Featured & New Tasting Notes

I recently tried the autumn flush from the same estate. They are day and night different. I only thought I knew what Darjeeling looked and tasted like. This one dry has a hay, grass, and orange blossom aroma. The leaf appears more like a green or a white peony. Steeped the liquor is honey yellow with a slight green tint. It certainly has no traits at this point to suggest black tea.

The wet leaf is freshly green and mostly whole leaves. Due to settling there are some large broken pieces but nothing to suggest this is less than top quality.

The wet leaf does have some woodsy muscatel notes to confirm it just might be a black tea after all.

Copying from my blog post concerning the taste: The What-Cha description on the sample label nails this tea, “A brilliant sweet start with a spicy finish.” Attempting to expand on this a little – after the sweetness I catch the first notes of muscatel. It is a light grape leaf like flavor. It fades quickly into a moment of mineral. Just as quickly it moves right into that spicy finish with the leaf taste moving below the spice. The aftertaste lingers well in a sweet fruity note, as just a touch of cheek tingle moves in to further please the senses.

If you find Darjeeling interesting (or if you know almost nothing about them) I highly recommend getting a sample of this one and the autumnal flush to experience the wide range of this tea.

I’m attempting to drink this tea at the moment. I’m glad to see that this tea has already sold out, because unfortunately, I can’t offer a lot of words that I think would encourage someone to buy this one. I’m just not crazy about it. (Sorry Frank!)

I’m not tasting a lot of pear. I’m not tasting a lot of ginger. I’m tasting jasmine. And it isn’t jasmine notes derived from the presence of the jasmine blossoms in the blend. It’s jasmine essence from jasmine oil. I really think that the people who sell jasmine oil should print on the outside of the bottle “for external use only” because jasmine oil is just not good on tea and I can’t imagine another culinary use that it would be good for.

This blend would be so much better if the jasmine oil wasn’t used and the jasmine was from either the flowers in the blend or if a jasmine scented tea was sourced for this blend. As it is, this just isn’t working for me.

ETA: As it cools, I pick up on more pear and ginger notes. It’s a better tea cold than it is hot. I still taste too much jasmine oil though.

I’ve had this a few times now, but I don’t remember the powder sugar being so pronounced.. or there at all. I think it was mostly plum before- now it’s all in with the cashew cake and tangy-sweet syrup. Magic. The kind that’s probably connected to cooler drinking temperature, shorter steep time, etc. Also, paying attention to what I’m drinking.. I don’t know.

This is going to help me not eat the last of the cheesecake in the fridge. Yes it is. The last of the cheesecake was the perfect accompaniment for this tea.

I did it!!! My cupboard is at 175 – yay goal achieved.

I drank the last of this at work today. It’s a really nice Yunnan Golden Snail style tea, but it’s not my favorite. This isn’t as chocolatey as I would like. It’s good, decent quality, Berrylleb is a great ebay seller and I’ve liked all the teas I got from them – but this is just more malty, maybe a little sweet potato – but not chocolate enough. Really Good – just not Fantastic for me. :))

Ooh, coffee tea. My kind of thing. The idea of a coffee-flavoured tea has always been amusing to me. Why not just drink coffee? Because a coffee-flavoured tea can taste so damn good too!

The dry leaf is coffee with heavy cream, kind of like a double-double (which reminds me that I need to get in on Tim Hortons Roll up the Rim before it’s gone again).

I’ve actually had this twice already. The first time I added less leaf and it turned out the best. Delicious iced cappuccino (Tim Hortons-style again, that is!). Then a whisper of cinnamon comes in. With 2% milk, this is smooth and creamy with some hard-to-describe dessert-like note in the background too, kind of like cake. My mind would like to think that it is appropriately coffee cake.

The second round wasn’t as good just because I had a weird amount left that was too little for two more cups, so I dumped the rest into my Nordic mug filter. The liquor was murkier, the coffee stronger, but those other flavours got kind of weird, slightly chemical. So the key is to keep the leaf ratio to a moderate level.

