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Noooope. I yoinked a bag of this from my office mate just to try it. I hated the caffeinated version of this tea but somehow thought the decaf option might taste better. I was wrong. Even rice milk can’t salvage this mess. Who puts black pepper in a chai anyway? That’s all I can taste here. Down the sink it goes, even though that means wasting what used to be perfectly good rice milk until this tea tainted it.

This is very unimpressive. I was hoping it could be a substitute for my beloved Butiki Flowery Pineapple Oolong. But where that tea tastes juicy and natural, this one is slightly drying and tastes more like pineapple candy than actual pineapple. I’m very glad to have tried this blend but the search for a quality pineapple oolong goes on. Thanks for the sample EmilyGee!

This still has a very distinctive flavor. Grassy and haylike with a refreshingly minty aftertaste and a hint of sweetness as it cools. I strongly suggest leaving the bag in while drinking. Sipdown, since the rest is going out in a swap. If I ever get to the point of having a manageable cupboard and only stocking teas I really enjoy, I hope to keep this one in the rotation.

This tea has got to be about 8 years old. I purchased it on an ill-fated trip to Montreal that ended with food poisoning and years of aversion to maple-flavored everything (I’m over that aversion now, thankfully). The tea’s still pretty tasty! I never drank it much because it’s one of those black teas that makes my stomach hurt, but it has a nice muscatel flavor to it. It’s rather drying but not unpleasantly so. I have never tried real ice wine so I don’t know if the tea tastes anything like its actual namesake. No rating because seriously, this tea is olllld.

Sipdown, finally.

Stacy sent this to me as a sample, so it must be at least 6 months old. It’s still really good; it must have been fantastic fresh. The dry leaves are dark, long and tight, almost twig-looking. As they unfurl over multiple steeps, the leaves show themselves to be full, dark, and medium-sized. This tastes and smells almost like a black tea. The robust flavor is full of roasted, almost cocoa notes. There is a slightly drying but not unpleasant afterfeel.

After looking at the description, I think I can detect the almond, jasmine, and malt notes, but that might be imaginary. The fourth steep suddenly comes out blazing with glorious honey notes – now I know why the later steeps of the maple pecan oolong are the best! It’s the base tea shining through and complementing what’s left of the flavoring. The fifth steep is even sweeter. The sixth steep is light and sweet. A lot of that roasted, dry aspect is gone. I ultimately got eight solid steeps out of this tea Western-style. Steeps 1-6 were at about 180F, steeps 7 and 8 were about 190F. The first steep was 4 minutes long. I didn’t time subsequent steeps but they were generally between 4 and 8 minutes long. I suspect the leaf would have lasted even longer brewed gong fu style.

sipdown

Nom nom nom. A little heavy on the clove. Rice milk mellows it out and highlights the vanilla. I think the rice milk is also smoothing out the artificialness that others have noticed, because it’s not bugging me here. Thanks to EmilyGee for the swap!

Score one for bagged teas! This is quite lovely. The brew smells nutty, malty… almost chocolate-y. It tastes like cashews, chicory, and malt, with just a hint of vanilla at the end of the sip. Adding rice milk brings out a roasted nut flavor and strengthens the vanilla flavor at the end of the sip.

This has sarsaparilla in it. I didn’t know what that was so I had to look it up. After reading that it’s used in old-fashioned root beer, I suddenly began tasting root beer in this tea. It now seems super obvious and dominant right down to that tingly root beer after-taste. I’m super skeptical of the timing here though. It’s impossible to tell how much my sense of taste is being influenced by knowing what the ingredient is. It might just be that knowing the ingredient gave me the ability to more precisely name what I was already tasting. Or the taste might have built, or changed, as I got further into the cup and the brew cooled. I love how there are so many factors that go into this one sense, and any one of them can lead the tastebuds in a different direction. Usually I have this experience more with straight unflavored teas but it’s interesting in a flavored tea too.

Thanks to EmilyGee for the sample!

I usually don’t like my teas to taste too much like juice. After all, if I wanted juice I would just drink juice. This blend is rather an exception to that rule. It tastes like mango nectar. Sweet, juicy, and on point. Yet I quite like it. Maybe because it’s an herbal? Then again Butiki’s Mango Lassi was also an herbal that tasted like mango juice and I never entirely got on board with it. I would have to do a side-by-side comparison to figure out why one works for me and the other doesn’t. Maybe it’s just that my tastes and preferences are changing. Alas, I ran out of Mango Lassi months ago and now I’m out of this blend too. Sipdown!

My new favorite complement to Thai food is ginger tea. This tangy root certainly fits the bill. I picked this up during *MissB*’s stash sale a while back. It stands up to spicy food without overwhelming or contradicting it. A touch of honey mellows it out nicely. It also resteeps very well. The second steep is still flavorful but smoother and sweeter than the first.

I also enjoyed this blended with dried lemongrass, orange peel, and mint. Ginger + citrus = yay, and the mint accentuates the crisp, fresh aftertaste of the ginger. The lemongrass came from my friend’s backyard, which I think is just super cool. I have no green thumb whatsoever. I tried to grow cat grass a few years ago and it molded, which I didn’t even realize was a thing that can happen. Add my lack of natural talent to the fact that I live in an apartment with no outdoor space, and suddenly other people’s gardening ability just seems miraculous. Also tasty and rewarding. Yay for friends who are happy to share!

sipdown

Cold brewed at a shmancy training session where they plied us with delicious food and drinks. Frickin delicious. The peach note is prominent, sweet, and juicy. This reminds me very strongly of Simple Loose Leaf’s Sweet Peach White Tea, to the point where I wonder if these companies sourced the blend from the same manufacturer. I loved that tea so I am glad to have found something similar.