Bubbly

So, apparently I am allergic to something I ate/drank last night. Half of my chin has swollen up and it hurts so much worse than I ever thought a rash could. ;~; I didn’t have anything strange or unusual, so I think it might have been the 3 root tea, since it had 3 ingredients I’d never tried before. I could always taste it again to find out but… I’m really not about to potentially put myself in so much pain again!

To make myself feel better since I can’t eat or even talk much without searing pain, I decided to make some fancy tea. And what’s fancier than champagne? As I think I’ve mentioned before I love the non-alcohol part of many alcoholic drinks, but not the actual alcohol part since it just makes me sleepy and that’s no fun at all at a party. Have one drink, curl up on the couch and fall asleep (except for sake, for some reason). So teas like Pink Sonoma are my best friend!

As other notes have mentioned, this reminds me a LOT of Buddha’s Blend. Very strong peach and jasmine, and there’s a hint of pineapple there too but it’s not very strong. I get some champagne taste but it’s hard to picture it as champagne in my head because of the lack of, well, carbonation! I have enough of my sample from ne14t to mix some with something fizzy though!

This is NOT my cuppa tea. I couldn’t bring myself to finish more than a few sips. Down the drain it went :(
Peach and Jasmine… Very similar to the Buddhas Blend tea. only stronger overall. In fact, they very well might be the same?
Ugh, what a waste of money. I bought this trio pack of teas because I’ve been eying it for a long time and then it was sold out for awhile. I was feeling the need for a pickmeup and this seemed to be my answer.
How sad is it that the only one I liked had no “tea” in it!
I’m disappointed in you David’s. Again. You gotta stop doing that k? :/

Hilarious, my Art of Tea order that took them seven business days to bother to ship came a day earlier than UPS said. Well at least I can say I’d use UPS again.

So after learning that a 1 minute steep is good with this tea, I did just that, and poured it over ice. It definitely tastes like wine, but it’s a stretch to say it tastes like champagne, I think. That could easily be fixed in the future with some club soda, I suppose.

But it actually tastes to me like it’s maybe a wine with a name I forgot. Sauvignon Blanc? Something like that maybe. I’m lacking in my wines right now, oops. Pretty sure SB is the one with grassy notes, which you get in here, and then peach and pineapple fruitiness.

Not really champagne. But that’s okay. We’ll see if it gets closer if I involve club soda in some fashion. It might work best if I make a tea syrup and add it, because to me champagne always has that mouthfeel to it.

Second steep: I added agave and didn’t really notice much of a difference, but then again it was the second steep. I had it cold too, but kind of was tired of the tea for the time being.

So I ended up splitting the leaves between two jars and cold steeping them overnight for two final glasses from this bunch of leaves.

Now it reminds me of champagne, I may have to add agave to the second glass when I have it later. This first one without it has this amazing white grape background to it.

Will report back on the other cup later. I didn’t realize how cold it was outside and went out with just a fleece jacket on so hot tea is calling me.

This morning I stared at my tea cupboard for like 10 minutes not know what to have. It made me curious about that tea randomizer I saw on the discussion board but as I don’t keep my cupboard up to date it wouldn’t work so well for me. So I scoffed off all responsibilities today and catalogued every single tea I have in a spreadsheet (except for the crappy bagged teas). I included samples and swaps as well. Drumroll… I have 332 teas. Wow. I honestly didn’t think I had that many. Anyway, before my days as a stay at home mom I was an application developer in Excel VBA and could create pretty amazing spreadsheets and programs that draw off of Excel spreadsheets. It was time to dust off some of those skills! I got all my teas added noting tea type, flavor, amount, if it’s eligible for swapping (i.e. do i have enough/willing to share), if it’s something I like, and if it’s a swap, who it’s from. Then I worked up some magic and now I have an application where I choose from a drop down what type (black, green, etc..), if I want a flavored, and if I want a sipdown. It immediately spits out a random tea that matches all the criteria. Which finally brings me to the this tea. My tea chooser chose this one for me tonight. I wanted a flavored green that is sipdown. Out popped Bubbly!

And you know, it’s not as bad as I thought it would be! Kind of good actually. Or maybe I’m just still high on my excel buzz. I mean, it’s not great and I wouldn’t purchase it. I don’t really like floral teas or pineapple and they are both present in this, but it does have a good champagne flavor and aroma. Had it not been for my tea chooser this would have sat in the drawer a lot longer.