I’m actually tempted to get more sometime. Just maybe 20g or so, like I was thinking with Chocolate Macaroon. But I wouldn’t load up on it and drink it religiously.

this was one of my teas from yesterday – a generous sample from Wymm tea that came wrapped in paper. This was a a nice sheng…full of honey and creamy notes, with only a hint of bittnerness on the back end. Unlike some sheng’s that i’ve had, it didn’t turn in to a bitter mess that i didn’t want to drink (i’m still learning!) haha later steeps had more hay notes to it but they were still smooth and slightly sweet. I may have a few more infusions of this today if i get time.

thanks so much for sharing these teas with us Wymm!

Tea of the morning. I actually also drank this tea yesterday while I hosted a tea party for twenty-five ladies. It was a lot of fun, and everyone really enjoyed learning about new teas. There’s already talk of having a garden party this summer which I think would be lovely.

Back to the tea, this is such a staple in my life now. It has delicious notes of chocolate, fruit, and bread. It’s sturdy enough for me to reach for it in the morning, but it’s lovely enough to make me stop what I’m doing and enjoy a quite moment with a really nice tea.

Yep, I’m a fan.

First of all, LLAP, Leonard Nimoy. :(

Secondly, the dry leaf smells fantabulous. Bursting with citrus, especially lime. But I’m always skeptical when it comes to these kinds of fruit blends from DAVIDs because they tend to be overwhelmingly sweet.

Cold brewed overnight, this is pretty good, but doesn’t taste nearly as good as the dry leaf smells. A little sweet for my liking but it’s not overkill. The cold brew itself smells and tastes like pink lemonade, particularly Minute Maid’s frozen variety that I’d sometimes have as a kid.

EDIT: I stupidly posted this under Sunny Citrus because I thought I dumped that one in my jug. Apologies!

Ahhh! This is the last caffeinated tea I am drinking before I take my vicodin. >> On the bright side I’ve nearly waited a whole 7 hours before taking another pain killer! And I didn’t even sleep in that time! Now that is an accomplishment!
Anyway, this tea. xD
So I wasn’t sure what to think of this tea, for some reason I thought it was a black for the longest time, even though I looked it up a couple times. xD So I don’t know what happened there!
This tea was like half roasted flavor and half flower flavor. Not floral exactly…well not the floral that I enjoy so much in green oolongs. But more of just like actual flowers…if that makes sense. xD I usually dislike roasted oolongs…like a lot. But the flowers in this one made it a lot more bearable. It was such an interesting combo, I couldn’t stop drinking it. It’s alright. Don’t think I’d get it again ever though. A little too roasty for me!
But thanks soo much for the sample, LiberTEAS! I’m so happy to have tried it! :D

must remember to always pick up at least a sample of each years harvest of this and zhu rong because they both are amazing or not depending on the harvest lol.

I’m almost ready to break into another package of this tea! That’s exciting. :)

I still love it. SO licoricey, no sweet aftertaste. THE BEST.

What’s also super fun is that once it’s steeped the leaves turn a mossy green. Whee!

Remind me not to hoard this and enjoy it without it getting old. Because it’s whimsical and truly like a macaron. Oh, that creamy lemon note. Swoon. And the base is so beautifully delicate. I can drink this any day of the year.

I have noticed a trend with my tea drinking lately — I’m not drinking too many flavored teas. I should definitely consume the ones I have left but I haven’t been craving many. Sometimes they are nice as dessert teas but overall I might be done experimenting with them for a while.

It’s hard to go wrong with a decent unflavored tea from a reputable, quality source. But flavored teas seem to be a disappointment to me so much of the time. I think a good plan for me moving forward is to sip those down and just not be buying a lot more. Also will be helpful for paring down my tea collection. :)

So this is a tea i got with my YS dark club order and I am trying it this morning. True to the name it has a lot of lighter-colored golden tips. I tend to like these types of yunnan teas and this is no exception. It’s very smooth with notes of cocoa and malt. Cameron mentioned cucumber which seems appropriate to me, not so much with the flavor but in the exceptional clean and smooth mouth feel of it. This is probably the lightest yunnan black tea I have in my collection right now. Good as a breakfast tea but would also be good as an afternoon tea. I like it!

Another from my dearest tea sister Terri This one has notes in it that remind me a bit of an oolong while still falling on that sort of bready kinda of tea. this one isn’t my favourite but it’s still been a nice cup of tea this morning while i work from home. I had this one while setting up the slower cooker this morning for pulled pork tonight! woohoo!

