Coconut Cream Pie

Story Time: School just started up again last week. I think this semester won’t be too bad. Most of the classes I have are in graphic design. It has been raining and gray for the past few days now thanks to the storm out in the gulf. I don’t mind the rain(I like it), but when i goes on for so long I get sooooo lazy.

Tea Time: This awesome sample was from Will Work For Tea
Being a coconut lover I was really excited to try this tea. The smell of this is like smelling a bag of sweeten coconut flakes…..YESTH! The leaf makes a really nice reddish liquor as well. OMG This smells and taste like drinking sweeten coconut shavings mixed with cream. IT IS SOOO GOOD!!! The only thing that is holding it back is that i don’t really taste the pie crust or something like that.

Overall I would highly recommend this to someone who is a coconut lover.

P.S. You can get two good steepings from this.

Specifics
Leaf: 2.5oz
Water: 28oz
Pot: Glass
Sweetener: about 1 tbsp light agave per 14 oz glass

I had the pleasure of trying this tea first in the Zoomdweebies shop in KS and it is delicious when they make it into a tea latte!

They have the tea latte recipe available so I don’t think I’m giving away anything when I say I went home and tried it on my own with sweetened condensed milk and that is the crux of their tea latte recipe.

With the full tea latte recipe the latte feels lighter than a normal Sbux tea latte and the flavor of the tea seems more developed too. Wow can Frank brew… trust me I had two!

At home making the full amount of latte mix is nice but then you feel the need to drink the whole thing… which ends up being a party type amount…. not I want a bit of tea now amount… so I tried this tea just adding the sweetened condensed milk and boy is that yummy. Actually I’ve discovered that sweetened condensed milk is FANTASTIC with a lot of different dessert type tea and I really suggest playing around with it as a tea modifier. The only flavor I don’t think it works well with so far is chocolate…. but I’ll be experimenting more with that later…

Using normal tea condiments I find that I am using more sugar than I usually do to try to mimick the tea latte flavor. Unfortunately I think I’m walking into this tea biased having had my first taste of it with the tea latte instead of my normal experimenting. I’m finding that three teaspoons of sugar in a two teaspoon of tea pot is the right ratio to about even up the flavor with what I was expecting and then of course some milk.

The tea base is a little astringent tasting if you don’t add enough sugar which is something I have not noticed with the other 52 teas blends so I’m probably again biased because of the tea latte.

Coconut is present and lightly awesome. Not over bearing or a punch in the face and it is accented well with the vanilla creamy flavor. This is a tea that I’m not enjoying with out milk as it seems to lose a depth without it and I also can’t enjoy this one with just milk and no sugar. Again it seems to lose a level without using both. Actually without sugar it almost has a woody black tea quality. Not smokey woody but that potato starchy woody round flavor. Interesting but I’m spoiled with this tea now and only want it light and sweet.

I’m happy this is a permanently available tea. I know that seems to go against the 52teas mantra but this one is that banging good… especially as a tea latte.

TEASUCE gave me a sample of this. Not as cream pie as I would like, but I could taste the coconut. A nice dessert tea for sure.

I’m not too good at writing these tasting notes, as I find myself rather intimidated by everyone else’s tea erudition — so I guess I’ll just take the redneck route…

This was yummy-smelling right out of the package, if a bit strongly of black tea — which, of course, is what it is. (The art alone on those packages is drool-inducing!) Unsweetened the tea was okay; I could definitely taste the coconut — but with a li’l bit of Coffee-Mate French Vanilla it was truly dessert.

I only used a heaping teaspoon for a 12-oz. cup and the second steep was, as expected, rather light. Next time I’ll use more tea. I’m still getting the hang of the steep time vs. amount of leaf thing.

I am currently in my ISOM class…staring at the bored TA who is basically babysitting us lol since my professor is sick. Not much to do, but we have to be here all the same…

A sip of this tea, and I immediatly feel better. This tea gives off a strange smell, but in a good way. It is a coconut smell, but weirdly enough it gives off that sweet smell of a liquor drink; almost like an alcohol. It tastes good; you know how in a coconut cream pie there is the top light and fluffy part that is like coconut whipped cream, and the bottom part which is more dense and buttery? This tea tastes more like the top fluffy layer.

I like to grade my teas on weather I will buy again, and for this it is a definite yes!

Last tea of the night, tonight. I was craving dessert and so I tried to curb the urge with a tea. This tea has so much potential, it is creamy and coconut flavoured and so much yum, however I need to remember not to steep it at boiling, as the black base is too harsh for my tastes.

Now this is a good coconut tea! And I like most any coconut tea. But this is really awesome.

The black tea is strong out of the gate, but there’s also a lot of creaminess. Towards the end of the sip, I get lovely toasted coconut flavour. I love the coconut shavings in the tea. It’s another I wish I could use as potpourri.

I might actually steep this longer next time. As tasty as it is, I think it could be stronger. Added to the shopping list.

Dec 16
All I can say is that I really loved this tea. When steeping, the kitchen smelled like we were baking. The coconut smell was everywhere. This tea is sweet, creamy, and has lots of coconut taste. Very very nice.
Second steep @ 7 minutes was just as good as the first steep. Excellent tea.

I just polished off the rest of the sample that Ricky sent me. Thanks again, Ricky!

The look of this tea in the bag really wow-ed me. There are huge shavings of coconut in there! To be honest, I’m not crazy over coconut. I like it best in moderation. And I’m not sure if I’ve ever even had coconut cream pie. So I’m going to rate this tea on how it tastes, not by how it compares to the real thing. And I should mention that I threw a pinch of sugar into this one. I’ve been doing that a lot lately, but I’ve also been trying a lot of desserty teas lately.

The color was a lot lighter than I expected it to be. But the smell is strongly coconut, as it should be, from all those huge shavings in there! I can also smell the black tea base just a little under all that wonderful coconut.

Yum! It tastes like it smells: lots of coconut with a bit of black tea. The sweetness isn’t too much, it’s just right. I could drink a big glass of this and not get sweet-overload (and I am going to, since I’m drinking this out of my jumbo cup). I’m thinking that I should have added milk to this, since I can’t taste any of the cream. But that isn’t stopping me from enjoying this.

So hooray to yet another 52teas tea that I have liked! They’re batting 4/4 right now (I think, I honestly can’t remember whether I’ve tried more than 4 of their teas. If I’m wrong, I’ll come back and edit this post).

EDIT: It was the 4th tea I’ve tried, I just double checked. Also, this is my 101st tasting note! The 100th note sure was epic… If you’re not sure what I’m talking about, check out the comments on the note before this one!

I’ve taken to drinking my black tea bare. It’s been a journey spanning decades(. . . but not too many decades ;) )
This is fantastic. Sweet and creamy and not overpoweringly coconut.