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Catching up on advent calendar notes today! I definitely got too many this year, so I’ll be doing this for a while. I think three is what’s actually realistic for me to keep this fun and interesting rather than stressful and overwhelming. This year I got the Teeccino, Clipper, Dammann Freres, Kiani, Plum Deluxe (advent and Hanukkah sampler), DavidsTea herbal, TeaThoughts, and did the Steepster homemade advent. I only managed to stay mostly on track with 4 of them, and even then my notes aren’t all up to date. TeaThoughts is a constant, but I’ll have to be more thoughtful and selective about my other advents next year!

French Roast is day 22 of the Teeccino advent calendar. Apparently I HATED this blend ten years ago, describing it as tasting like “burnt chicory, with a hint of carob.” It’s still not my favorite Teeccino blend, but I’ve softened on it with time. It doesn’t have any astringency or bitterness, but it’s thick and has a pronounced chicory note that makes it clear that it’s not coffee. The blend is particularly disadvantaged because I accidentally mixed up my mug with another and drank some incredibly good coffee thinking that it was this tea, then went back to this tea – so the not-coffee-ness of the tea was very acutely obvious. It’s less of a big deal in the flavored blends because the flavoring takes center stage, and somehow the dark roast seems to have been a better dupe for coffee. On the up side, my tastes have changed in ten years and I now quite like chicory, so I’m adjusting my score (up from 12!) accordingly.