Underground Pumpkin

Doesn’t taste at all like pumpkin, but maybe it’s not intended to? The description mentions only ‘pumpkin pie spice.’ I’m not getting a lot of spice either, but there’s kind of a warm earthiness to the flavor that probably wouldn’t come from just tea alone. As the golden monkey base can easily stand on its own, I guess it doesn’t matter that this comes across as an unflavored tea.

meh. this tastes like largely a cup of black tea. It’s not a bad cup but i’m really not getting much in the way of spices or pumpkin. Just a malty cup of black with hints of ginger and spice. thanks variaTEA!

Such a slacker, not even writing about this one yet. This is my second cup by now and I’m on the fence. The spices are subtle. I pick up on ginger first, followed by cinnamon. The base doesn’t seem to jump out at me in heaviness as it does with other blends such as Not So Vanilla and Minted Monkey. Perhaps the spices cover up the earthiness more. I enjoy it the most with light cream.

The predominantly ginger flavouring reminds me of Butiki’s pumpkin blends, such as the last batch of Pumpkin Creme Brûlée, as well as Pumpkin Milkshake. Those seem to have a little more of an actual squash vibe, whereas this just seems like a tea dressed up with pumpkin pie spices.

Many thanks to CrowKettle for the selection of Tippy’s Teas.

Unfortunately… yep, they’re dirt teas. With milk and the spices, it’s not so bad, but this isn’t my favourite base.

I kinda get how people taste cocoa and sweet potato, but only if the cocoa is unsweetened cocoa powder and the sweet potato is fresh from the dirt.

(Sorry, Tippy’s. It’s not you, it’s definitely me.)

Good morning, Steepster! I woke up early thinking about the Tippy’s teas I would have today! Ha!

This sample was actually a bonus sample from the generous Cameron B! I asked for three Tippy’s teas and she sent me all five that she had!

I like pumpkin, but most of the time pumpkin teas are a miss. The funny thing is certain ones tend to grow on you over time (I’m looking at you, DT pumpkin chai and Butiki Pumpkin Creme Brulee!). This tea is different than the rest in that I tasted more of a nutmeg creaminess and maybe a teensy bit of pumpkin. I didn’t really get cinnamon, which was nice for a change. I’ve noticed that Tippy’s lightly flavors their teas and this is a good thing in my mind, but just don’t expect it to hit you In the face. Overall, I don’t think I’ve fallen head over heels for it, but it’s a unique, cozy cup. :)

Apparently I’m on a Tippy’s Tea roll here. :) The dry tea has a lovely “pumpkin spice” smell. I’m excited to see that the base tea is their Golden Money – the same as in the Not So Vanilla. Brewed, you can really smell the chocolate notes of the base tea, along with the pumpkin pie spiciness. The taste is smooth, with a hint of acidity and a lovely subtle spiciness on the finish. It does remind me of pumpkin pie, but lacks the creamy and biscuit-y notes that would really round out the pie experience. Hang on, I need to try this with a bit of milk and sugar.

Mmmm, ok yeah, this is even better with just a bit of sugar and a splash of milk. It’s not necessary to make the tea enjoyable (David’s Pumpkin Chai, I’m thinking of you) but it just smooths everything out and makes it all a bit more dessert-y. Yum!

After purposely overloading my taste buds with everything pumpkin this season (As I always do.) I was curious, if not apprehensive to try this blend. But knowing what Tippy’s style of flavoring teas is like, I felt confident that this blend would not taste like the infamous teeth-rotting-sweet PSL.

I thought I had done something wrong when I had brewed this tea. The pumpkin is definitely underground for sure. There was no distinct ‘pumpkin pie’ flavor that I was expecting. The golden monkey in this blend does stand out as a pumpkin stand in (:P)though. It takes on a sort of sweet potato, creamy quality when the spices were added.
The cinnamon and nutmeg flavors were very light in my sample. Almost as if I didn’t even have it in there. I didn’t feel like this was a pumpkin-y blend at all. but the golden monkey was so good that I finished off the sample in a few days.

The last brew I made, I added the teeniest bit of maple syrup – about a half a teaspoon. I drizzled it over the leaves and waited a minute or two before pouring the hot water over it. It brought out the flavor of the pumpkin pie spices quite well. A very tasty last cup.

Last one! It’s taken me longer than I expected to get to these since I haven’t been drinking many flavored teas lately. I’m actually not a big fan of pumpkin spice-type teas, I find that they generally just have spice and no pumpkin. This appears to be one of those as well, the description only mentions “pumpkin pie spice”. Ah well! It’s the same Golden Monkey base as Not So Vanilla, the same tiger stripe leaves. Dry scent is creamy with warm spices.

The steeped tea smells much the same, and it almost smells like there’s a hint of vanilla or cream flavor here. Hm, not as much a fan of this one. The base tea is tasty, but I don’t taste anything pumpkin at all. Just cinnamon and possibly nutmeg, also clove. It’s okay, and the spice is subtle enough, but I wish there were some pumpkin present.

So Tippy’s is having a 20% off sale today only, which means trying out the rest of my samples, since I know that I need a good amount of the People’s Tea. (Oh god, I suck at not ordering more tea!)

After the absolute deluge of pumpkin teas this fall, I’ve been feeling fairly jaded about anything with pumpkin in the name, but I’m glad I didn’t let that get the better of my curiosity when picking out teas for my sampler.

This is good. Tippy’s base tea is really excellent – tonnes of malt and really distinct chocolate notes. Only the smallest hint of spice – I want to say maybe cinnamon and ginger, but it is so, so subtle, and that’s nice. I could mistake this for a complex straight black.

I’m not sure that I need to order more of this one, but I’m very impressed with the quality of Tippy’s teas, and super glad that I picked up the sampler when it was available. I’ve been really appreciating the quality of their blended teas, and how their flavourings are subtle and just enhance the natural notes of the tea, rather than the base being secondary to the flavourings.

I really like Tippy’s black base in this tea – chocolatey and malt and really smooth. Then there is the pumpkin spice which is subtle and balanced but present enough that its clear this is more than just a black tea. It really is quite nice. I am been really impressed with this company so far so I am glad I still have more to try.