I can see geeking out on this thing a lot more. Adding a lot more functionality. Good to know I still have skills! And shmiracles thanks again for the insane amount of tea you sent including this one.

Thank you Raritea! SIPDOWN!

Haha Raritea graciously offered up a sample of this one for me to try. I figure she’s doing well in single handedly trying to get me to try the entire David’s tea menu. To be fair she DID get me to buy 100g of lime gelato!

This tea? It’s not half bad. It REALLY smells like champagne in dry form, but luckily that goes away when you drink it. Not that I have issues with champagne, and this IS bubbly tea, but it was a little weird smelling.

In liquid form this is much more a peach kind of tea with floral notes that are just slightly off putting. Not really my cup of tea. However! I apprecaite getting to knock another David’s tea off my list!

Backlog. This one definitely does smell like champagne or some kind of fruity alcohol. Unfortunately, I really don’t recall how it actually tasted. It was good and flavourful, fruity, perhaps tasting like champagne.

i haven’t even tasted this tea yet and i can tell from the reviews that i’ve oversteeped it…

aaaaand i did oversteep it. but i love the smell very much. and i’ll try again soon enough.

actually i just did a weird thing. i put maybe 1/3 a pack of splenda in my cup. i have spelnda in my desk but it was put there under a moment of insanity. i was not quite myself when it happened and i am NOT a splenda/stevia user. just to be clear of where this is coming from. but because of the over steep i figured i had nothing to lose so i added the tad of splenda and now the tea has no bitterness at all, and it’s not even really sweet! but it is still dry and the smell is still wonderful.
not that i’m gonna start using the splenda or anything, but i figured i’d get creative cuz it was already kinda not a good cup. and my experiment paid off :) cup of tea resuscitated!
good way to end the rainy blah work day that’s for sure.

I used 1.25 tablespoons of dry leaf for 375 ml of water.

The brewed tea has a definite alcohol quality to the aroma. I am smelling a mixture of peach and pineapple which is reminiscent of champagne.

On the sip, I am detecting a very mild green tea flavour on the forefront which blossoms into a peach/pineapple taste. I am getting a bit of a fizzy mouth-feel which I think is sourced from the tangy-ness of the pineapple. Sugary sweetness in the background is strong in the aftertaste. Mild toasted astringency coming from the green tea close to the end of the sip into the aftertaste.

I would like to try to infuse this for a shorter amount of time (maybe only 2 minutes 1 minute) in the future.

Dry Leaf Nose: Delicate grape with a champagne note.

Liquor: Champagne gold in colour with a delicate grape/champagne aroma.

Flavour: The nose comes to you as you sip the cup – champagne notes with delicate grape background. The green tea supports the whole, giving a nice, lively mouthfeel.

I can see why they’d equate this tea with champagne: it’s brisk, and fruity with a carbonated mouthfeel. Peach is what I think when I sip, not grape.

Maybe if I were drinking this for New Years I’d get more out of it, but as it stands I can take it or leave it.

Yowza – low rating alert! :O I feel bad when I see a number that low, but I’m trying to base it on the smiley’s and I’m halfway between happy and ambivalent.

Courtney sent me a sample of this one, and even though I absolutely hate champagne, I really wanted to try it because sweet and fruity pineapple sounds delightful.

It is way too similar to champagne for me.

I do see from several other reviews that this one gets bitter if it is steeped for longer than 1-2 minutes, so I will try that next time to see if it’s any better, because I have enough for a couple more cups.

This tea smells great! White grapes, champagne, and floral notes in the dry tea had me very excited to try it. Unfortunately that’s where the love for this tea ends for me. I only got through a few sips, I found it bitter and too floral like for my tastes. I love champagne but I didn’t get that from this tea at all. The first time I followed the steeping instructions exactly, and I tried a few variations but Its still not to my liking.

I don’t think its a “bad tea” it just wasn’t for me.

This is interesting…Vaguely sweet, vaguely fruity, maybe champagney? I like it but it isn’t going on my shopping list or anything. Glad I got to try it though! Thanks Jessiwrites! :)

Day 32 of my 101 days of tea challenge and, saying as I am not very interested in the taste of alcohol or the mouth-feel of carbonation, what I rang in the new year with.

Unfortunately, I made my first cup far too strong — I wasn’t using my usual set of tools, and I think I may have put far too much tea in, so I’ve given it a second chance this afternoon/evening.

