Ripe For Romance

Uhhhh, call me a teenager, but I have a huuuuuuuge band crush on Hedley right now. Huge! So ridiculous.

So this tea. Another sample from the wonderful Alphakitty! Have I mentioned yet that my goal for today is to try drink one tea from each person that has swapped with me so far? Preferably a new one, but the cute little tuochas Amy Oh sent are a bit intimidating yet, so I might just go with a different tea from her :D

I keep getting off track… this tea, dry and steeped, and even the bag it came in(!) smell like delicious chocolatey raspberry goodness. (And apparently that is making me sneeze?? Oh boy.) And WOW does this ever come through in the flavour! This may be the most strongly-flavoured black I’ve had – the raspberry pops immediately, followed by a full-bodied dark chocolatey flavour, and then the two combine deliciously like I just ate an expensive dark chocolate raspberry truffle. I say expensive, because this raspberry flavour is no cheap pink cream crap, it’s more jam-like. Amazing.

I’m very impressed with this cup. And glad I was sent enough of this one for at least 3, maybe more additional cups! It’s not a tea I would buy (I said the same about Butiki’s Raspberry Truffle tea, which is a similar flavour combo) because although I enjoy it, there are too many other flavoured blacks I’d be likely to go for first, given the choice. Namely caramel/vanilla/creamy blacks.

Oh, and CHAroma, I have hiccups again. And this time it could very well be caused by drinking tea too quickly… looks at empty mug

ETA: Second infusion for 4 minutes still has a fair bit of flavour, but a bit of astringency. I’m drinking it cold but I imagine it would be quite a bit better warm.

I’m baaaaaack. What a trip. Beyond my Habs pulling off a ridiculous 4-3 comeback after being down 3-1, the highlight has to be when one of them, a rookie, and one of my faves right now for sure (even scored the game winning goal) was walking down the street to the arena. I see him. He sees me. I’m wearing a Canadiens shirt. I turn around and face away from him.

He obviously notices this and my boyfriend said he got this huge grin on his face (though he’s already always smiling I’m pretty sure). And when he passed us he says, “Afternoon!” to me. And my boyfriend claims he pointed me out to another player when they were warming up. Oh my god. I laughed for 20 minutes after. It was terrible.

Continuing now into the traveling tea box, I’m trying this one out. I had to add milk and agave because it didn’t have a very pronounced flavor, as usual for me and Adagio flavored teas. The chocolate comes out a lot more obviously as chocolate now, previously it was like kind of chocolate, but bitter. Now it’s a lot more like dark chocolate.

The raspberry isn’t there at all. I already have plenty of raspberry truffle-ish teas too so this one isn’t remarkable enough to stand up to the others.

This is a fun tea – tastes just like raspberry and dark chocolate, two of my favorite things. (I can’t do milk chocolate, allergic. But luckily NOT allergic to dark chocolate.) I purchased the V-day set to share with my husband…OK, I just bought it for myself. But he can enjoy some of it, if he wants.

My only issue with this tea is that you can’t really steep/infuse it more than once. It’s a great, hearty and delish cuppa, just once. I have that issue with many Adagio teas, but since they are inexpensive I don’t worry about it too much.

Thank you Melanie for the sample!

Her swap box ended up pushing my tea count up to 125, but I’m loving it. Also, these won’t take too long to sipdown. #challengeaccepted

This is supposed to be chocolate raspberry truffle, but it sorta smells like roses to me. Maybe that’s just the v-day association? I am getting sweet raspberry flavours, and a touch of chocolate too. It’s simple, but pleasant.

Sipdown, 168, another from the Traveling Tea Box. I wasn’t going to pull this one at first, because Adagio. I’ve actually never had an Adagio black flavored tea because I kind of skipped over them when I was starting my tea journey (but only just, because I remember thinking of ordering samples from them), and then became uninterested because everyone seems to complain about the quality of their black base for blends. Being quite picky about my base teas, especially now, I wasn’t going to go for it, but this tea actually has decent ratings, plus I needed to free up some weight in the box for the teas I included, heh.

When this was brewing I caught a whiff of it and it smelled almost dead up like Land’o’Lakes Raspberry Hot Chocolate. We always buy those LoL individual serving hot chocolate packs, and they come in a lot of flavors. It’s not the most authentic raspberry in the world, but it is tasty anyway. Fully steeped it does smell quite a bit like that hot chocolate, although the tea is making it smell like a slightly darker chocolate.

Having just had quite a nice very dark (so, slightly bitter) chocolate tea, this is a bit of a letdown. Yes, it’s chocolatey, and the raspberry is definitely there, reasonably tasty, but man if this isn’t bitter! I could really use some milk and sugar, and then I’m sure it would quite quite tasty, but plain? Blech. So bitter. Ah well, I kind of expected it anyway!

