Secret Weapon

I received this as a sample from one of my online orders and thought today was a good day to try it. To be honest, it wasn’t on my list of things to try..
Dry: Pretty pieces of orange, almond and gogi berries. Sad looking leaf quality.. tons of stems and very crushed leaves (disappointing..)
Liquor: Pleasant green that reminds me of straw for some reason? Smells of damp straw as well somehow. Peanut butter straw… musky like. Odd.. anyways moving on to taste.. Oh no wait, it tastes like musky peanut butter straw. It’s alright. I taste absolutely no chocolate (maybe due to having only one (what i assume to be..) cocoa nib.). There is a creamy mouth feel to this tea that is pleasing.

Overall: I won’t be purchasing. It is an interesting tea, but the musky peanut butter straw taste is not really for me. I like the mouth feel though. Also, I tried a second steep – it tasted more like straw peanut butter water. Weird.

I’m so disappointed! When I heard about this tea, I couldn’t wait to buy some because the description seemed awsome for me..I asked few people who already know this tea and they weren’t really exited by it. I hesitated to buy it, even if the smell is just so amazinggg!
(I’m not used to buy just a cup, I prefer to try a small bag and brew it at home)
I didn’t wait too long to have my first cup of this and damn, I think this is one of my favorite. I really should have buy more of this because I feel I’ll get addicted to it. I find it very creemy, both rich and sweet. I reallyyyyy taste almond and a bit of cocoa.

They say this is good for immune system too ? Woahhh I need more!
I don’t know why, but there’s something soothing and comforthing with this tea…

Mann… I did not think I’d like this, in fact.. I had no intention of looking at this tea at all after looking at the ingredients.
I’m not a huge fan of white tea, I don’t like berries in my tea… and I HATE licorice.
The staff member at David’s took it off the wall and asked me to smell it before I could even protest and… Ok, hey.. that smells pretty good.. Uh, I guess I’ll get a few grams to try it..
Oh my god. Definitely a new favorite. It’s nutty, creamy and slightly fruity. It’s also thick, and not watery and weak like white tea normally is. (IMO…) I think the cocoa adds the thickness. I don’t taste the licorice, thankfully. Just a nice, nutty white tea. :)

I really like this one! Much more than I expected. I received a sample from Davids Tea with my order, and I’m so glad I did. When I first opened it, I thought all the nuts and blue leaves were strange, and there was no way the sliced almonds could give flavor to a tea by just hanging out in the water as it steeped. The tea smells faintly of chocolate and not much else – definitely a hint as to how light this tea is. It’s a white tea, and feels perfect for spring or any time you need a tea that’s not too loud or bold. This tea tastes like chocolate hazelnut wafer sandwiches I used to eat as a kid (kind of like Kit Kat bars, but not covered in chocolate), and the aroma of the tea is stronger than the tea itself. Brings back good memories and tastes great. Oh, and I think you definitely need to steep this one for the recommended 4-5 minutes to get the full flavor.

Looking at the ingredients I can’t taste berries or licorice or orange peel, but I don’t mind. As for magical immunity increasing powers, I think I’d need to drink more than three cups to see any effect ;)

David’s sent this as a sample with my order. I love free samples! Sadly, however, I do not love this tea. I would never have ordered it because it contains two things I don’t like – licorice and almonds. But! It was free, so I had to try it. I had a hard time figuring out how much to actually use in my cup – the tea is about 50% sliced almonds, and they don’t fit in my teaspoon. I ended up adding extra because there was so much air in my scoops.

It’s sort of good/bad for me with the taste. On one hand, I can’t find any licorice at all, not even in the aroma. On the other hand? So. much. almond. If there are other flavors I can’t find them. I do smell something chocolatey, but I can’t taste it.

Without additions the taste is bitter almond. Again, to be fair I always think almonds are a bitter. I added a tiny bit of sweetener, which thankfully took away the bitterness. It was still almond though, but I drank the entire cup anyway! The tea coated my mouth and left a strange taste behind.

But I bet if I liked almonds this would be awesome. So if you like almonds? You should probably try this tea. Me, I’ll refrain from a rating, since I wouldn’t have bought this on my own, and it doesn’t fit my personal tastes!

Edited to add: and… an hour after drinking this I developed hives. I do not have food allergies (and certainly not to almonds – I drink 2 cups of almond milk a day!) I think it must be the goji berries… The internet (which is never wrong, right?) says they can cause hives in people with pollen allergies… which I have. I doubt I’ve ever had them before – good to know!

{Backlogged Review}

Got this one as a sample in a mail order. It isn’t one I would have tried on my own, but I figured what the hey, it was free and in my hands.

Dry, I wasn’t a fan of the smell. I’m not sure which note it was that mixed it to where I wasn’t liking it, but I definitely sealed that package up again quickly. Afterwards I noticed that the wet leaves had a very similar smell, to the point where I had to take the trash out to rid it from the kitchen.

The tea itself? It was a blend of almond and licorice to my tastebuds. Which as much as I love licorice as a candy (yes, even black!), I’m finding I loathe in a tea. I didn’t finish my sample package of this one, instead giving to a neighbour down the hall.

This tea was another discovery from the advent calendar (totally ordering another one later this year, best tea investment I’ve made in a while!). Was a bit reluctant to try it at first, as I’m not a huge fan of nuts usually. Well! This tea confirmed my suspicion it was the texture of nuts, not the taste I usually don’t like. It was so delicious! And helped fight off the sore throat I got just before Christmas! (no, not placebo it works dammit!). I liked the walnut taste, and the white tea base set off the other flavours nicely. Was very calming on my throat and didn’t need extra sweetening (which is good as sugar is bad for a dry inflamed throat). Definitely going on my reorder list.

