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A relatively new addition to Epices de Cru’s tea assortment!

This was the last tea of the evening that Marika and I drank, and also the only flavoured/blended tea of the night. We also made it in a very large Western teapot, and she actually didn’t tell me what it was before trying it and had me try to guess the flavour. I do very much love that game, though when it comes to teas with spices in them I always feel so much pressure to guess them correctly given how much of a spice genius she is.

I was very proud of myself though! I tasted a lot of malt and cocoa from the black tea itself, though admittedly I was getting enough cocoa that I wasn’t 100% sure if it was only the black tea or if there was maybe a small amount of cocoa shell or nib in the blend tea. There is not though, it’s just a really pleasant bittersweet and dark cacao note.

In terms of spices, the big ones I tasted were cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice – all of which are present. There’s also ginger, and eventually I named that one too but it was really the very strong autumnal and wintery vibe of the nutmeg and allspice combination that was sticking out to me. Because those are spices we’re so conditioned to think of as linked to holidays, I was really interpreting the overall profile as a sort of gingerbread hot cocoa flavour – and I actually loved it. It’s a very, very smooth and tasty tea.

Welp, turns out it’s pumpkin spice. Except, respectfully, no it’s not. It’s delicious, truly! But I honestly don’t think that I’d have named the flavour direction as tasting like pumpkin pie even if I’d gone into my first sips with that context. The allspice is present, but where are the rest of the pumpkin spices like the clove? And the ratio just feels all wrong. But more than anything else I think the actual black tea base is working against the concept. It’s too naturally molasses-y and cocoa tasting. It gets the job done putting me in a seasonal mood, but it’s just the wrong season…

So conflicting because I drank a lot of this tea. Like, it’s tasty. It was just challenging to reconcile in my brain that I wasn’t drinking a gingerbread blend.

Another that I drank with Marika this past weekend! After all of our gongfu sessions we moved to the big ass teapot portion of the evening, and this was first up. It was definitely a nice darjeeling with a lot of delicate, refined feeling malt and honey notes and a sort of autumnal “crunchy leaves” kind of undertone. Medium bodied, but crisper in the finishes. Certainly a type of tea I can see hitting it off really well with a more British style high or afternoon teas with little finger sandwiches and pastries.

However, and I’ve said this time and time again, I think living in Montreal I really am incredibly spoiled by my proximity to Camellia Sinensis. Kevin’s expertise in Darjeeling is just exceptional, and what he sources every year is so fresh and unparalleled compared with other Darjeeling I’ve experienced. So this is fine, but maybe less impactful feeling that just going to the shop and asking for whatever his favourite thing of the season is.

Gongfu!

Another tea that I was excited to brew up and share with Marika because it was one of my favourites that I brought home this year from the Toronto Tea Festival. We both really loved it, but I actually think it was her husband who liked it the most. I always feel really satisfied when I find a tea that Steve likes because he’s not quite as big a tea drinker as either of us are, but more just in the sense that his palate is much more particular.

It was the oaky, malty sort of smoothness of the tea that resonated with us all. I also really like the red fruit and vanilla sort of undertones, too. Sometimes the sips made me think of walnuts, and I enjoyed that a lot especially with the woodiness. Just a gentle fuzz of astringency as well. It’s distinct, for sure, and also probably my last session with it because the amount of leaf I left in the bag is really awkward. I’m thinking one last Western style cup after this…

Gongfu!

I had a fantastic catch up and tea hangout with Marika yesterday since it was a long weekend here in Canada. Patriot’s Day in Quebec, and Victoria Day everywhere else. It was very overdo, though!

We drank a lot of teas, of course. For the most part stuff that I wanted to share with her since I don’t get to do that on a daily basis anymore, and this was one that I really wanted her opinion on because it’s one of my fanciest smoked teas. It was very, very good. Lots of longevity to the smoke notes, but also buttery smooth with these really fantastic honey and red fruit undertones to it. I’ll have to do another tasting notes in the future that does a better job explaining the tasting notes, but for now suffice to say that I was so satisfied sipping on this one and just really happy that I’d got to share it with her.

We don’t always love the same teas, but smoke is definitely a BIG area of overlap for us.

Iced!

Shook this one up using the water bottle method, and it was a pretty nice drink! I do quite like the sweet but slightly floral leaning pear flavouring that B&B uses, and it worked quite well with the honeyed undertones and almost graham cracker notes of the rooibos itself. The grind on this isn’t super fine, so there’s a powdery mouthfeel as you sip on the tea. However, it’s not gritty and that’s the important part IMO.

I am ready to just finish this one off and be done with it, though. It’s nice but not so nice that having it around this long is super justifiable.

Hot cuppa from a few nights ago. Smooth and a little buttery, but more than anything else this just tasted like sweet rooibos. Thankfully I like rooibos, but I definitely felt a little let down to not be getting as much cookie as I was craving.

Cold Brew!

I had another lychee blend not too far back and it was very sweet, syrupy and intense. Both this blend and that one are pretty juicy, but the biggest difference is that I feel like this one leans a lot more into the more floral notes of lychee while still having that refreshing fruity quality. It’s also a little bit creamy, but more in the sense of the natural cream note you sometimes get from white tea (the base here) versus the more sweet and polished taste of a cream flavouring. It’s very good though, especially cold brewed like this.

I haven’t had this tea in so long despite loving it, and I really have no excuse other than I simply just got distracted by other teas in my stash…

But I made a cup the other night and oh how I melted right into that mug after my first steep. It’s bold and heavily smoky in a sultry but savory kind of way, with the warmth and tickle of chili and an underlying sweet maple-y brown flavour. It reminded me of these applewood smoked barbeque potato chips I like that have a little bit of a maple glaze note to them, but not quite as salty. Sweet and savory in a tea is delicious though and such an underrated combination.

How could I forget about this blend!? It was such perfection.

Totally not the customer for this tea, which based on the packaging I gather is primarily meant to help jump start labor for expecting mothers. Lots of raspberry leaf in the blend. But raspberry leaf is also great for period cramps, so I figured I’d give it a go anyway. It’s very blah. Not unpleasant, but herbaceous and flat/dull tasting. I guess that might be intentional because if you’re heavily preggo you maybe want to still with something relatively neutral tasting instead of taking a bit swing with a more polarizing flavour!? But for my purposes I think I’m going to stick with some of the more palatable blends in my stash.

I think y’all know how I feel on Detox messaging with tea, but shoving all of that aside the actual ingredient profile of this blend was interesting to me. I sipped on it during the morning at work today and I actually enjoyed it a lot. It’s very lemon forward in a bright, fresh way. Not too sweet, but not overly sour/tart either. I liked that there’s was this very light, gentle earthiness and herbaceous quality to the backend of the sip from the inclusion of things like the milk thistle that kept this otherwise highly citrusy tea pretty grounded feeling. I felt like it would have been very good with a little honey.