New Tasting Notes

With this tea, it isn’t the fruitiest, but it still tastes great, and served iced, I find it can actually quench my thirst pretty easily. Still 8/10, and really yummy warm as well.

Iced.

I wanted something sweet, fruity and refreshing and this was one of our TOTDs yesterday so I thought why not? I was definitely getting a lot of the sweet, smooth berry notes: not just blackberry but more of a mixed berry type of thing. With the creamy undertones, this all came together in a way that was giving me mad Campino vibes. You know, the creamy fruit and yogurt candies? I’m pretty sure they never had a blackberry flavour, but I know they definitely had a strawberry one.

It’s been a long time since I last had a campino; now I’m really craving one!

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

- With added milk and sugar… kind of
- More elderflower than currant; but still both present and jammy
- Was trying to go for really “British” steep of it by using milk/sugar
- Since black currant is such a British flavour
- It didn’t quite work because my hipster ass only had coconut milk & coconut sugar
- Still pretty tasty, but coconut was not the most complimentary flavour

Well, I did something really stupid today. Shopping at a Chinese Food Market I picked up grocery store sencha. Why oh why? Got it home, opened it and tried it and it smelled and tasted bad. What was I expecting? You only get what you pay for. Oh well. One of those bad decisions.

However, buying this tea was not a bad decision. Buying this was a VERY GOOD decision. The name is almost the same as the tea I loved from last year but the Tokujo in the name is different. It runs a little cheaper than that expensive tea (which I did buy too). This tea is very buttery and has a definite floral taste in the first 2 infusions. After that it’s just buttery & smooth. Very little astringency in this one compared to other Japanese greens. Did 3 infusions 30sec, 2 sec, 5 sec

So I’ve tried 2 out of the 4 teas I got from Yuuki-Cha and they are both great.

Decided to treat myself to a bubble bath with a cute little teacup of this tea, one of my favourites to ‘reward’ myself with when I’ve had an off day or just need a little something special. As always, it was warm and toasty with the perfect sweet, nutty flavour profile that just felt like a warm, inviting hug. Though, there was almost a salted peanut sort of thing going on too.

But I wasn’t mad at it.

100% brought this one in to work with me to show off how fucking pretty it looks. It worked.

Strong notes of both basil and anise, hints of rose.

Bought this recently in a stash sale. It was such a good price I couldn’t resist. This is an excellent tea. There was a fair amount of fermentation flavor this being from 2014 but that flavor was neither fishy nor unpleasant and was somewhat sweet. The fermentation lasted about four or five steeps and what I was left with was a nice sweet ripe. This is the highest grade of ripe in normal production at Menghai Tea Factory and you can tell, it tastes that good. There was a bit of a fruity flavor at the end but not really sure what to call it.

I steeped this ten times in a 100ml teapot with 8g leaf and boiling water. I gave it a 10 second rinse. I steeped it for 5 sec, 5 sec, 7 sec, 10 sec, 15 sec, 20 sec, 25 sec, 30 sec, 45 sec, and 1 minute. I could have easily gotten a few more steeps out of it but ten was enough caffeine.

Tasty and pineapple-y.

Latte Sipdown (248)!

Slowly getting those sipdowns in…

This one wasn’t a bad latte, it reminded me a lot of DAVIDsTEA’s Creme Brulee rooibos blend that I was always such a big fan of. It was very creamy, with a super rich mouthfeel and strong, full bodied vanilla notes. I think it would have definitely benefited from a secondary flavour though because it did feel a little one-note. Perhaps the softest hint of cinnamon or nutmeg? You could totally add that yourself by just lightly dusting some onto the latte, though. Anyway; it was a nice enough sweet treat! Very comforting, for sure. If you’re looking for a good, point blank vanilla flavour this would be a dependable option.

This is definitely my favourite out of the new mini collection. While it is like Electric Lemonade, it’s much better with the nice strawberry flavour and without the citric acid in the blend (which made my tongue hurt) So yeah this is pretty good for me! I really like this one. Will definitely get more!!

Western.

God, I love the little curly snail looking tea leaf for this one. It’s just so strikingly fun and whimsical; I could look at it forever.

- Can’t decide if I like this one or not
- Very, very buttery with a sharply smokey finish
- The body is very, very vegetal: artichoke, green beans, peas, squash
- It’s unlike your typical white tea for sure; just don’t know that I’m into it

Maybe it’s a bit of an acquired taste and I’ll just have to try it a few more times to get into it; or perhaps I just need to approach this one with a different style of making it. I’ll hold off on rating in the meantime, until I’ve tried this a few more times and know what I think of it a little better.

Oversteeped this one while I was closing up the store the other night – I was pretty distracted by the paperwork I was filling out, and closing up the registers. My bad!

I added in some milk and the smallest pinch of cane sugar to smooth it over though, and it worked out pretty good. Strong bergamot notes for sure, with fruitier jammy undertones. It also had a weird floral thing going on? Sort of lavender-ish, which was very weird to me because there’s no reason this one should taste like lavender. Oh well.

Latte!

I made this one as a latte for myself because I was craving chocolate and it’s pretty well our mostly chocolate-y tea at the moment other than, possibly, Hot Chocolate. This has white chocolate though, and I like white chocolate. I also needed a new apple free tea, since I bring an apple free tea to the guy I’m ‘dating’ (seeing? idk; dating culture is weird) every day that we’re both working – and this was a good a choice as any other.

