I wish I had a cherry flavoured black. That’s just exactly what I’m in the mood for right now. As it happens, however, I do not currently possess a cherry flavoured anything.
So I searched through the black teas in the collection, looking for something that would fill the same sort of criteria. Fruity and black. My first thought was a strawberry black. Which I also don’t have. Second thought was either black currant or blackberry, both of which I have and both of which are really nice, but I’ve just had those recently. Not again already.
Passion fruit then. Very un-cherry-like, but still fruity and I see that it has been rated consistently high by others. I think this one came from QuiltGuppy, which reminds me that my lack of received samples, swaps and gifts organisation is soon to be a thing of the past. See the whole story in the brackets below.
Apart from this sudden onset of fruity black craving, I’ve actually been eyeing this one for a couple of days now, especially when preparing that morning pot. I just don’t think it’s very suitable for that particular purpose. Not the first cup of the morning, and not a shared one when I’m fairly certain that the boyfriend prefers something unflavoured at that point. He does now and then request something flavoured when I bother asking about preferences and sometimes when I don’t bother and just tell him what I intend to make and would he like some, he also agrees. It just never came to pass with this one yet. It’s an ample sample, though, (Ample sample! TEEHEE!) so he’ll probably be subjected to it sooner rather than later anyway.
The dry leaf smelled absolutely wonderful. It was all tropical fruity and even slightly yogurt-y and cake-like. The yogurt-y, cake-y notes are gone in the steeped cup, but the fruit is still strong, and it smells more genuinely passion fruit-y than it did in the dry leaf. There seems to be a touch of vanilla to it as well although this may just be the sweetness of the fruit playing tricks on me.
The flavour is strong and again very fruity. My problems with teas flavoured with passion fruit and mango and papaya so far have been that they all strike me as very similar flavours, and in some cases it’s quite synthetic in flavour as well. Consequently my interest in tropically flavoured teas have been rather low, as are my expectations when trying them out. This one, I’m pleased to inform, have none of those issues. It’s very clearly passion fruit rather than some generic tropical flavour and it tastes real. If I were to say anything negative about it, it would probably be that the flavouring was just a smidgeon too strong and slightly overwhelming. I should have liked a touch of subtlety here.
The tea base is also coming through nicely, in spite of the heavy flavouring. I can tell that it’s tea and that it’s black, but I can’t say anything else about it for certain. It’s a fairly strong bodied one and I’m thinking possibly something Ceylon-y. There’s something dark about it, a dark brownish red flavour that I would immediately associate with that flavour. A sort of polished cherry wood colour. I need to make up a plain Ceylon later and pay attention to whether that one provokes a colour association and whether that too is a dark brownish red.
All in all, I’m very pleasantly surprised by this one. In spite of previously mentioned reservations towards the tropical flavours family, I actually had some pretty high expectations of it, and I’m glad to say I was not let down.
(The boyfriend has bought me a plastic storage box of a suitable size and everything that was kicking about in the Sample Basket is now in the box, sorted according to type.
I’m going to need another box for pouches such as the ones from 52teas and Chi of Tea and suchlike. They don’t really belong in the Sample Box, even if a couple of them were gifts, but they don’t look very attractive on the shelves either with the tins. Now if I had one more shelf… but there’s no room for that unless we stretch to reach the new top one. I don’t think we’re very interested in that.
Anyway, the original plan was that each group of samples should be sorted according to where they came from, but that didn’t really seem to work out too well in the box. Partly because I can’t remember where I got all my current ones from, so I can’t sort them for certain and also partly because I’m not really likely to stand there and think, ‘Oh, I think I’ll want something from QG today.’ I’m more likely to decide I want something black or green.
I shall instead device a numbering system. I need a small notebook and some small labels, and then I’ll just number the lot according to who the gifter was. The boyfriend says I’m being highly OCD about it, but he did seem to agree that the current non-system of being unable to remember who to thank is a little rude of me. If OCD is the solution then so be it. :) )
