My first sniff of the dried leaves smelled just like canned pumpkin with a little additional spice. But sniffs after that were more… pumpkin cider. And then more of a sweet chai. I’m missing the sweet bit that I had on the first sniff. All brewed up, I get more pie spice still, but the pumpkin is back a little. I’m expecting this to be very chai-like.
The taste isn’t a strong as I expected actually and after I swallow, a few pauses later I get an expanding taste of the tea base. Also a little warm spiciness is left on my tongue. There is also a distinctly different spice taste at the front. So each sip goes sweet spice, warm spice, nothing, spicy spice, pause, pause, pause, tea. Honestly, it’s the nothing that’s throwing me off. I can’t seem to taste anything when I hold the tea in my mouth. Even swishing it around, all I taste is just a spice aftertaste. Once I swallow, I get more spice but when the tea is in my mouth, I just get the post-warmth aftertaste. It’s really really weird.
I’m wondering if the sweet taste I get at the beginning is pumpkin. Or maybe the nothing taste is really pumpkin. Either way though, it’s overpowered by the spice when I sip so I just can’t get my tastebuds to it. But it’s weird because none of the tastes seem to blend. They are all separate. Standing there independently, not glancing at or even acknowledging the other tastes there.
With half a cup left, I put a little sugar in to see if that helps any. I’ve probably put too much sugar (maybe a quarter teaspoon) so I imagine at the very least this will be sweet now… And sugar did it no favors. Sure, now there is an underlying sweetness that attempts to mush the uncooperative tastes together but having that added sweetness makes the spice and the tea flavor at the end show up as bitter. Yes, I added sugar and I taste bitterness now.
Okay, before sugar, this cup was weird. After sugar, this cup is unpleasant. But I’m going to rate this on the better of the two tastes and go with the unsweetened cup. Which means instead of being gross, this cup was just… confusing.
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I wish I had the $ and the cupboard space for this one! I get more interested w/ each tasting note.:(
I initially didn’t like this much. It was drinkable, but only just. I found that adding (plenty of) milk to it helped a lot to smooth it out. But then I’m not entirely sure that my problem with it (a dry, almost dusty dark sort of flavour) is the same as yours (spicy aftertaste), so that might not help for you. Taken that way, it’s been growing on me though. Not enough that I would cry if someone took the rest of it off my hands, but I can drink it now and will likely actually finish the bag.
Thanks for the suggestion – I will give that a shot the next time I try it. I think the milk would help mute the spices and maybe (hopefully) let the pumpkin come out more? And if I’m really lucky, it’ll bring the tastes together for me. Because this tea confused me a bit.
I haven’t first clue what pumpkins actually taste like so I wouldn’t know. But it made it more tolerable and less soap-like for me. I find it’s good for just before bedtime so I can fall asleep. But that likely has more to do with the warm milk than with the tea. :)
Do you put sugar or just milk in it? I’m currently plotting a take two.
I only put milk, but I use a LOT of milk. About one part milk to four parts tea or something like that. I’ve tried it with sugar and that worked too, but I decided it wasn’t as necessary. I can’t remember if I’ve ever tried it with just sugar other than the very first time I had it and I was experimenting, so I don’t know how that would be now that I’m liking it a little better. I’ll have to test that out.
I wish I had the $ and the cupboard space for this one! I get more interested w/ each tasting note.:(
I initially didn’t like this much. It was drinkable, but only just. I found that adding (plenty of) milk to it helped a lot to smooth it out. But then I’m not entirely sure that my problem with it (a dry, almost dusty dark sort of flavour) is the same as yours (spicy aftertaste), so that might not help for you. Taken that way, it’s been growing on me though. Not enough that I would cry if someone took the rest of it off my hands, but I can drink it now and will likely actually finish the bag.
Thanks for the suggestion – I will give that a shot the next time I try it. I think the milk would help mute the spices and maybe (hopefully) let the pumpkin come out more? And if I’m really lucky, it’ll bring the tastes together for me. Because this tea confused me a bit.
I haven’t first clue what pumpkins actually taste like so I wouldn’t know. But it made it more tolerable and less soap-like for me. I find it’s good for just before bedtime so I can fall asleep. But that likely has more to do with the warm milk than with the tea. :)
Do you put sugar or just milk in it? I’m currently plotting a take two.
I only put milk, but I use a LOT of milk. About one part milk to four parts tea or something like that. I’ve tried it with sugar and that worked too, but I decided it wasn’t as necessary. I can’t remember if I’ve ever tried it with just sugar other than the very first time I had it and I was experimenting, so I don’t know how that would be now that I’m liking it a little better. I’ll have to test that out.