it makes me feel a bit nauseous. This morning I made a perfect cup though and it’s suiting me just fine. 4 min steep seems to be just the way I like it.

After reading the reviews here, we wanted to see if we felt this tea lived up to the hype so we ordered up a packet.

52teas ships in 2-ounces packets which are solid silver on the back and see through on the front. This is a nice touch, especially when you have such a visually-appealing tea like this one. Those great images that 52teas creates (the one above) are actually the labels generated for the teas. We like these, but the labels are small on the packet and really don’t do justice to the work Frank and Company put into creating them. On the web and 52teas website, they look awesome, on the packet (printed on an ink-jet label printer) they look boring.

Our advice for this would be to simply leave the label off the packet and have those incredible images printed up as small glossy cards or inserts to be mailed along with the tea packet. It’ll add a bit of glitz and really show off the hard work done in creating the images and labels. The other upside is that there will be no label covering the front of the tea packet obscuring the beautiful tea inside.

Now, to the tea: the dry leaf really does look and smell awesome. The shavings of coconut are monstrous and the scent wafts up wonderfully. The shavings are supported by added flavorings, no problems there because it really gives a great smell. There really is no other tea on the market that we’ve been able to find that uses such enormous pieces of coconut.

In brewing, the tea brews up like a standard black tea. The tea leaves themselves are fairly small – nothing exciting. They are not fannings or dust, it appears to be machine-processed black tea that is commonly available and often used as a base for flavored teas. This is typical and we did not expect otherwise.

The liquid has a unique taste to it, we also found the “mint” flavor that Jason noted – though it isn’t a flavor inasmuch that it is a “bite” that appears as the tea dries on your tongue. It didn’t come in the back of the mouth, it comes at the front marking it as a mild bitter snap. The coconut flavor never really comes out in the liquid, but we are certain that the unique bite this tea has is a result of the coconut pieces. We did not try the latte recipe so we can’t comment on how it enhances the flavor of the coconut.

One interesting aspect we noted was the presence of the coconut oils visibly in the tea. Since oil rises to the top and separates from water, little spots of oil can be seen floating on the surface. We liked this, while we couldn’t taste a strong present flavor of coconut (beyond that unique minty-like bite) being able to see the infusion of the coconut was nice. This is a product of the large shavings used; this has not been noticed in other coconut teas.

That said, the coconut shavings do make this an interesting tea to drink plain; the snapiness that it has certainly sharpens the flavor profile. Because of the uniqueness of the tea, we did several tastings of it on several different days (ultimately consuming the entire packet just to come to our conclusions). We wanted to ensure we were thinking about it correctly.

It is an interesting tea, but as coconut goes, this batch/blend didn’t quite make it into the liquid. The dry tea is absolutely amazing, practically a work of art. If you want a decent cup of tea and don’t expect something wonderful from the cup but it is certainly worth buying just to look at the leaves and to shove your nose into the packet to inhale the smell.

This is my first tea from 52 teas. And it was a great one to start with. I made it with honey and frothed milk to make a latte and it was literally like drinking a cup of coconut cream pie. Glad I grabbed his last bag of this. Sorry guys ;-)

I’m glad to see he reblends the super popular ones. I’ll reorder this for sure.

Thank you so much to Kittenna for this lovely sample!
I’ve been so busy with school that I have neglected my notes here! Ah well! I have a life time to make notes and only a year to finish school ;)
The smell of this tea is crazy delicious – coconut supreme!
The tea has a lovely black tea base with hints of coconut and possibly a creamy aspect.. though I am not really picking up on the pie part. I am getting a little stuffed up right now so perhaps that has something to do with it?
Either way..I think this is a lovely coconut tea, but not quite coconut cream pie. Love that I got to try it though! Thanks again Kittenna!

Well. First I must say THANK YOU to Jillian for sending this to me. 2nd I must say I was super jazzed to try a tea from 52 Teas – as I am VERY new to them – AND this was on my list to get one day…so…52 Teas didn’t let me down…this was different and good…HOWEVER…even tho I am enjoying this cup right now…I was shocked at how much Coconut slivers were in there…thinking that it would be all about the coconut…but…I got more of a cream pie taste than the coconut. I could still taste the coconut – just not nearly as much as I assumed it would taste based on the amount of visible coconut in the blend. Then again…end result it blends well…and it’s tasty…so mission accomplished, eh!?

CHEERS to another great tea day!!!!

Backlog…more later.

