Liquid Proust Teas

This is a very nice dessert tea. Chocolate, vanilla, cinnamon, smooth, with nuts at the end. Some earthy puerh comes through on the second steep. I would have steeped it more, but I fell asleep before I could do so.

While I kept meaning to review this…. Pu’erh and oolong got in my way :p
This was an enjoyable tea to create because I talked with Tealet for the black tea base which is quite unique. The idea came from making an earl grey tea that wasn’t too brisk or awkwardly bad quality flavoring. Wasn’t too hard to do that as I had good results with the peach and bergamot oolong I did last year.
Anyways, this tea excels at what I wanted. Great citrus undertones with a feel while the black tea is smooth and goes well with breakfast. I’ve drank this a few times during breakfast and haven’t found an issue with pairing which makes me happy because my best friends favorite type of tea is earl grey. Really looking forward to giving her some as a gift.

This is a mild tea. It’s not special, but it’s certainly not bad. What I really like about it is the teeny tiny rolled up tea balls.

I also can see the root beer taste like Daylon said in his review with stronger steeps.

Sipdown

I found an unopened bag of this last weekend and drank the rest of it on Friday (delayed note, for sure. Ha-ha). The last bit of this was grandpa styled. I even added the vanilla bean to the cup, which made it excellent . I don’t venture into flavored teas that often, but I’m glad that going through my stash allowed me the opportunity to revisit this tea for one last time… :)

Backlog

A tea treat for everyone, apparently.

My wife and friend had both sat down to drink this as we celebrated the new “tea lounge” and study. We were able to each have an experience where neither of us disliked a tea, but had shared similarities in flavor as well as appreciation for this blend.

I realize, after have read LP’s Ode to the new adventure(s)/end of tea blending, as well as have spoken to him in person on said adventure(s), I’ve come to the realization that Liquid Proust Teas will be the new Butiki….However, unlike Butiki, I’ve had the opportunity to sip, share, and enjoy LP’s blends. So, not only do we celebrate the new room where my wife and I can study/read/write/sing/jam out on the drum set/listen to vinyls/have coffee/talk/etc., but we celebrate the new adventures for LP, our family, and friends as well.

Notes (wife): French toast without the cinnamon

Notes (friend): French toast with lots of vanilla

Notes (me): Mmmmmm

I had received this yesterday, but was too immobile after work to make any. However, I must admit that this has been a fun tea to drink. I’m currently on the third steep; which really comes to life with the French Toast experience. I can taste a lot of the “toasted nutmeg bread smothered in vanilla maple syrup” in this steep; which is an accomplishment for LP, since he’s the food-tea combo inspired artist who made French Toast tea.

I will have to extend this note later on, but I want to point out something that occurred to me only a moment ago….A few weeks back, I had the pleasure to visit with LP, to drink tea, eat, and share many thoughts with him on many subjects. However, during the tea gathering, an idea was brought up about pairing food with tea. I believe that Andrew (LP) mentioned that there’s very little known about food & tea together, as much as there is with either wine or beer paired with food. Yet, here is an artist who has accomplished something so complex, unique, complicated, and undiscovered—and with his blends—has made a whole new kind of tea. He uses quality leaf with quality ingredients. And although I’ve never disliked anything thus far (I haven’t tried the Mediterranean Chicken Tea, as I’ve heard/read it called) while drinking LP’s stuff. And with that said, this is why I’ll always support his projects/teas no matter the cause. He’s a great individual with a unique talent; to which I’m happily able to give my monies over to him with the hopes that he can achieve his tea blends and/or dreams!

This tea was okay. It mostly tasted like a root beer flavored black tea. I expected something heavier, but I got a light cup. The tea did have a smoother quality that I usually associate with Dian Hongs, but the cup had a decent amount of dry tannin. I personally did not get a lot of flavor, but I did not think that was horrible. I just don’t think it compares to LP’s other teas.

Lovely tasting cold brew. Took me no time to drink it all. Juicy watermelon. Tastes true to eating watermelon, no artificial taste present. Oolong comes through as a creamy base. Rebrewing the leaves.

Another sample from TTB puerh plus.

This smells wonderful, and very much like jackfruit. My first steep was good, what I would expect from a fruity sheng. Very aromatic, with just a hint of bitterness. 2nd steep still had an amazing aroma and now there’s a bit of mouth drying astringentcy. 3rd steep tasted the fruitiest and continued with a bit of astringency. Later steeps mellowed out and got sweeter as the steep times increased into multiple minutes. Very enjoyable!

