Mariage Frères

Next time I’ll use hotter water and less time, after reading an article about hojicha.

This is a very toasty looking and smelling dry leaf. It’s basically a uniform chocolate brown.

Steeped it makes a gorgeous medium-light orangey-coppery liquor and has a deep, toasty aroma. Hojichas’ aroma sometimes make me think of rice, but this one doesn’t.

The flavor is very mellow and smooth, with a thick-ish mouthfeel and a lingering iota of sweetness. It’s toasty, but it’s basically the essence of toasty. Not toasty rice, not toasty veggies. It’s just toasty.

I wonder what a higher temp will do?

I am finally finishing my reviews of GCTTB because I lost my samples in a box but found then yesterday.

1.5 tsp leaf, 500 mL hot (not boiling) water, ~5 minutes (although I kept the teabag in and it has now been about 30 minutes)

This is a comforting, warming black base that is both flavourful and smooth. The spices are reminiscent of winter. It was sweater weather today where I live, and so I grabbed this for my morning cup. The clove and cinnamon (mulling spice) are there, but not overly strong. I can taste citrus peel (orange). From the ingredients list, I can see there are a few ingredients present in the flavor that were subtle in the background: molasses (raisins?), nuts, and vanilla. Definitely more molasses/raisins and not very much nutty or vanilla flavor.

Overall this is a really nice choice for a cold day. I think it would take sweetener or milk well, but I find it very palatable by itself.

Pretty tasty. Orange rind is definitely prominent along with that big-red cinnamon, but in small amounts so it just adds s nice touch of heat and celebration. Has a light candied feel without being cloying or artificially weird. The tea base is prominent enough to hold its own and strike a nice balance. Not my favorite holiday Tea, but very nice nonetheless. Smells fantastic and adds s nice holiday vibe to the house when brewing. Also makes a great iced tea.

Marco! (waving my arms around in a pool trying to find a direction but no idea where I’m going)
I was hesitant to try this after reading all the supposed similarities between this and Harney Paris. I don’t like Paris.

Polo! (oh. I hear you……..whaaa? which direction? not sure)
I had this in tea bag form (a whole box of ‘em) and decided to brew one up because why not. I mean, it’s tea, right? So it’s probably okay. The worst that can happen is that I don’t like it.

Marco! (OK, I think you’re on my right. flailing arms a little less)
Hmm. Smells good. Not artificially weird. and I still smell the tea. Let’s take the teabag out. Oh! okay color…….smells fruity but in a good way, not in a bath and body works way.

Polo! (ah ha. you’re close. I can tell.)
take a sip……oo. Pleasant. caramelized currant. And no headache! The tea is flavorful and there! Very fall-like. Could use a touch of milk but this is just great how it is. I should ice this someday.

Marco! (HA! FOUND YOU!)
Okay, now I get it. No fear anymore. I see the potential to draw similarities between this and Paris. I know Paris has its fans……..I get that everyone has different things that they like and don’t like. I didn’t like Paris because it tasted too artificial to me. Does Marco Polo have artificial notes? I’m sure the ingredients are not 100 perfect natural….but they TASTE like they’re supposed to and don’t trigger a chemical headache for me. It’s like buying a pair of jeans at Target vs. buying a pair of jeans at a Boutique. You’re going to pay more, but the fit is going to be better, and you’re more likely to wear them often…..and in the end, what’s the point in having tea if you’re not going to drink it?

Marco Polo FTW.

“Well, hello, baby. It’s good to see you. I’ve been thinking about you allllll day long and couldn’t wait to come home to you so we could snuggle in bed”.

This is how I feel about Pleine Lune. Absolutely delicious with a natural cherry almond, hints of fruit and nut, and I can still taste tea in it as well. It’s not all fun and games, though. Even though the notes are comforting there is a feel of moodiness to this tea…..like, catch it on a different day or treat it differently and it will show you a whole different side to it. But you don’t care, you are so attracted to it that it could serve you nothing but Cheetos for a month and you would still think it was the best relationship ever. It’s that good (if you’re into dessert-y teas). When I brewed it, the color was a touch lighter than I expected it to be but the flavor was a surprising juxtaposition to the visual substance. The leaves in the tin are gorgeous and smells very much like a cherry liquor. I don’t get a lot of artificiality here, it smells like they used some bitter almond EO, which smells strongly of cherry so the stone fruit strength here would make sense.

In the meantime my husband just got home and this tea needs to go hide in the closet. No one can know of our love. Except you guys.