Yet another from the traveling tea box. thanks, Alphakitty! I was thinking of Adagio’s Hazelnut tea this morning, so I thought I’d try this one from the box. It has chocolate and raspberries in it! Nice. It’s good, but I don’t love it as much as the other Adagio blends. The chocolate is like cocoa but it could be chocolatier. I did see some pretty good sized raspberry pieces fall into the infuser, but there wasn’t too much of a raspberry flavor. The tea also had a drying affect on my mouth. It’s good, but not great. This might be the first non-wow from Adagio though! I suppose I’ll have to steep up some more of the hazelnut when I get both of these tea boxes moving!

A little cliche, but how could I not drink some Ripe for Romance tea on Valentine’s Day?! Truth be told, I was a little worried when I decided to drink it since I loved this tea so very much last year. I have heard so many people commenting lately that Adagio’s teas have become weak or bitter to them, and since I’ve not had it in awhile I thought “Nooooo, not my beloved Ripe for Romance!” Luckily that wasn’t the case and this tea was exactly as I remembered. This is one of the few teas that I can enjoy without added sweetener, and it’s a cup of rich, dark chocolatey goodness. Once you add the sweetener it definitely brings out the juicy raspberry flavors, and a little milk makes it so nice and creamy. Ohhhh it tastes just like taking a bite of a lovely piece of chocolate with raspberry filling! So happy to have this tea to enjoy today, I wish everyone else a wonderful day full of love and tea!

-Dry blend has medium black tea leaves with pieces of green raspberry leaves, raspberries and cocoa nibs.
-Dry leaves smell chocolatey and of sweet raspberry. Tea liquor aroma is malty and of rich chocolate.
-Tea liquor is a thick dark brown color.
-Strong dark chocolate flavor with a juicy raspberry finish.
-Best with milk and sweetener.
-Excellent tea. Perfect cup of creamy chocolate and raspberry!

It’s not you, it’s me…
I’m removing my rating for this tea because, as it turns out, I just don’t like raspberry chocolate teas. I know, I’m as shocked as you are. But I’ve tried 2 now, and even though I can certainly appreciate that they (this one included) were well blended, I just wasn’t crazy about either of them. This is a good tea. It’s just not a good tea for me.

The last chocolate and fruit tea I had was Mighty Leaf’s Celebration, which I really enjoyed, so I’m hoping this one will be equally nice. It’s billed as chocolate and raspberry , and I can see small pieces of milk chocolate, raspberry, and raspberry leaves in the mix. Dry, it smells divine. Very strongly of cocoa, but not so much of fruit. There is a slightly sweet raspberry scent underlying, though, so I’m encouraged so far.

I left this three minutes and added a splash of milk. The recommendation is five, but I’m slightly wary of the tea base in Adagio’s flavoured blacks, which I’ve found can get quite bitter. Less is more, at least to begin with.

Brewed, this tea smells even more strongly of cocoa. It’s quite sweet and dark, and pretty mouthwatering. The taste is, as you might expect, a slighty watered-down version of the smell. I can definetly detect milky chocolate, and a darker, more powdery note from the cocoa nibs. I can hardly find the raspberry at all, though. I suspect it might be contributing the slight sweetness I can taste on first sip, but it’s not prominent. On the whole, a pleasant experience. I’ll be experimenting a little to try and develop the raspberry a little more, though. That would make this tea truly pleasing.

I’m having a lovely mug of this. I forgot I had it and was craving something sweet. I love the aroma I’m getting from this. It’s just like smashed red raspberries. So sweet. I’m not getting too much chocolate flavor but I can catch hints of a dark chocolate-like flavor. It blends well. mmmmmmmm

Adagio took a pretty safe route with this Valentine’s Day tea: chocolate and raspberry. That’s not a complaint nor is it a complement; I love the idea, but I’ve found that fruit-flavored blacks are not really Adagio’s strong point.

It smells nice enough, a semi-artificial (it’s far too sweet to be real) but clearly raspberry scent with a hint of chocolate. Not much of a tea scent here, which is fine by me when it comes to flavored teas on the inexpensive side (better to smell and taste the added flavoring than the cheap base, right?). It’s a fairly attractive tea, too (or else I’m easy to please) with real dried berry pieces and leaves adding color.

In the taste department, I’d call this… good at what it wants to be. It totally reminds me of a chocolate truffle with raspberry filling (which I assume they were going for, given the holiday release) and that accounts for the not particularly realistic nature of the fruitiness. It’s nothing like a real berry, but it’s definitely like a berry candy! The chocolate is there, but weak. It’s not a very complex taste overall (think candy from the drugstore, not Malley’s [do they even have Malley’s outside of the midwest?]) but for a Valentine’s-themed treat, it does the job. My preferred way of drinking this is in a custom blend, though; it goes very well with creamy flavors.

Like most of Adagio’s flavored black teas, you’ve got to keep a close eye on Ripe For Romance, as it can get very bitter very quickly.

A good tasting chocolate raspberry flavored tea which with a spoonful of sugar makes a good desert alternative. Just like most flavored teas the flavor does not seem right without adding enough sugar to give it a fairly sweet taste.