Ok, the more later part…

I just found this to be mild and lightly coconutty, but I think I had issues with my steep because I think my Timolino needed to be rinsed a bit more from the Fantasy Island that occupied it previously.

I think I want to get another brew and drink from my mug to get a better sense of this tea before rating.

This one is from CrowKettle, from our local tea crawl and swap this past weekend.

Iced, latte-style = DELICIOUS!

I’m trying this tonight thanks to Jillian, who I traded with.

It lives up to everything people have said about it. It’s delicious. The black tea is very strong, and accented with warm, sweet vanilla. But the coconut flavor — it’s fantastic. The coconut shavings in it release just a little bit of coconut oil into the tea, which collects at the surface. When sugar is added, this becomes a wonderful, slightly tropical treat.

This is going on the shopping list. We’ve made three pots of it in a row tonight!

Just made my first 52teas order of the month. Whiskey sour tea? This Kentucky girl couldn’t say no to that!

This is another sample from Meghann (it’d kind of be nice if we could actually tag people in these posts) that I’m having in celebration of the new TOTW. I admit, I’m not getting “pie” out of this one. Then again, I’ve never had coconut cream pie. This is, however, very coconutty, and has a creamy quality to it. Black tea base is yummy as always. I’m glad it’s part of the permanent collection…it’s one that I’ll probably invest in in the future.

Another winner! I was quite suprised how “creamy coconutty” this one tasted…With milk and sugar, this one was a dessert….

The leaves smell wonderful and the tea is just as good. I had it sweetened with no cream or sugar. I think this would be even better with a touch of cream.

I’m definitely going to try that tea latte recipe.

My plan for today is eating very little so that I can feast tonight. This tea just arrived and I’ve dragooned it into my plot to keep me low calorie during the day while satisfying my hungry inner child. (Thanks for such great timing 52 Teas.)

The tea looks amazing with giant pieces of coconut strewn through the tea. I absolutely adore coconut and would happily live on it if that didn’t mean that I would gain tons of weight. But coconut tea? Just what the diet doctor ordered I think.

The tea’s fragrance wafts upward with a light floral note combined with coconut, vanilla and the classic tea scent. It steeps into a reddish brown liquor that has a sweet dark taste with a coconut aftertaste. It’s reasonably good and definitely what I need today to stay on my meager calorie allotment until tonight’s bacchanal.

Thanks ozli!

I sorta oversteeped this, by steeping it for about 5 minutes or so but it worked out just fine. It is really good!

That is all. :P (for now)

Story Time: School just started up again last week. I think this semester won’t be too bad. Most of the classes I have are in graphic design. It has been raining and gray for the past few days now thanks to the storm out in the gulf. I don’t mind the rain(I like it), but when i goes on for so long I get sooooo lazy.

Tea Time: This awesome sample was from Will Work For Tea
Being a coconut lover I was really excited to try this tea. The smell of this is like smelling a bag of sweeten coconut flakes…..YESTH! The leaf makes a really nice reddish liquor as well. OMG This smells and taste like drinking sweeten coconut shavings mixed with cream. IT IS SOOO GOOD!!! The only thing that is holding it back is that i don’t really taste the pie crust or something like that.

Overall I would highly recommend this to someone who is a coconut lover.

P.S. You can get two good steepings from this.

Specifics
Leaf: 2.5oz
Water: 28oz
Pot: Glass
Sweetener: about 1 tbsp light agave per 14 oz glass

The smell is just like coconut cream pie. The taste is more like a coconut tea. Really good. I am so glad I purchased this tea for my dessert shelf in my tea cupboard!

Ah, so I did make an order with 52teas. The one I couldn’t remember if I made or if I had changed my mind. Either that or someone decided to send me a present which would be cool but also kind of improbable.

I’m starting with this one, mostly because the picture on the pouch looks like something that would be right up my alley. The leaves smell lovely sweet of coconut. Not so much of tea though. Dessert-like.

After brewing I’m finding an odd note of raisins… it sounds weird but somehow it fits. Again the coconut is prevalent. There is also a creamy smell which suggests that I ought to try this with milk also.

For now, I’m sticking to plain. Coconut, defintiely. Sweet, but not cloying at all. I can pick up the tea underneath too. It’s a strong base. Somewhat malty. One that would carry a little sweetener well, which is probably why it’s doing so well with the coconut.

I shall definitely have to try this with a little milk, but on its own as I’ve got it now, it’s quite nice too.