Euphoria

“Who couldn’t use more Euphoria?” I thought as I added this to my Kusmi cart without ever trying it. Luckily, I was not let down! This is a delicious tea that is much like a chocolate orange or Butiki’s Three Friends tea. The chocolate and orange blend really well together and it gives you a nice boost.

I wasn’t going to try this today, but a friend stopped in my room after the school day was over. We had both had rough days and a parent had just given me some cookies so I suggested a tea time for the two of us.

We both greatly enjoyed this tea and it definitely lifted our moods (or maybe it was the little tea party, who knows, probably both). The packaging claims the tea is “for a moment of sheer happiness” and while sipping this tea and laughing with my friend I had one. Thanks, Kusmi!

my first Kusmi tea experience – there is a Kusmi boutique on Saint Denis in Montréal that I stumbled on this afternoon in the blistering cold, and ended up picking up a few bags of loose teas to try as a treat. the price point for this tea is definitely a few levels above my usual of DavidsTEA. but i must say the aroma of the dry maté was fabulous. i might need to try this again with less tea or less steeping time, because the flavour was almost too powerful. More orangey than chocolate once it’s steeped and ready to drink. i think id like to try this with some hot milk next time.

I normally hate the combination of orange and chocolate – those chocolate orange balls you smack and eat like orange segments? Not my cup of tea.

This tea, however, is totally my cup of tea. The loose tea in the tin has a very strong aroma – you open it and you get that immediate whiff of chocolate with a touch of orange.

Steeped in the cup, you still smell the chocolate, but the orange dominates the flavor and the chocolate remains on your tongue in the aftertaste. It still helps kill my chocolate cravings.

Also, the Kusmi tin says it’s strongly caffeinated – I’ve noticed it’s strong and sweet enough to perk me up in the afternoon for a mid-afternoon class and keeps me up to get my reading done. I will admit that my main source of caffeine is tea or coffee and soda gives me jitters, so your mileage may vary.

The first cup I made using a teaspoon and a half of tea in my strainer was strong (nearly as black as a coffee americano), sweet, and thick with no bitterness. I reused the tea in the strainer for a second cup which I steeped for about seven minutes – it was substantially weaker (light, golden brown) with more balance between the flavors on the tongue but a lighter aroma.

This is a keeper, especially if you have cravings for chocolate but not the calories.

Wow, this tea is candy-like, it smells of some orange and cream candy you can buy in Denmark, very nice, I have to say.

As mentioned, the leaves smells nice and sweet; like milk chocolate combined with sweet orange aroma, the roasted maté is not noticeable though.

The liquid tea is quite dark orangish-brown in color, and smelled so sweet, that I really feel of the chair… oh wait I’m just kidding, but it really is SWEET.

It has a chocolate flavor, I really don’t remember from other Kusmi-teas, it’s milk chocolate and very sweet. The orange is in fact the dominating part, when you drink it, and it really is all over your mouth, not only in the beginning of the sip, or in the end, it is all over your mouth. The chocolate is only there at the end of the sip, and when you just swallow, a melody of roastyness and coffeeness is revealed.

The orange aroma in this tea is not that fresh orange flavor, it’s that candy-like orange flavor. No other chocolate tea from Kusmi has a sweeter chocolate taste than this, it’s very sugary, and totally feels like sniffing to a block of milk chocolate, but do you know what? I like it!
Totally enjoyable, if you aren’t scared of sweet things!
Since I really can’t see what’s bad about it, I’m going to give this a high rating.
It does not overtake their Imperial Label, their Samovar and their St Petersburg though, but it belongs in top 5, definitely.

I LOVE THIS TEA. It’s so evocative of… Russia? Toasty mate with a kick of orange and a hint of bittersweet chocolate all somehow come together in a clean, unmuddled way. Delicious smells and good tannins, but the flavor isn’t nearly as strong as the smell (which I like – a tea that tasted as strong as this one smells would overwhelm me). I could see this being nice with a dash of milk, but I almost always take my tea plain. I’ll have to buy more once this small sample is gone.

Second steeping: smell is more toasty, less orange and chocolate. Flavor is much more black tea/mate. Doesn’t resteep so well (probably because of the herbal flavorings). Means I’ll be going though this one pretty quickly.

Oh yes – and a good kick, too!

Hmmm nah. I was not really impressed with this, but drank it anyway for testing’s sake and for the caffeine. Without milk, this smells and tastes gross. The combination of the strong orange with the roasted mate and the chocolate just tasted wrong completely. With soy milk and sweetener, I found it okay. I was really expecting the Jaffa taste to come with the dry, Jaffa-like smell, but it has a thick, strong, liqueur-like tastes that was really unappealing to me. I’ve had worse, but this is one tea I’m pretty glad I got as a single sachet sample.