Ocean of Wisdom

This tea is warm. And I don’t mean temperature-wise!

takgoti sent me this in the huge box of tea she gifted me, and I was eager to try it from the first time I smelled it. First off, the tea itself is quite beautiful, with the varying shades of reds. The honeybush and rooibos are specked with little pieces of cloves, cinnamon, licorice, and ginger. The whole thing is extremely aromatic and spicy.

I used 3/4 of a teaspoon (Samovar’s little video said 1 tsp for 16 oz., so I halved it). Looking back on it, I should have used more. Anyway, I steeped it up, and the color was very typical of rooibos. Deep scarlet with a wonderful smell coming off of it. Spicy. You can’t pick out every spice in the scent, but it’s complex and incredibly warm.

On first sip, I was surprised how light this was! I think I’ll definitely steep it for a longer time next time. You can’t really taste all of the spices separately unless you concentrate very hard. Then the cinnamon comes out with some warmth. Then there’s a bit of kick and bite from the ginger, and the warmth of cloves (and I’m happy about the clove not being overpowering, because I’m not the hugest fan of cloves). The rooibos comes through with that signature woodsy sweetness. The licorice is a big hit here, not in licorice flavor, but in sweetness. This baby is sweet and spicy at the same time in a delicious way.

What a great herbal! Sometimes herbals are a bit medicinal or cloying. I thought I might have this problem with this particular one, but Ocean of Wisdom is an ocean of awesomeness.

Inhale…

Good, good.

Exhale…

Inhale…

Meditate on the tea.

The tea is light.

The tea is love.

The tea is love, and you are going to buy more.

The tea is light, and you are getting your purse.

The tea is light, and the tea is love.

…

Ohmmmmm.

Stressed out and looking to relax. Enter: Ocean of Wisdom. I haven’t had this for a while. I forgot how awesome it is. Mmmmm.

I drank this yesterday after some friends and I stuffed ourselves to the brim with food and topped it off with some crazy good chocolate cake. You wouldn’t think that I had room for tea after all that decadence, but you’d be wrong.

I’m drinking it again now, in an effort to wind down from the day and study for my final tomorrow. It’s doing the trick quite nicely. Going for cup number two as I type.

I just got more of this in today. It could not have come at a better time.

I’ve developed a habit of drinking this before I go to bed. Slightly bitter at first, but with a sweet aftertaste. Also one of my favorite teas to drink while studying or reading.

Like yesterday, today I fell asleep right after I got home from work. Unlike yesterday, I woke up before it was time to go to bed, so I was determined to have some tea. Since it is so late, I am skipping my first choice of Kukicha (caffeine, you know) and thought I’d give this a shot. Takgoti sent me some knowing I wasn’t a fan of rooibos, but I had such success with Scarlet Sable, she wanted me to try it. I’m pretty much always game for trying new things.

The dry tea smells like A-1 Steak Sauce. Seriously. Sweet and a little tangy. I also smell wood in there which I’m pretty sure is the rooibos but it doesn’t smell like sour wood so thumbs up to that. After pouring the now brewed tea into my cup, the main smell I’m getting is of wood. Again, not sour wood, so that’s good. I can get hints of other stuff going on smell-wise, but honestly, I just keep focusing unintentionally on the rooibos and missing out on the other stuff. I think I’m keeping an eye on it to make sure it doesn’t stab me in the back.

And now to the tasting. To me, this tastes exactly like it smells (well, not the steak sauce smell). Rooibos rooibos rooibos with a little something tingly going on on the tip of my tongue. That being said, it’s not a sour wood rooibos taste. It’s woody and the spices add a nice depth to it, keeping it from being flat tasting. And now that I’ve determined that the rooibos in this is not evil, I seem to be getting other tastes from the tea. Sweet and a little spicy (just to the level of a warm tingle, not an actual burn).

I’ll admit, I’m not fully sure how to rate this. The dominant taste is rooibos but not a bad rooibos so I can’t hate it, even if I wanted to. I actually really like this. But it’s taking me a bit to get over the mental block of rooibos = evil. This is certainly something drinkable and I like having non-caffeine options so it totally gets points for that. I’m giving it a tentative score right now but depending on how future meetings so, I could see this possibly going up.

So all in all, not the total win Scarlet Sable was but by far the most successful rooibos adventure I’ve had!

Giving this one another go with the hope that, now that I know the rooibos taste in it isn’t evil, I can pick up some other things going on in the tea. So far so good – along with rooibos, I smell a twinge of cinnamon and some sweet something or other that is almost (but not quite) fruity. While the cup sits next to me to cool, I’m getting a clove-like smell. And something like cooked carrots. Don’t know why.

Sipping, I still get a lot of rooibos but I’m getting at least one other taste as well – cloves. It comes in more on the front and it’s nice. There are other spices that are obviously there but I can’t really pick out what they are. But it adds a nice fullness to the taste. As it cools I’m getting even less of a rooibos taste and more of just a spicy swirl on wood. It’s sweeter but for once with rooibos, sweetness doesn’t make me think of moldy/sour wood.

I don’t think this tea is ever going to be something that I crave (too rooibos for that) but it’s certainly one I enjoy. And since I typically detest anything with rooibos, I think it’s safe to say that those that actually like rooibos would really enjoy this one.

^4g/12oz