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I forgot to set the timer and ended up steeping this cup longer than I intended to, but the tea doesn’t seemed to have suffered for it. This is a fun tea as the name would suggest – it has a great, sweet banana flavour and smoothness that makes me think of banana cream pie. It certainly doesn’t need any extra sweetener added to it which is one thing I love about honeybush-based teas.

I feel a cold coming on – not surprising really as there’s usually something going around this time of year at the university. My taste buds haven’t been affected yet so I’ll post this tasting note while I still can. ;)

I can’t believe no one has thought to combine an earl grey with cheesecake flavours before. It produces a very smooth, almost creamy blend that’s reminiscent of a good cream earl grey but with the addition of that cheesecake hint of sourness. There’s an oddly fruity note that I’m also picking up, though this might be due to it having absorbed flavours from other teas in my cupboard as it was sitting in there for quite awhile. :/

Sipdown – I fiddled a bit with the leaf amount and steaping time but I was never able to get more flavour out of this tea. Even with milk, it never improved beyond basic-black-tea-with-a-hint-of-cinnamon.

Revisiting this tea. Hotter water and a bit longer steeping does bring out the cherry flavour and I’m picking up a bit of vanilla in the bargain. I’m not tasting any brandy, though I’m not feeling the lack too much. The white tea base was an excellent choice for this blend as it really compliments the flavours.

I’m liking this tea a bit better with some agave nectar added to it as it lightens the bitterness of the cocoa and makes the blend more like a chocolatey dessert tea. Still not quite getting ‘chocolate truffle’ from it though. :/

Flavoured teas are all very well and good, but I was craving a nice, plain black tea today. This tea comes from the now-defunct Special Teas (another casualty of Teavana). It’s a very nice-looking tea – small twists of black and gold and it has the classic malty Assam scent with a hint of smokiness. The tea is robust but not bitter and at a steeping of 3.5 mins it’s fine without milk. It has wonderful fruity notes underneath that maltiness that give the tea a layered subtly you don’t normally get with Assams.

I stocked up on this tea but I’ll have to see about finding another source for when my stash runs out.

I thought for sure I’d logged all those Teaopia teas I purchased back when they were having their big “We’re-being-taken-over-by-Teavana Sale” but either I was mistaken or Steepster ate the tasting notes. Anyways, I’ll see about remedying that.

The smell when I opened the pouch was very sweet, creamy and fruity to the point of being almost too much. Some other Steepsterites have called it artificial and I can sort of see where they’re coming from. I expected the tea to taste equally as sweet and creamy but unfortunately I was disappointed – I still got the peachy notes particularly as the tea cooled off, but the rest was sadly missing. A bit of a let down all told.

There’s so much going on with this tea it’s hard to properly sort it out. It’s certainly spicy but there’s not really anything coming across that makes me think of ‘cake’ or any other kind of dessert. It’s not terribly sweet and the vanilla and the currants and the chocolate, which theoretically should have alleviated that, ended up pretty much buried underneath the spice. The spices are a nice mix with star anise and cardamom being the most prominent ones that pop out. I don’t normally sweeten green teas but this is one that I think would be improved with a bit of agave nectar or honey.

Yes, another chocolate pu’erh – they do seem to get paired together quite often. I get a stronger sense of the pu’erh base with this blend than I have with other chocolate-flavoured pu’erhs. It’s a pleasant mix of earthy and leather-like with a hint of smokiness. It goes well with the rich bitterness of the cocoa though it could stand to be a bit sweeter. Ultimately it’s not bad, but also not my favorite out of all the similar blends I’ve tried.

Whoa this is a jolt to the system. It mostly tastes like ginger with a healthy shot of spicy cayenne pepper and a citrus tang that reminds me a bit of Neo Citron. It has the tendency to settle no matter how well the powder is stirred in, which means it gets stronger as you get towards the bottom and the last few sips nearly had my eyes watering.

I’m going to save the rest of this for the depths of winter as I’m prone to colds and this seems like something that would actually help a bit. I don’t know if I’d drink this for enjoyment – it’s a bit much for me.