The dry leaves smell a bit like fruit-intensive trail mix. Not like juicy, fresh fruit, but like dried/preserved fruit, but with a little bready or cookie-like back note.
Pouring the tea into cups, there seemed to be a nutty smell going on but as it cools in my cup a becomes a bit more ‘default tea’-like but with notes of dried fruit. Also, there’s a whiff of dryness that brings to mind wine. Not that this smells like wine but there is a dry feeling to the smell that seems similar.
Taste-wise, it’s… not all that special. It’s smooth with a touch of odd astringency. I say odd because it feels simultaneously dry and sweetly wet. Ultimately the dry astringency wins over the sweet and ends up as the final taste/feel left in my mouth after a swallow. Slurping seems to increase and mix the astringency and wetness, making it wetly bitter, like off nuts from the holiday nut bowl.
Ultimately that wet bitterness makes me unhappy so I’m not a big fan of this tea. It’s not horrible but it’s not good and there’s no special taste in the tea to counteract the end wet bitterness. I’ll have to try it with milk to see if that gets rid of the bitterness because I think without the bitterness, it might be okay if still plain. A ringing endorsement, I know.
Gave the husband a cup too and he thought that it wasn’t up to the standard of some of the previous Ceylons he’s had but he thought it was pretty good. When I asked for more detail, he said that he honestly didn’t remember that much about it even though he had just finished the last swallow less than two minutes before. So yeah, not an overly special tea. That’s too bad.