Reliving my awkward preteen crush on Steepster chat right now guys…

Morgan Kelly is perfection. Sexy, “bad boy” perfection. But revisiting this formarly forgotten about childhood crush today started with me trying to find Falcon Beach online to rewatch it (if anyone knows what I’m talking about; I love you – and if you can help me find someone to watch it online, I’ll love you even more). Then I wound up scouring youtube to find the hamburger commercial he was in. Success!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukkx0cWr3GM&list=PLz-_KtzcbQuSWAs8Bb5pL3DcTeyKch5sB&index=13

Sexiest hamburger commercial, ever. The comments make me really sad though! Motherfuckin’ bamf Morgan Kelly is not a serial killer. What awful accusations! What you silly people on the internet call “creepy eyes” I call bedroom eyes.

Anyway; I’m currently trying to drink this one. I say ‘trying’ ‘cause it’s not really very good. I cold brewed it because I thought that it’d be rich and indulgent since this is one of, if not the best, caramel teas currently in my stash. Dessert teas usually do well cold brewed! I even added a tiny splash of milk after I’d strained it this morning, to make it silkier and creamier.

But instead, while this does have a rich caramel flavour and thick mouthfeel, something has gone terribly wrong with the Pu’Erh and it’s overwhelmingly strong with a very grimy, earthy flavour and – even worse, for the first time ever I’m tasting oily, slimy fish stink in the aftertaste. Barf. I wouldn’t serve this to anyone; even Tre (and I feed him some pretty gross stuff sometimes).

It’s now taken about two hours to finish half my 25 oz. mason jar and I can’t do it anymore. This is a bad tasting, failed experiment and now I know better: drink this one hot! The rest is getting dumped and I’m moving on to a better, tastier tea.

My first Yunnan Sourcing club order arrived today squee!

After a busy day of packing my suitcase and trying to get the house in order before I go away on Sunday I am delighted to have finally sit down and have tea time. I haven’t had tea all day and it’s almost bed time!

The leaves are dark brown with some red patches and golden tips present. They are mostly thin, tightly rolled and curly but there are some thicker pieces present too. Also some stem/stick. It has a light, sweet and wooden scent with a hint of lychee/dark fruit.

Steeping Method: Gaiwan

First Steep
45 seconds
The liquid is burnt orange in colour and has a soft wooden scent.
Flavour is gentle and malted with sweet wood and soft leather tones. Fresh yet musty.

Second Steep
120 seconds
More sweet and rock sugar like and the malt tones are now in the background, with the wood. Also a lychee or dark fruit aftertaste.

Third Steep
2 minutes
Extremely light and all that remains is the fruity aftertaste.

This was rather a simple black but it was clean tasting and very pleasant. Not the best but something I can happily finish my 50g pouch of. Another tea where the scent showed pretty much what to expect in taste.

I thought this one was long gone, but apparently I still had a cup’s worth left. So, I enjoyed it last night, making this another sad sipdown. Wish I had a bit more of this one, but I’ll definitely be picking up some leafhopper-bitten blacks sometime in the future. So good.

You know, it’s times like this when I am so SO glad that Steepster exists and that I found it. Without Steepster, and all of you tea lovers posting your awesome reviews encouraging me to try and buy more more more (and also, thanks in general to the internet, for feeding this habit by bringing everything that much closer to me)… I never would have discovered this tea.
Or TTC.

Because honestly.

Last night I decided to make a mug of this, I had purchased 5 samples from TTC and recently got them. I am practically on a tea hiatus at this point, i mean i certainly SHOULD be. But I’d had a TTC sample once upon a time and knew that down the road more would be mine, all mine.

So when I cut open my adorably patterned sample bag, I stuck my nose in and inhaled like breathing was going to go out of style and OMG. The scent. INTOXICATING. I don’t even know. So good. I can’t describe.

And then I brewed it up, took my first sip, and it was like happiness exploded all over my tongue. It’s fruity and malty and bready and fresh and bright and SO FLAVOURFUL.

I don’t ever want to live without this tea.

I really need to start drinking down everything I have to reach a point where I only stock my absolute loves. This would be one of them.

I wanted to shout it from the rooftops last night, but there was no one around who would care. There never is, I’m alone in my world of tea love. Except for you guys.

Everyone who hasn’t tried this tea must wishlist it immediately :)
You’re welcome. Trust me.

