307 Tasting Notes
Thanks to Naylynn for this particular sample (from Xmas card).
Meh, I think I’ve come to realize that in tea, I kind of prefer spearmint, as in like Moroccan mint tea. Peppermint is just OK for me.
I imagine this would be nicer if I put sweetener in. Also- I couldn’t stand the smell of this when it was hot, it smelt super duper medicinal, which for me isn’t always a bad thing, but today, with this, I didn’t want it. After it had cooled to lukewarm, it smelt sweet. The taste is vaguely sweet (without sweetener), and the after effect is kinda minty. I actually am wondering how this would fare as an iced tea in the summer – it would be super cooling!
Thanks Ost for this sample via her Xmas card!
I really liked the first steep. I figured as a pu-erh this could stand being left in the water so I put it directly in my cup! (Western style steep.) I never do that anymore! How my steeping has changed! Really I’m so dependent on my gravity steeper nowadays.
Anyways, the first steep was robust and sweet and yummy. The 2nd steep though was pretty much straight through pu-erh. That can be a good thing most of the time, but in this case it came off to me as fishy, not fun. I finished the cup but didn’t rebrew.
I didn’t write it down, but if I were to guess, I think this sample was from Ost. It’s definitely one I got from the Xmas Cards swap.
A full nutty flavor with a sweet finish. Honestly I’ve never had much in the way of chestnuts. I tend to avoid water chestnuts in stir fry at any cost, but I think the idea would be regular or roasted chestnuts. At least those sound more appealing. I like it, the little white bit in the tea was weird, but I’m guessing that was a chestnut piece… I hope.
From Veronica, from the Xmas Cards swap. Backlog.
This tea is soo good. I have no idea where to get Wegman’s, but that’s probably a good thing with the amount of tea in my cupboard at the moment. It really does taste like almond cookies! When I bake almond cookies, I’m a bit of an almond fiend, I put 2-3x the almond flavoring and mix in some sliced almonds. I’m glad that this tea is strong on that note! The cookie flavoring didn’t disappoint, but what can I say? I’d be in it for the almonds. Yum.
I got a sample of this with my last Lupicia purchase, and I’ve been on a tea bag kick lately.
It’s super fruity! I don’t know what I was doing following the 5 min steep time for a green tea blend though. I suppose that’s for the taste of the rooibos to come out, but it made the green tea bitter. I think if I could try it again I’d try it with green tea parameters. Despite the bitterness, the flavoring was pleasant, as it usually is with Lupicia.
I’ve got an assortment box of Mighty Leaf tea bags that’s just been chilling in the corner of my room for a year or so. I pulled a random one during the middle of this week, because I’m still getting over being sick and I wanted something that would be easy, i.e. teabag.
I’m not the biggest fan of chamomile, given the choice of tisanes, I almost always go for the chrysanthemum. Surprisingly, this tea, while faithful to it’s citrus moniker, is sort of sweet. It’s light on the palate and doesn’t taste too medicinal. Good enough for a mid-break pick me up.
Backlog from… Thursday? You know, sometimes I have brainfarts so massive I wonder how I even function. I was making it cold with some milk (that I bought specifically for the purpose). I also used my blender bottle (although that still stinks of protein).
Somehow I misread 2 tsp as 2tbs. I know right? So after putting two heaping tbs into 8 oz of milk and thinking ‘does this bag REALLY only hold 2-3 servings? LAME’, I reread the bag and caught my mistake. SHAME. To try to fix it I filled the bottle to the top (22oz!) with milk and skipped protein powder for the day. Soy protein counts a little? Maybe not. The proportions probably were not right, I was running late for work and didn’t bother looking up the conversion.
Even shaken up like crazy (until the milk foamed) the powder was not mixing well into the milk. It was also settling out of the liquid every time I let it sit for 10 min. The mix was a little grainy, and honestly I could taste the soybean, and was wishing for more of a matcha taste. I might add some of my own matcha next time to adjust the flavor.
I was wondering how this would go with water, but seeing how badly it did with milk… I don’t want to see the visual result of it settling out of the water mostly. At least I finished most of the bag in one go?
Ost sent this to me in her Xmas card. This girl! She knows my heart! Incidentally I had just got this in the Cyber Monday sale. But I’m drinking her sample first! (Can’t you tell how behind I am?)
I really like this one. It’s a quite compact dry oolong with dry little sugar bits in it, which are green. But the melon this tastes like is cantaloupe! With the green crystals I was expecting honeydew, but nope, those crystals should be pink, or orange.
Even with the sugar crystals this tea isn’t as sweet as their Golden Honeydew, which was super sweet, too sweet for my liking. I think that the little sugar crystals didn’t add much in the way of flavor though, because the 2nd steep were as lovely as the first. I just added anther 30 seconds or so to each steep. The 3rd and 4th steep was more oolong, but still very lovely. I iced the 5th steep. Can’t you tell that this tea just keeps going on forever?
Preparation
I’ve been really bad at doing tasting notes lately. Like really really sporadic. =(
Anyways. This is a random Darjeeling 1st flush that I got in a stash sale, the seller didn’t even remember where it came from. I wasn’t too bothered with that then or now even because it does brew up decently, even though I hope that I know a little bit more know about darjeeling tea now than I did then. Although that is admitted not much more.
Compared to the other darjeelings I’ve tried this one is definitely more of a younger taste. Which I feel like I’m saying younger, but that might mean something different to you. It’s more mellow, yet lively. It doesn’t have a whole ton of depth, but there’s an interesting roundness and surface taste. That probably doesn’t really help all that much, but I had fun trying. How’s this: It’s good, not the best, but nice.
