17480 Tasting Notes
This is another tea shared with my by thereadersteacup! And she shared such an incredibly generous amount of it, too! Honestly, I can’t even tell you how big my smile was seeing this one, and it got even bigger smelling the dry leaf. Oh, I was drooling! I absolutely love root beer flavoured things, and this smells exactly like popping the cap off a bottle of Dad’s Old Fashioned Root Beer. If you’ve never tried that brand, it’s one of the best. Such a treat from my childhood!
Steeped up, the smell wafting off the cup was just as mouthwatering though the taste was more black tea forward with a strongly tannic bite to the sip followed by more of a malty, bready sort of note. I wish the sarsaparilla and the overall creamy “float-like” qualities were a little stronger, but it wasn’t as if they were missing. Just more of a backseat to the black tea. Frankly, that’s arguably how it should be. It’s just rough being such a root beer fan and getting drawn in by that heavenly dry leaf aroma. A little sweetener and maybe a short steep time would likely pull all of that root beer goodness more to the forefront.
This is a sachet that thereadersteacup was kind enough to share with me!
This summer I’ve been really, really spoiled by having a lot of very fresh, very high quality Japanese green tea available to me thanks to my coworkers who visited Japan earlier this year. I’m not even historically a big drinker of green tea, but I’ve been more open to it in the last month than maybe ever before.
Unfortunately, this tea kind of felt like a step backwards from all that progress I feel I’ve been making with this style of tea. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it was just very coarse with more of a blunt feeling hay note than the rich umami flavours that have become a guilty pleasure of mine. That said, I still drank the full mug which is more than I think I would have a year ago. And if I didn’t have such recent memories of a much higher grade of sencha so fresh in my head, then maybe I could have been even more on board with this tea…
Having enjoyed this as much as the Adagio Japanese Sencha Premier, and being a green-tea novice, the lesson to me is that I should stick with this, not explore higher quality senchas, and just be satisfied! Of course that will be impossible, but maybe I can delay a little. It’s good to know that it can be even better! Thanks for your descriptive review, as always, Kelly!
I definitely feel spoiled by the new green teas I tried at Camellia Sinesis… a little made at myself for not grabbing more.
Cold Brew!
This weekend I got to finally meet up with thereadersteacup after several years of online friendship through our fabulous tea community!
We spent a couple hours at Camellia Sinensis just enjoying a lovely conversation over some different tea cuppings. I had no idea at the time that this was your first tea cupping, so I’m so incredibly flattered to have been able to be a part of that experience! In addition to obviously sharing some tea samples, we also swapped international snacks. I’m actually currently enjoying a late night bowl of Cookie Crisp, and it’s really good!!
After our cupping, I did end up snagging a new teacup to take home for myself (I have no teaware self control) and I also specifically wanted to buy a new bag of this tea since it’s been a little while and I adore it as a summer cold brew option. I, of course, started my cold brew going as soon as I got home and then later that night was able to wind down with this delicious, delicious blend.
What I love about it is that because of the white tea base it’s not really a super heavy tea, but it does have some body to it. Also, that white tea really allows the ripe cherry, red berries, and juicy sweet orange notes to come through in a crystal clear way where everything is just so fresh and defined. It was really nostalgic tasting it again, and I’m just happy that I thought to pick up a little more while I was already at the shop enjoying my afternoon with Gabby!
I loved this one, I cold brewed it yesterday and it was so perfect! So happy to have had tea with you! It was so fun! As for the Cookie Crisp, that was my favorite growing up, I feel like its harder to find these days… the Oreo and crazy trendy cereals tend to overtake the aisles now.
This was the other tea I ended up making after searching through my black tea samples for some teas to pass along to thereaderscup during her recent visit. I can’t lie, there was something very blasphemous feeling about making this super wintery chai blend in the middle of a summer heat wave, but those really rich and silky white chocolate notes were calling to me!! I particularly love the white chocolate and cardamom combination. It’s very cozy but decadent, and the aromatics of the cardamom have always felt like they really even out what can be a slippery slope into a strongly cloying territory.
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 and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.
