277 Tasting Notes
This is our 5th Tea of Christmas! Every year for our holiday poll, quite a few banana teas are nominated and of those – several win enough votes to win their way into the box. However, I want to maintain a variety of tea flavors within the box (I probably could do a banana box with as many banana teas we have blended and how many of those have been requested as a reblend.) So I choose the one tea that received the most votes.
And that would be this tea.
I did tweak the recipe slightly this time around – and I added a teensy bit of Lapsang Souchong. I did this after the initial taste test and I realized that it kind of tasted a little “flat” – like it needed something. This may be because I’ve recently had some bananas foster (the dessert) and the deep caramelization that came from the flambe of the brown sugar was something that I wanted in this tea and I think that the addition of the Lapsang Souchong accomplished this.
It smells a lot smokier than it actually tastes – especially after some cool time – where the smoke melds together with the rum & caramel. I really like how these flavors fuse together in the sip so – as CrowKettle mentioned in her post – this tea definitely does benefit from some cool time.
The 3rd Tea of Christmas!
I realize I’m a little late to the party today – as on the east coast, it’s already time for the 4th Tea of Christmas – my last 24 hours have been a little weird & as a result, I haven’t had the time to sit back and enjoy a cuppa & write a post about it.
PS: I apologize if this ends up being a double post. Steepster was acting weird.
I am CRAZY for Earl Grey. I love bergamot. So, I’m often thinking of ways to bring a new Earl Grey blend to the 52Teas lineup & I’m always happy when the opportunity arrives to reblend one of my previous EG blends.
As I mentioned earlier in a comment on another post for this tea – my original blend had pastel blue & white snowflake sprinkles – while this blend has the rainbow sprinkles & a quick look into photo album tells me that I also did a version with green, red & white sprinkles for a previous holiday box. Ideally, I would have chosen either of those sprinkles for this blend, however, I had purchased these sprinkles a couple of months ago when I had planned on reblending it – however at the time of blending, my cold-pressed bergamot oil had not yet arrived and you can’t very well blend an EG tea without bergamot oil. So, I had to shelf that plan & since this blend did so well in the holiday poll, I decided to just reblend it for the 12 Teas of Christmas box – but I didn’t think it was necessary to buy a new batch of sprinkles since I seldom utilize sprinkles in my teas – but for a cupcake tea, I felt it necessary to add sprinkles. :)
So, that was probably more than you needed to know about why the rainbow sprinkles. Anyway, this tea: I love it. It’s Earl Grey, it’s vanilla, there’s a richness to it that is evocative of cake batter. YUMMY!
Our 2nd Tea of Christmas
I have been looking forward to this cup. This is the first tea that was complete & packaged up as I worked on the 12 Teas of Christmas box – so it was the first tea that I tested. So it’s been a while since I last tasted it! I really enjoyed it – but since I have been tasting a lot of teas over the last 3 months while working on the 12 Teas of Christmas as well as the regular monthly teas, I haven’t had a lot of time to just sit back and brew a cup of tea that wasn’t part of a taste test – you know? So it’s been nice to be able to sit back (at least for a couple of minutes) and enjoy the teas I made for this box.
I really enjoy the way the flavor of the cream cheese (vegan, of course!) plays with the smooth, nutty flavor of the chestnut. It’s a really pleasant cuppa!
The 1st Tea of Christmas!
A blend of black teas, raisins, oranges & my own special recipe of essence to create a taste that evokes thoughts of tea time with scones! I just brewed up a pot & my s/o informed me that it is in the top 5 of all time teas that he’s tried from me (and I’ve served him quite a few cups of tea since I started the 52Teas thing more than 7 years ago!)
It’s really tasty – and it’s lovely to revisit these teas. I think the 12 Teas of Christmas box is one of my favorite things about the holidays!
Have a great day!
That sounds lovely!
Smells delicious!
YAY the 52Teas advent is here!
I can’t believe it’s been seven yeaars!
@Nattie – it’s hard for me to believe too! I didn’t do the 12 Teas of Christmas that first year, because I was struggling to get caught up with all of my Kickstarter rewards, so I instead introduced a 5 tea holiday collection instead. My original plan was to bring that collection back every year, however, I decided to go back to the 12 Teas of Christmas and I’m glad I did because I really enjoy putting it together every year. I start looking forward to it around April or May!
I’m glad you decided to go with the 12 days of Christmas too, not that I have been able to order any tea recently but I always look forward to reading about the teas each year and I can’t wait until I can order it again myself! Hopefully next year will be the year I get my cupboard under enough control to start placing new orders again. (:
That’s a lot of forwrad planning!!
I’m sipping this at the moment – it was one of the reblends from August’s “reblend” month. I cold-brewed it overnight & it’s my first time trying it cold-brewed. I have made it iced by hot brewing & then chilling it, but it’s even better cold-brewed! So yum!
I am logging this one as July’s scavenger hunt prompt “an african tea” because as just about everyone is probably aware, Honeybush is native to & grown in South Africa.
I just added this tea to the website & it has quickly become one of my favorites. I love it. Lots of berry flavor with that unmistakable note of bergamot, I love how well the berry notes & the bergamot mingle on the palate. So sweet but with just enough of that distinctively tart, slightly perfume-y note of bergamot. Really delightful.
