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I received a Bird and Blend subscription envelope yesterday. I prepared Cloud 9, but I was too tired to make some notes.

Today I took another one. This one. Mug (300 ml), heaped their tea spoon and strainer. I do not know how much grams.

Aroma: Chocolate, cherries – quite strong for brew. When dry, it smells more like sherry liquor. It reminds me my first (and last) sherry experience. That was when I was 11 years old. I had to admit I liked it.

Colour is as expected – copper with bit of dust. And clear.

Taste: very interesting, quite vivid and changing with temperature. At first it was more creamy and chocolate notes. Now it is much more cherry and bit sour. But it is very pleasant.

Nice black tea blend – I found out that it is with tea, so I hope I will sleep! If I took that as a fruit blend – it is really nice. If I take it as a “real” tea – not so perfect. But still very high rating from me for this one

Tea bag (well, I am a collector, so I bought a pack of different ones).

I took it from the foil wrapping which is around and strong aroma hit me. Banana. Not chamomile, or honey but banana. Then some chamomile notes started to appear with faint honey. I guess I won´t like it.

Colour is not so clear and golden.

It smeels quite reasonable now. Quite herbal – but yeah, it is herbal blend.

Taste, flavors, et cetera: Actually, it is not so bad! Bit spicy, bit of bananas (I really wonder), chamomile flavour is weak. Not much honey. Not my cup of tea I assume, but I understand why somebody can like it. But for me, it is just a little above average.

By the way, there are two entries of this tea, so it should be merged up.

Tea bag of unknown age, but in foil wrapper, so it should be still okay.

It was pleasant, bold black tea. No bad taste, stongly malt one. I can not find any downsides of this tea. It wasn´t much complex – but hey, it was a tea bag, right?

Colour was dark copper, as expected from black tea bag. I would prefer bit of sweetness, but it wasn´t bitter at all. Honestly I am really surprised of this one. Robust, malty, rich tea. And better than that Sebastea High Grown loose leaf I bought the other day.

I almost ran out of black teas, so I picked up in shop this one. The shop assistant recommend me some another, but it was CTC. Like really? I guess she wanted sell me bad tea for awfully high price. This one is HGFBOP. I wonder what “HG” stands for? Maybe “high grown”?

Anyway, let´s check out this tea.

Aroma of dry leaves is strong, black “tea” aroma, withount funky notes, bit herbal. Dry leaves are quite big, but broken. Luckily not many branches there, but unfortunately they are there. On visual side I think they are quite good for the price.

Heat up the kettle, I need a tea! I used about 4 grams of this tea, in ball strainer (I really should buy some big one!), a mug with boiling water. They suggest a 3-5 minutes steeping time. I did 4 minutes brew.

Aroma is bit weak, little a jam notes, little malt, little campfire. Not smoky, but rather like a fire (thus campfire I guess). But really weak. Taste was similar, bit more bold of malt and jam. But still really weak which surprised me as it is broken orange pekoe. I thought it will be much stronger. Maybe next time I will use more tea and/or longer steeping time. I have plenty of it. I can share (but nobody would like it I assume).

Hmm, weak tea, not fancy as much they are selling it. Nothing distinctive. Too bad that I have tea bags with stronger and more interesting taste. At least it is not awfully bitter!

I went to tea room yesterday, as I had to wait for my friend.

Gaiwan (unknown volume, I guess about 120 ml), steeps around 20 seconds with 90°C water, then up to 1 minute steep. I don´t know how much leaves in, maybe 5 grams?

Let´s start with aroma: really nice floral garden, maybe little jasmine notes, nothing funky, bitter, or unpleasant. I really liked it and it changes during the steeps.
Colour: hard to say, as it was dark there, but I was trying my best and I think it was yellow-green and clear. Maybe bit more yellow, but the light has warm temperature. So, I can´t be really sure.
Taste: the most important! Wonderful. It was like walk through garden, smooth, bit like a cream or milk (thank you Mr. Teaman there). I have to learn so much to recognize different tastes. Smooth. Jasmine. Floral. Dreaming.

Really good tea, which is unfortunately out of their stock (on website), but they offered me a bag for 350 CZK (I guess 100 grams). More amazing than I thought, probably very fresh one. LOVELY!

Yesterday I ate too much kebab apparently and today was my stomach upset.
So I took another tea bag – I should return to loose leaf at home.

Zažívání means digesting. Steeped for 10 minutes, as it is recommended, boiling water.

Colour is medicinal green. Like the box I guess.
Aroma – herbs, peppermint and chamomile.
Taste – herbal, dominant peppermint with chamomile sweetness. Bit spicy due to ginger. Nice and easy drinking tea, pure herbals, no extra ingredients. It was not really tasty – but it was not so bad as I expected.

My stomach feels better now.

I was looking for some simple Bergamot tea tis morning and took this one again.

It was again very nice, blend of teas was carefully selected so it was smooth with little of citrusy taste. But this time it was not malty at all. Aroma was very different too; completely different than first time. It smelled like campfire and smoke. I did not noticed any fresh citrus aroma this time. Colour was dark copper without oil flecks. Probably less oil on these leaves?

But still it was nice blend – so I would not change my rating.

I would not rate, as I usually do not like camomile on it its own.

I guess it is okay tea. Aroma was nice, no funky notes, no unpleasant stuff. Colour was nice golden and quite clear. Bit of dust settled down the mug. Taste – well, just camomile, quite soothing . But it is camomile.

I have this one from October 2017 apparently. Some last rolls in a tin. For first time prepared in gaiwan, so let´s see.

20 s rinse, 30 s steepings

At first it smelled very citrusy, like crushed lemon peel or lemon dish detegrent. That one is unfortunately (or fortunately?) gone with rinse. Now it smells and tastes like grass, maybe bit of hay, quite flowery though. Hmm, not great. Bit bland maybe.

Boring tea. Hay and grass, bit flowers.
Liquor colour is pretty green, with bit of yellow notes. Clear though.

Maybe it is old, maybe just cheap oolong. At least the leaves are quite big; now I have full gaiwan of leaves and almost no space for water.

Traditional bag, not a pyramid one.

Well, another gift, another tea bag. But at least nice wrapping which is going to be awesome in my collection.

Aroma is really strong, it was like smelling bloom of sakura itself. Mug (about 300 ml), boiling water. There were no instructions. Or maybe in Japanese. Hmm. Let´s see.

Colour was turning quite quick to copper – apparently it is black tea with sakura flavouring / aroma. But it was smelling great, full blooming sakuras. No tea notes. I took bag out about two minutes of steeping.

Taste was smooth and flowery. Bit of cherries. But it was pleasant. I liked it more than expected.