Cold Brew!
This weekend I had the chance to meet up in person with thereadersteacup while she was here in Montreal on vacation, but more on that later!
In preparation of her visit, I did pack up a mix of tea samples for her and while doing that I sort of “unearthed” a few older DT blends in my stash that I hadn’t made in a while. This was one, and so I prepped a cold brew because it’s very timely right now. Classic Lemon was one of the original three cold brew flavours that I personally worked on developing. While the other two from the same period have been consistently well received, this one never quite got the same love. Something that does really baffle me since it is such a quintessential black tea and lemon flavour. Bright, just a bit sweet, and citrusy but balanced by bold, brisk black tea. It makes me think of Southern style sweet tea, and what could be more perfect as a fast to prepare option in the summer?
I digress, though. You can’t make people like a tea as much as you do. I really appreciated my revisit of this one this past week, though.
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 and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.
Iced Latte!
I made this today as my first tea after getting into work. I couldn’t just make an iced latte though and because we’re out of the strawberry jam I’ve been obsessed with I had to find an alternate option to add to my latte. I ended up including a bit of black cherry syrup, and between that and the vanilla matcha my drink ended up tasting kind of like melted Cherry Garcia icecream from Ben & Jerry’s. Just, less sweet with more of that fresh, vegetal matcha note. Also, no chocolate component.
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 and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.
Cold Brew!
I haven’t had this tea in so long, but after sipping down the Cranberry Pear Crostata blend from Almost I was just really feeling something more pear forward and this was the first tin I saw while hunting for something to meet that craving…
As a cold brew, the pear is very fresh and floral with that sweet and dewy fruit note that I was looking for. However, the black licorice-like taste of the anise is also very strong and it borderline starts to overtake the pear. Mostly because it REALLY coats the palate, and it’s one of those flavours that lingers for a long time while the pear is a little crisper and more swift in the flavour payoff.
I still enjoyed it a lot, though!
Sipdown (2949)!
Though I definitely still have a few criticisms, I liked this a lot more the second time around. It came off as less artificial and “chemical” tasting to me, and I think that honestly might just be due to the fact it’s an older sample now and those initially very fresh flavourings have had the needed time to air out and settle.
The red fruit note was bright and just sweet enough, though hard to call specifically cranberry. That’s something I remember noting the first time around, too. I liked that the pear was the flavour that stuck around on the palate after the initial red fruit top notes – it reminded me a bit of the juicy pear flavoured jellybeans from Jelly Belly. Lighter, though.
Honestly not a bad blend at all, but it’s just tough when one of my all time favourite teas is a cranberry pear blend that (in my humble opinion) nails the balance, clarity of flavour, and overall flavour intensity a lot better.
Cold Brew!
I’m currently sipping on this cold brew while I work through tasting notes, and it’s just so fresh and juicy! More of the crisp, umami notes of the sencha on the backend of the sip, but the sweet white-fleshed Japanese style apple notes are like this refreshing explosion that kind of coats the whole palate. In a delicate and floral way, though? It’s hard to put into words aside from, like, there’s just a lot going on but it doesn’t emotionally feel like a lot? Y’know?
I’ve been trying to decide what yerba mate RTDs to get for my next fridge restock, and to my surprise and delight the local grocery program that I’m part of (LUFA) recently added all of Mana’s product line up to the drinks they offer – so I picked up a case of this one!
I’ve tried it once previously and really enjoyed the sweet green melon note, but found the mind a bit jarring with how herby it was. I wanted to give it a second chance though, especially now that it’s summery and melon is so spot on seasonally. I think knowing the mint is more herbaceous/earthy and less cooling made a world of difference because I found this really refreshing and enjoyable! Melon first, and more of the mate and mint combo to close out the sip.
Ahh I’m so glad you like it! I thought… what was something iconic and kinda worthy to share from the States (not a huge US snack fan myself lol)) so I was like “Ah root beer”. I definitely agree, it takes the back seat to the tea flavor but it is soo good cold brewed and made into an iced latte! Another root beer blend I like is the one from Simpson and Vail. That might be a good one to bring next time!