YEP. I tasted a vanilla tea the other day that I found a bit weak and dull, it really didn’t do much for me except get the response ‘eh’. This, on the other hand, is Vanilla Tea. I can taste a smooth, black tea, and the vanilla used is a mirror of the vanilla bean paste that I buy at a local spice shop……it has the rich sweetness of tobacco without the smoke, the smoothness of rum without the alcohol, and dan absolutely intoxicating, but comforting vanilla scent. The taste of this blew the other one away, hands down, no doubt…..

Even my 15 year old son was all ‘oh. is this what vanilla tea is supposed to taste like?’

Yes, grasshopper, yes. Learn the flavor well. Only good tea for my offspring.

The aroma from the can was shocking, in my opinion. It had a great scent of chocolate, a smell I did not particularly connect to tea. The color was of an amber brown, quite warm-nature. The taste was quite different from the leaves’ aroma, instead of a chocolate taste it had more of a vanilla taste. Overall, the tea was not bad, nothing to overpowering, smooth and slightly sweet.

This tea is so delightful to smell, it should be made into a candle. Its incredibly sweet chocolate and fruity scent overwhelms the nose, but is light on the tongue. It is somewhat bitter, and takes several minutes to fully steep and extract any flavor.

This tea tastes exactly like french vanilla coffee, makes for a good breakfast tea.

Bright blackberry or possibly plum flavour here. Nice black and unsweetened. Milk doesn’t add anything special to this, in my opinion. Sweet, maybe a mix of berries. Light black base. Elegant. A bit honeyed. A delightful cup.

Thank you for this, VariaTEA.

For 50 euro, this is was truly disappointing. For anything more than 20 dollars this would have been disappointing. First of all, for such a price you’d expect Mariage Freres to provide a tin; it didn’t. Second, the leaves are coarse, unpolished, filled with yellow highlights, and unfragrant. I’ll attribute it to the fact that this is “organic.” The same goes for its lack-luster taste. I brewed it at 175 ‘F for 50 seconds with a slow pour but this might call for 160’ at 1 minute 20 because my first brew was lame. There was no umami-filled creaminess characteristic of a high quality tea. The steeped leaves were a brownish green as opposed to the vivid uniform green of better quality teas. Overall, don’t be fooled by the beautiful photo of dark needles; this tea is of poorer quality than the $12 Sencha Yamato from Upton Tea.
Update: I did actually try 164’F for 1 minute 20 with a slow pour and it was so much better. Still definitely not worth the price, but much better nutty, slightly roasted, rounder vegetal flavor. But you can still taste a certain “swampiness” that makes this tea markedly inferior.

Despite limited baggage space coming back from Europe I just HAD to get this tea because it smelled so good.

First thing I was struck by is the colour. It brews up an impressively dark blue-green that I was not expecting, especially considering a reasonably short steep time at 2 minutes. It is beautiful and I almost wish I had made it up in a glass teapot just to really get the full effect.

In terms of taste, this is a lovely ginger and citrus tea and is by no means unpleasant. That being said, I really would’ve like a bit more of a ginger kick. Then again, I think I do often find French teas kind of lacking in ginger even when it’s a prominent tasting note. I think I’m just looking for something that really delivers a strong ginger kick and I’m not looking in the right places.

Recently went to Paris and actually got a chance to go to Mariage Freres and while I didn’t have the bag space or budget to get everything I wanted to (i.e. the entire store), I had to get some of this because it smells absolutely amazing.

Taste wise, this is very similar to how it smell. Very floral and almost perfume-y, though not strictly in a bad way. This reminds me pretty strongly of a jasmine tea. The oolong base is nice but definitely overpowered by the floral notes.

Definitely an enjoyable cup

I got this since I thought I liked floral tea. After having many of Mariage Freres teas, I think I don’t. This tea is really overpowering of violet (given the name, duh!). It makes for an ok iced tea. I don’t like it hot, too much. I think it might make a nice milk tea. I think buying 50g of this tea is ok, I got 100g, it’s just a bit too much.

I love love their Paris Breakfast. It’s a well put together tea. American Breakfast? It’s just not for me. I see this as a stepping stone for a coffee drinker trying to convert to black tea. It’s caramel flavoring came off fake, and too much of it. It’s a ok tea, I’ll drink the rest up with no issue, just don’t love it.

This tea is visually just beautiful in the picture, but the product I got looks nothing like this. I found this tea just ok. I wouldn’t buy it again. It’s just rooibos with just light flavoring for floral. I am been disappointed with a lot of the rooibos blends I got from them. They all taste very familiar with no defining difference. The flavor of citrus isn’t really present without knowing it.

I think this tea would be heighten if there was some black currant flavor. This is a decent herbal, flowery rooibos. Nice amount of lavender. I prefer this iced at night.