He liked it a lot; personally I didn’t mind it. I mean, it is VERY chocolatey and that’s what I was craving so in that sense it worked very well for me. However, I likely would have been better off choosing a a blend with chocolate and a secondary flavour because half way through my latte that intense chocolate craving had been more than sated and I was left with a beverage that just otherwise felt a little flat/one dimensional. I will say that it tasted strikingly like chocolate cake though and not just flat chocolate. So it definitely gets kudos for accuracy’s sake.

Meh; it worked in the moment.

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

Nabbed this one with my last order because I’ve been curious for a while; and why not try it now? I can’t think of a reason not to…

I suppose what I expected from this one was pretty much your typical Shou Mei flavour but just with a lot more body? In a way, I suppose it is that. It’s got a very thick mouthfeel/liquor, and the overall flavour is relatively full bodied (for a white tea) with a lot of natural sweetness. The top notes and body are both pretty tangy, with some supporting hot hay notes. The finish is much smoother, and has a bit of a wood chip/dried wood sort of taste to it.

For a Western cup, this was interesting with a slightly above average sort of complexity to it. I imagine this would be quite nice and smooth Gong Fu, though my gut feeling is that it probably wouldn’t be a very long lasting session. Something worth trying, though.

In my short tea drinking life, this has been my favorite tea. I haven’t been able to find the subtle chocolate flavor that this tea suggests in anything else so far.

You know how sometimes you start drinking a tea and you don’t feel the desire to drink another tea, like at all. You wake up and you think what tea shall I drink? Oh, I know— the same tea I drank yesterday! This continues until I have to go out, because this tea mostly does not survive an outing in a travel mug or thermos.

So as I’ve mentioned before, this tea is all mild milky banana pudding and lovely collaborative black base. Total comfort drink, like wrapping myself up in a thick fleece blanket, which I’ve been doing as well because there have been several back to back cold and rainy days. That and because my spirit needs it.

The appeal of this tea for me is the taste and the comfort. The banana and coconut are both mild but present.

The past few weeks have been challenging and this tea has been a great balm while I attempt to keep myself together. Surely I have another tea or two that are comforting and sustaining, but this is the one that I’ve been reaching for. Its days are numbered. And then what?!

I’m not a fan of oolongs but I keep getting sucked into trying them. With yummy names like “lemon pound cake” how can I resist?! I got a sample size of this in store and I’m surprised to say it is pretty good! I’m getting a lot of bright lemon/lemongrass flavoring and none of the cardboard flatness that I tend to get with oolongs. There is a little tang at the end of the sip, but most of it is lovely light lemon, like the scent of a lemon, not the taste of the fruit. I totally neglected this tea while steeping and left it sitting for several minutes, but it seems to deal with the abuse well. Although I’m enjoying this tea, I don’t think I would stock it in my cupboard, but it has been a fun tea to try.

This tea is disgusting. I have had and liked an herbal cocoa mint blend in the past (I recall the company had rooibos in the description), but it had been discontinued and I’ve been searching for a replacement since. This is not a proper replacement for it. All I can taste is watery rooibos with a little chocolate mint. The whole thing is weak and watery and unbalanced. I’m glad I found it in bulk and only bought a little bit of it. Bad tea makes expensive compost.

My 2nd all time favourite tea. It’s the best iced, no questions asked. Tart/sour, and delicious.

Another grapefruit tea… I’m not a fan of grapefruit, so thought I’d get this tasting out of the way. It’s definitely better than Grapefruit Granita was. I don’t like grapefruit but if you’re a fan of it, you’d probably really like this tea, it’s very grapefruity. With the bitterness that comes with it as well. I added sugar which makes it more drinkable. I will finish it, but won’t buy it. I only got a small amount to make this iced cup at home. Not bad, but not my cup of tea either.

So, I’m stuck at a weeklong youth retreat for a position I’m about to leave. I find this situation infuriating. Fortunately, I managed to carve out some time for a morning gongfu session. I know I don’t do a ton of Keemun, but this was really nice.

Obviously, I gongfued this tea. My current setting wasn’t ideal (I had to set up shop in a dormitory room), but I managed. I did not conduct a rinse due to the limitations of my surroundings. I started by steeping approximately 5-6 grams of loose leaf material in 4 ounces of 212 F water for 5 seconds. This infusion was chased by 14 additional infusions. Steep times for these infusions were as follows: 7 seconds, 10 seconds, 15 seconds, 20 seconds, 25 seconds, 30 seconds, 40 seconds, 50 seconds, 1 minute, 1 minute 15 seconds, 1 minute 30 seconds, 2 minutes, 3 minutes, and 5 minutes.

Prior to the initial infusion, the dry leaf material emitted aromas of chocolate, plums, and leather. After infusion, I detected emerging malt, brown toast, smoke, roasted nut, and wood scents. In the mouth, I discovered intriguing notes of dark wood, brown toast, cream, plums, smoke, roasted nuts, chocolate, and leather. Subsequent infusions allowed the nut impressions to separate. I began to pick up roasted almond, hickory, and black walnut. I also began to detect sorghum, pine, cedar, black cherry, apricot, minerals, and roasted grain. The later infusions were dominated by minerals. There were, however, lingering touches of wood, smoke, leather, sorghum, and nuts.

I know it is not exactly the season for strong black teas, and as previously mentioned, my setting did not lend itself to a gongfu session, but I found this to be a very nice tea regardless. The Keemuns from Harney & Sons seem to enjoy a good reputation, and after trying this tea, I can certainly see why. I would have no problem recommending this to anyone looking for a flavorful black tea.

I’m getting to the end of this cake and I’ve enjoyed the journey. It started out very light but in the past couple of years the tea has become significantly sweeter and thicker. An incredibly reliable and consistent every day drinker that I’ll definitely miss.