And I claim this tea as my “Tea with a Creative Blend of Ingredients” from May’s scavenger hunt. (Yes, May.) Because I’ve not seen another tea with bergamot, blueberries, blackberries, allspice & nutmeg before. :)
I cold-brewed this tea overnight last night & I am loving it. I’m going to post this as a “melon tea” from August’s Scavenger Hunt.
I reblended this for July. I’ll be totally honest with you, after I blended this – I considered blending something else & tossing the batch because I used freeze-dried watermelon for this & while I have used both freeze-dried watermelon as well as dehydrated/air-dried watermelon in my watermelon blends in the past, but this particular batch of freeze-dried watermelon turned out to be so sticky. I’m not sure if it’s because of the combination of freeze-dried watermelon & freeze-dried raspberries, or if it just happened because this batch of watermelon is just stickier than previous batches of freeze-dried watermelon. I don’t know. I just know that it turned out sticky.
But then I tried it & it is SO GOOD. So very good! So very, very good! And it’s even better cold-brewed. I cold-brewed this for 12 hours and it is just so amazingly good. LOTS of watermelon flavor. The raspberry plays well with the watermelon. A nice contrast in flavor profiles.
Also, if you go to this tea’s profile here on Steepster, the “buy now” button will lead you to an Adagio tea. This is better than anything Adagio has ever crafted – so if you want this tea, I still have a couple of taster pouches of it left, so please, instead, visit my website. :)
I know it must be so frustrating that Adagio does this.
@Shae – it is. It’s very frustrating. It’s also – it hurts. I am one person. I own 52teas together with my daughter. We aren’t rich by any stretch of the imagination & we don’t make a whole lot doing this thing. In fact, if I were doing this for profit, I would have thrown in the towel a couple of years ago. I do what I do because I love tea. It’s my passion. I’ve spent a good portion of my life dedicated to it in one way or another and to have a much larger, profitable company like Adagio come in and sponge off my tiny little company hurts, tbh. When an entry level employee at Adagio is paid more by the company than I make at this thing (I don’t even have to know what their pay rate is to know that they’re making more than I do) – to have them also potentially profiting off of my work – hurts.
So, I just “discovered” this in the fridge (or my s/o did) – I had purchased it some time ago when I discovered it at Trader Joe’s & since I love green tea & pineapple together, I figured I needed to try this.
And – it’s OK. I don’t generally care for sparkling water. I find it a bit too bland and all that sparkle should not be so bland, you know? But here, the sparkling water works because there’s a good amount of flavor from the pineapple juice. I don’t taste a lot of anything that I’d recognize as green tea – maybe a hint now and then – that could be more of my wanting to taste green tea than it actually being there. But I definitely do taste pineapple juice – and I like pineapple juice so I’m not hating this. I don’t know if I’d buy this again – it’s not something that I’ll be heading out to Trader Joe’s to get more of tomorrow or anything, but if I happen to be at Trader Joe’s and I see it – I might put another one in my cart if the mood strikes me – but it’s not something I’ll hunt down.
This is my “tea that I’ve never tasted before” for August’s scavenger hunt.
This is the tea of the week for July 4, 2022 (it was just added to the website) & since I have yet to complete May’s scavenger hunt (and a Strawberry Tea is one of the prompts for May’s scavenger hunt) I decided to post here as I do my final taste test of this tea & also post it as part of my scavenger hunt teas. :)
This is so good. I love how it turned out (I know I say that a lot.) The solid Assam base is hearty & malty. It’s the primary flavor of this tea – however, as I continue to sip, the flavors of strawberry shortcake continue to develop & make themselves known. It starts off as a very gentle note of strawberry & hints of vanilla & butter. By mid-sip, I can taste buttery shortbread & a more pronounced strawberry note & a lovely note of cream. The butter really becomes defined as it continues to cool & I continue to sip.
Because this is an Assam, attention to the steep time is important. I recommend somewhere between 2 1/2 minutes to 3 minutes, but not beyond that because the longer this one steeps, the more risk of bitterness. When you do hit that sweet spot (for me, it is 2 minutes 45 seconds) you get a really rich, flavorful, malty black tea that is exactly the flavor I look for in a breakfast tea.
The cool time is also essential for this particular tea. It needs at least 10 minutes to cool before you start sipping. If you drink it fresh & hot right out of the teapot – it’s going to taste like black tea. A really flavorful, delicious black tea but if you want that strawberry flavor, wait a few minutes (at least 10) – the flavor will continue to develop..
It’s also a delicious tea to come back to about an hour later after you’ve forgotten that it’s waiting for you on the counter – (this is my way of saying it’s a good iced tea!)
Flavors: Butter, Malt, Rich, Strawberry, Vanilla
That’s the joy of creation — seeing your finished product come out as intended!
Yeah, it doesn’t always happen that way. Sometimes (not often) the blend just does not work and I need to go in a completely different direction. Sometimes it didn’t quite turn out the way I wanted to but it is still tasty (sometimes even better than expected). It’s hard to know how the leaves will react with the ingredients sometimes.
Applies to yarn, cutting and gluing, concocting kids’ activities…(I’m laughing at “the blend just does not work.” Describes the kids I’ve been teaching for two years two a T! Love them all individually, but oh, the combined chemistry!)
I cold-brewed some of this overnight & I found that the flavors really POP when it’s cold brewed. I like it as a hot tea as well, but I think I prefer it cold-brewed.
I really like this Fujian White Peony & how well the flavors played with the white tea. The blood orange has a nice tartness that contrasts with the sweet honey notes. A lovely iced tea – very refreshing.