I feel like this tea presented itself as a series of dessert flavors. What I got first was a strong brown bread flavor—the bitter earthy kind. There’s a figgy, raisiny kind of flavor that lends sweetness to the entire mix. I also got dark chocolate, but the creaminess of the brew made it taste almost like a chocolate fudge topping. Sometimes I got marshmallows, which switched my mindset from bread pudding to s’mores. . .fun!

As it cools, the vanilla makes itself more well-known, and many of the other flavors drop away. Now I’m drinking a creamy vanilla pudding, but that fig-raisin flavor is still hanging around.

Last of the LP teas! It’s been such a chocolatey, desserty kind of day for me. Happy Birthday LP!

Now that I’ve brewed it, the liquid smells like burnt chocolate pudding and yams, which sounds disgusting, but I am a fan of. I love overcooking chocolate pudding and eating the skin off it.

The brew actually tastes pretty simple. It’s sweet, with a strong flavor of sweet potatoes. These sweet potatoes have the skin on, as that earthy flavor is pretty strong. The cocoa comes up next with a sharp buzz on the finish. A sweet, very strong raisin flavor comes back up the palate after swallowing. I was surprised not to get any of the nuts or rice in the flavor.

My first thought on the first sip was “WHOA, complicated.” There are a lot of layers to this tea. This is an introspective tea, something to spend a quiet afternoon on, thinking.

I like to call teas like this traveling teas—the teas whose different flavors light up the regions of the tongue as you swallow. The dark flavors are the ones that hit first, which are sweet potatoes and cocoa. Then the tea hits the middle of the tongue with brighter flavors, like sugary red fruits. I’m going to tell you now that I suck at identifying fruits in teas, so red is as close as you’re going to get. As the brew fades in the back of the mouth, there’s malt, a little bit of astringency, and a honey-like sweetness. I also got some vanilla caramel flavor.

Though I couldn’t find the nuts in the first brew, subsequent steeps yielded a sweet, creamy pecan flavor, while most of the chocolate and fruits fell away.

The tea itself is beautiful, with cocoa-colored curls of leaves and bright pink petals. It’s an interesting choice, as the bougainvillea-colored petals combined with the creamsicle aroma of the blend suggests a tropical experience is to come.

Once brewed, the liquid has a honey smell that comes out strongly in the flavor. The base tea is sweet and vibrant with honey and floral overtones. I’m not sure if the floral flavor comes from the flower petals or the base, but it’s light and not soapy at all (which is how I typically tend to perceive florals). The bergamot is fresh tasting and bright. It may be a little on the light side for some people, since I didn’t consider it too much. And believe me, I was looking out for it.

The bergamot does get too powerful as the tea cools, however. It’s like I squeezed a full lemon into the cup. So that part isn’t for me.

Otherwise, this tea is a major home run for me.

Finally getting around to trying this one. Such an aesthetically pleasing tea.

Smells strongly of pecan in the dry leaf. Steepings lead first to strong pecan notes, which is really nice. I’ve not had a pecan tea that brought pecans into the flavor without maple. I didn’t get any cocoa until the last 2 steeps of 6 but then it came out and replaced the pecan. An enjoyable transition. The pecan and cocoa melded nicely with the base. This was a nice, pleasant way to spend the evening.

Really well done.

GCTTB5 version 1

I had put a sample of this aside to try. By the time the box came my way a couple of months ago, I was very much unwell and not up to drinking much tea or doing anything really.

Really really like this one. Bright juicy fresh berry flavour supported by the slightest bit of sage to ground it more firmly. Beautiful base. Yes, yes, very enjoyable.

Thank you for sharing this with us, Liquid Proust.

I invited my friend Mitch over to enjoy the Rummy Pu with me. Mitch likes both puerh and liquor, so I was curious to see what he would think of a combination of the two. Upon opening the package, we immediately thought we opened a bottle of rum. The aroma of the dry leaf was strong! It hit us like opening a bottle of rum. I decided to brew 5 grams in my 100ml gaiwan with boiling water. I gave the tea a quick rinse, and normally I would discard the rinse of any puerh, but I was curious to try it. The rinse tasted like straight rum! The puerh hadn’t become apparent yet, I actually got a bit of that alcohol burn! The next few infusions I brewed for about 15 seconds to let the puerh get a bit stronger. The tea definitely had a rum kick to it, but the puerh gave it a nice chocolatey note to it. The best description I can come up with is that the tea tasted like chocolate rum balls. A nice strong rum taste but with a heavy chocolate note to it. What I kept remarking on during the session was what high quality the base puerh tea was. It was a golden needle loose shou puerh that had excellent flavor. I would drink the tea alone even without the barrel. Liquid Proust does not use lower quality bases and hide its flaws with flavor, everything about this base tea was excellent.