2.5(ish) teaspoons in a teaball for my two-cupper. Steeped 3:15 the first time, around 10 the second time. Let the kettle sit for a while the first time, and put an ice cube in the second, so I have no clue over the exact temperature either time, but it was cool enough not to burn the leaves at least.

When NOT made to be far too strong, the tea isn’t bad at all. It has a very dry taste to it, and the candied pineapple leaves a sweet, fruity aftertaste. There is also a slight sourness from it — not the bitterness of oversteeped tea, but just a slight sour tang. Seems to be better hot than not (I left the tea cool for a while and drank some lukewarm, and found that I preferred it hot). The resteep is nice as well — the flavour is still quite strong if you let it steep for longer (and not bitter at that!). I tried adding sugar the second time, but found this to be unnecessary — it didn’t seem to add much to the taste.

This tea’s scent — quite fruity — is also lovely. I think I might even prefer smelling it to drinking it!

I certainly hope that this is around next year. As someone unlikely to accept a glass of champaigne to ring in the new year, this could be a very fun substitute!

I don’t drink alcohol because I don’t react well with it.

I was surprised with the taste of Bubbly…I didn’t expect DAVIDsTEA to get close enough to a champagne (others will probably disagree). I got that dryish smell like most wines do. I steeped the cup and I found that the taste is exactly like it smells! I got the dry sort of taste with some fruitiness to it. I really enjoyed this one, too bad it’s not a wall tin!

Note, I only used one tsp, it’s a strong tea.

It’s been a year since I first tried this tea and I hadn’t really planned on giving it another chance, but it was free, so I can’t complain.

It’s kind of ridiculous to try and Christmas shop on the second Saturday before the big day, but I needed to pick up a couple of the “mug tails” mugs as Christmas gifts. It’s a good thing I did it today too since the ones I picked up were the last of their “species” in stock, a fox and a bear. I had to wait in line for a bit while they fetched the boxes (the only ones left were the display ones) but my reward was a piping hot cuppa Bubbly.

Now, I’ve never tasted Champagne and due to stomach issues and/or pregnancy I haven’t had any type of wine—sparkling or otherwise—in ages, so my perceptions of how alcohol should taste are wildly off. This, though, I would gladly drink as a safe alternative.

On the day I picked up “Ceylon Star” I found the most delightful bottle of “Bubbly” on the shelf. Its design sold me and I splurged on it for the collectability factor. BUT most for the fact that this tea was my favorite in the wine collection. The grape and pineapple notes along with the sparkly nuances does make it feel like drinking a tall flute of champagne.

It reminds me much of the past Christmas when I first got this tea as a gift. The charm remains all the more pronounced. Some may say a little bit more so due to the packaging design this year. But gosh it is a good fit for all the holiday parties if you want to drink something special and want to share the drink with everyone without any guilt. Cheers!

Update March 3, 2013: Totally in debt to this wonderful tea for helping in my recovery from Bronchitis. The Mullein blossoms were a total life saver. For anyone who has a bad cough this tea soothes coughs really well. Thank you David’s for the rescue with this lovely tea.

Finally got to try this one today. My lovely friend who works at Davids made me it iced with Aguave. She said the key is to brew it for only a minute, and I think she is right. It reminded me a lot of iced green teas that you buy in the bottle, but it was still really good. I would love to try it with some carbonation to see how it tastes.

As my favourite tea from the Wine collection, and having run out of it months ago, I was excited to see that Bubbly was being offered on the tea wall!

As someone who’s not a fan of champagne itself, the alcohol bite combined with the carbonation makes it difficult to enjoy, I was excited to try champagne flavour, in tea form. From what I can get from real champagne as far as flavour, I think this tea is a pretty close match. Hot, it doesn’t need any added sweetener, but iced I found it needed a little something, and oddly enough, Stevia was the best match. I think the mild tartness caused by the slightly astringent green tea lends itself well to hiding the odd aftertaste of stevia. half of a 1/8 tsp was more than enough to sweeten a 16oz cup of iced tea.

someone else described the floral notes as being jasminey, but I taste more hibiscus. I think it’s the floral notes, combined with the unique flavour of the pineapple, that give the palate the illusion of grape flavour.

I really like it and look forward to bringing in the new year with a cup of Bubbly!

As soon as I smelled this tea I was sold. I definitely was not disappointed by the taste. I’m just beginning to get into green teas. I know it sounds silly but the leafy smell always got to me. This tea is a good starter because the pineapple mellows out the flavor of the tea leaves. It also sweetens it nicely. Overall, a great mildly sweet flavor.