Got this as a sample in my recent order,

the leaves smell like nuts, almonds mostly

The liqueur is a nice lemon color and smells like a chocolate duncan hines cake while its baking in the oven… i know specific smell but it gave me a flashback of sitting in front of the oven door watching my mom’s cake bake.

time to taste: first sip … cocoa and tea, it tastes a lot like it smells again like a duncan hines chocolate cake… i really like this i think i’m gonna add this to my shopping list.

Everytime I get a hint of a sore throat I drink this tea and all symptoms disappear. I don’t know if its the tea or me believing its the tea (mind over matter) but whatever it is, I am not going to question its ‘powers’. Plus the tea smells and tastes great :)

This tea is pleasant. That sums it up for me.

I find it very enjoyable when I drink it, but I don’t find myself reaching for it or craving it often for some reason. It is pretty nutty which is nice but as others have mentioned overrides the white tea flavour. Largely I prepare it for my mother when she’s over as she likes anything involving white tea and it’s not going to over-excite her (which is easy to do).

This was the first tea I ever tried at David’s. I was out of town in the mountains and just grabbed it to go on a chilly day. Honestly it wasn’t love but I would give it another chance before I walked away from it. I think it was just a little more on the nut end that what I had been looking for at the time and would hate for just the situation to spoil the whole outlook on the tea.

I found this tea very nutty and as I am not a big fan of nutty teas, it was just OK for me. I would have it again but maybe not all the time so I’m glad I just picked up about 10g.

I’ve had this tea for a while. It’s part of my regiment and I keep a tin nearby for emergencies. This is the tea I start the day with once I feel the sniffles coming or someone sneezes near me. It’s worked so far and it may have something to do with the following teas I drink when trying to fight a cold. It could also just be a placebo effect.

Dry, it looks boring and dull. The leaves are shades of brown and bronze with some sporting greenish oxidized copper accents—those ones are kind of pretty. There’s not much to say about the almond slices, except to say that there are plenty to go around. There is a moderate amount of orange peel and goji berries, but the real attention grabbers are the cornflowers. There are so few of them. Yet they add a bold contrast to the overall tone of the tea. I wish there were more.

The smell is slightly different dry or wet. Dry, it has more of a cocoa and corn flower scent to me. There is a hint of almond and orange. Not picking up much goji. Wet, the white tea and almonds stand out a touch more, but I still get a dominant cocoa scent.

The liquor is typical of most flavoured white teas. It’s slightly foggy and golden with hints of amber and clear green. The initial flavour is always dominantly almond with cocoa following closely behind. As the tea cools, I can taste more of the orange, subtle as it is. As for the goji and the licorice, I tend to feel like they’re more in my imagination than they are in my cup. I think I try too hard to detect them that I make myself believe I can taste them. They’re too subtle and about as lost as the forgotten cornflowers.

If this tea didn’t have any purpose in my life, it wouldn’t have made its way into my cupboard. I can’t say it’s something I crave for or would go out of my way for. It’s a wet almond. But since I like to start my day off with one cup of white tea, it fits the bill for the mornings I feel under the weather. Somewhere in my mind, I want to believe that it’s the superfruit-tea.

Oh man do I love this tea! I find it needs to steep longer than instructed, but then, I like really strong tea and white’s are usually on the thin side..
ALMONDS YAY. oh man. just so good.
(i made this as a latte tonight using skim milk. YUM.)

I didn’t like this tea..

It tasted nutty and it didn’t seem to work as a balanced drink I found myself wanting to dump it halfway through..not really sure why

I basically only got what I think is almonds here, and it was definitely bordering on cardboardy. Bleh. I couldn’t taste the white tea at all, or anything else… with the exception of toasted walnut, I don’t think nutty teas are really for me!

First of all, I love the scent. You can totally smell those almonds, yum. They’re the strongest flavor note as well, which is fine by me. I’m just happy the licorice root didn’t present a strong flavor, which I was worried about — NOT a fan of licorice in tea. The packaging recommends steeping for 4-5 minutes, and I’d recommend the lower end of that spectrum. I went for 5 and it’s just a touch too bitter.

This tea is litterally my diet at the moment. Upon smelling it’s content you will be tempted to eat it, but don’t. It tastes just like it smells, it’s that nice. Think ‘’white tea meets almond dessert’’.

I was surprised at how much this tea smelled like roasted almonds and only a little fruit. Also, the licorice listed on the ingredients list is completely undetectable.

I’m surprised I like this one, but it’s definitely growing on me. I didn’t steep it long enough the first time and it tasted a little watery, but the nuts were quite prominent but not overpowering as I’d expected. There was also some lovely undernotes of fruit and a clean white tea flavour. The second time was much better, a fuller taste this time, the nuts were quite prominent again, but the other flavours were nicely balanced this time and it was actually quite a good tasting tea.

I’m hoping this one continues to grow on me, but for now, I’d say that I quite like it

One of my favourite teas of all time. The taste is indescribable! Also, this tea just LOOKS awesome. There is nothing quite like the almond punch infused into this tea. I sometimes grow tired of other teas, but never of this one; I keep it as a special treat, and every time I come back to it, I remember how much I love it. I also like how it tastes exactly how it smells, so if you like the smell, you will fall under the tea’s spell as well.