Full Review on Tching.com http://www.tching.com/2016/08/review-liquid-proust-teas-rummy-pu/

I was hesitant about trying this sample because the thought of coffee and tea together made me recoil. Today I felt a little adventurous and decided to try it out.

The dry aroma is of caramel and hazelnut coffee. When wet, it smells like ground coffee beans. I was expecting the coffee flavor to dominate, but to my surprise this tasted like a nice roasty da hong pao. The coffee flavor is there but not up front and center. You taste the warm toasty jin xuan first and then a little char from the coffee that complements it nicely. Shared it with my better half who thought it was weird at first, but liked it the more she sipped.

Really grateful to have tried this tea as it’s an unusual combination that I would never have picked out for myself. After having this and Watermelon Baozhong, I’m legitimately impressed by Andrew’s mad skills at tea blending. Looking forward to future LP creations.

I liked this, thought the coffee would be a darker stronger flavour but luckily it wasnt.

was super groggy this morning and after a couple o cups of this im a bit perkier.

it just adds a nutty taste & aroma to the jin xuan making it a bit more like a light-medium roast. Nice. It was a nice jin xuan too, fruity & leafy. I thought I might not like this one but I did, the coffee added a sort of dryness to the brew. I also get grass as well which is odd for jin xuan. slight cream but nothing too strong, just was there in the background, and it appeared as the leaf unfolds, couldnt notice very much milk – perhaps it got hidden from the roast – maybe try giving it a milk steam next time like some other makers do when they make flavoured milk oolong? you might be able to get away with heavier coffee if you do that? IDK, just throwing thoughts out there.

Interesting stuff, well made, everything worked & nothing jumped out and scared me. You’re such a nice bloke as well Andrew – keep it up, LP teas will keep going from strength to strength the more you do this, Steepsters #1 Ambassador.

Made me smile this morning :)

This tea is definitely interesting! On opening the package, I was hit by the strong scent of rum. I’ve never had tea that tastes like alcohol so I was super excited to try it!

I used 3g in about 8oz of boiling water for 1min. The brew smelled like rum and something kind of… mushroomy? earthy? muddy? which is probably the puerh coming through. I couldn’t taste much rum in the beginning, but the rum flavor started coming through as the tea cooled. There was also a hint of sweetness that complemented the alcohol flavor very well.

This tea is very unique, but probably wasted on me since I still haven’t learned to like alcohol yet! I might brew some of this for my more alcohol-loving friends to try.

Still enjoying this one. It’s become my afternoon pick-me-up! I love the cocoa and chocolate flavours, and I’ve discovered that the oolong stays pretty much in the background even with a longer steep time. “Delicious” is all there is to say, really!

Opened this one today. On first sip, it actually reminds me quite of lot of French Toast Dianhong, in as much as the creamy vanilla flavour is very similar, and the black tea base is quite light and definitely chocolatey. I used 1 tsp of leaf for my cup, and gave it 3 minutes in boiling water. I wasn’t sure whether to go with boiling at first because of the oolong, but I figured it was worth a try – I mean, what’s the worst that could happen?

I almost get vanilla chocolate brownie from this one, except the flavour isn’t quite as full or rich as that would suggest. All the elements are there, though, and I might try a longer brew time for my next cup to see how that impacts things.

The oolong is a lot less prominent than I thought it might be. Mostly, I can taste the Fujian black and the vanilla, with only a little woodiness/mineral from the oolong. Also, something that’s putting me in mind of coconut. It works, though, somehow! A delicious start to the morning, and the work week.

I have to admit that I was afraid to try this tea after a mini session with LP. Putting 5 or so needles in a cup full of water yielded a pretty strong rum taste. What on earth was a full session going to taste like??

The dry leaves smell very strongly of rum, but there’s also a fungal, earthy sort of aroma beneath it. That aroma comes through in the scent of the brew and the flavor of the liquid.

Rum, of course, is the strongest flavor. This is particularly great for me because I like some aspects of certain alcohols, but hate that burn that comes with it. This tea allowed me to experience some of that great rummy flavor without the burn. This rum flavor lasted through several steeps.

The base is also nice. As with the dry leaves, the brew is a little fungal, but it is also sweet and woody. It’s rather clean and refreshing for a shou. Later steeps reveal the brew to be more like a dark brown bread, which pairs well with the subdued rum flavor.

This was my favorite of the LP blends so far. Great job!!