(PS – I spent like 2 hours just slowly and enjoyably organizing my tea stash yesterday. Of course my online cupboard isn’t really up to date yet, but physically arranging and mentally taking stock of all of my teas (ALL OF THE TEAS) was incredibly calming and satisfying.)

Sometimes when I first start sipping LB I wonder why I love it so much, especially if I haven’t had it for awhile. Of course, the aroma is awesome, but those first couple of sips are always a little weak. And then the layers of flavor start to build, sip by sip, & I’m in love again. I hope there will never be an LB sipdown, at least not for any length of time!

Got a sample of this from EmilyGee! Have wanted to try it…that DavidsTea fan group on FB makes me wanna try tons of their teas because apparently they are amazing.
Well…
That’s definitely not the case in my book. xD
Just like with every other tea company, I seem to only like a few xD
I had high hopes for this one, but of course it was dashed when I took a sip of it. The steeping aroma smelled really sweet and fruity.
But the black tea base totally overruled. Wasn’t sweet at all. I didn’t even over-steep and it was just bland. Tasted faintly of blueberry but that wasn’t enough. Bummed out this wasn’t as good as everyone says! :( Glad I tried though. Thanks, EmilyGee!

GCTTB

I pulled this one out of the box to try today because it’s been a while since i had it and i wanted to see if my first experience with this one was repeatable. Turns out, it was. This is an excellent tea from GTT and one that need to go on my wish list now for a future purchase! Honey notes are really tasty in this one!

I’m drinking this tea at the moment so that I can have a just for me moment. I’ve been very busy with: 1) Kickstarter stuff (seriously, unless you are exploding kittens, it’s hard work!); 2) blog stuff (getting all my reviews in place so that I can ‘retire’ and get our new sisters on board, plus getting the blog in order for them to get started); sampling/testing teas and flavorings.

Which is to say that I’ve not taken a lot of time to just sit back and enjoy a tea that is neither for a review or for me to test out for potential teas for the all-new 52Teas.

So, I decided to take a tea moment for me now and try this tea. It’s been beckoning me for a while.

And it’s good. I am not usually a big espresso fan. But it works with the melon. The espresso adds a roasty element to this, making it taste almost like roasted cantaloupe which I’ve never tried but based on my reaction to this blend, I’d say it’s probably quite delicious.

The black tea has a Oolong-like texture to it that I’m liking with the melon notes. It’s a very tasty … very unusual blend. I like.

Got a sample of this one from AllanK in our swap. I didn’t know what a praline was so I never picked it up and All I heard about it from people was that it was gonna be nutty, so I passed.
That was a mistake.
I regret not buying this so much!
It’s absolutely delicious!
It’s bold and rich. The main flavor is a creamy caramel. The base tea gives it a strong malty flavor which I love! Has a tiny bit of nuttiness, but not much at all.
It’s not bitter at all, and while it’s very rich it still has a certain sweetness from the caramel flavor.
This was so much better than I thought it would be. It’s crazy good. If this were available still I’d stock up on it. Seriously so so good!
Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to try this incredible tea, AllanK! Another win from Butiki!!

I’ve been meaning to do a Mandala order for sooooo long… But with Butiki recently closing all of my money the last few months seemed to be leaving my pocket and doing a very fast and very happy jig over to Butiki… And then one day…. Dexter posted some pictures of some amazingly beautiful and unique walnut tea trays Mandala had recently acquired and I knew my time of avoiding an order to save my credit card was over!!

This tea has been on my wish list FOREVER!! So of course it had to sneakily be added to my tea tray order (along with so many other goodies!) and of course I tore into the bag as soon as my order arrived… Well as soon as I’d stoped drooling over my new tea tray… (Thank you so much again for sharing your beautiful find Dexter!!!). The dry leaf scent of this tea is unbelievable!! I’m talking coconut milk mixed in with a rich , heady condensed milk scent! And the taste? Mmmmm, I’ve died and gone to tea heaven! The milky flavor doesn’t quit, steep after steep, it’s still present, just more subtle as the tea morphs from creamy and nutty to a more floral flavor right at the end.

This will be my milk oolong yard stick from now on, the tea that I hold all other milk oolong in comparison to! I hope I can find something else that’s just as good, but if not, I’ll be more than content with this little gem never ever leaving my cupboard!!