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I really loved the tea of the same name by Darlene’s Teaport, but I didn’t feel like committing to a full order there just yet. I was, however, about to place an order at ETS with the free shipping coupon (thanks for posting it Azzrian!) and noticed they had an identically named tea. Now, it seems like several of the ETS blends can be found elsewhere (though usually for more) so I thought it was possible that they had the same distributor and whatnot. And for $4.20 it couldn’t hurt trying! I needed one more tea to round my cart out anyway.

I did a short cold brew on this and indeed, it is the same tea! Or it’s awfully damn close. Sweet grassy green, hints of juicy strawberry, and a slight hint of tropical pineapple goodness peeking through. The strawberry is just right in this blend, not overpowering or artificial candy-tasting either. It’s such an amazing iced tea! I’m so happy that I found this, since I really do enjoy it! In fact, I’m liking it more now so I’ll up the rating a little bit from my original tasting. Yum!

My second sample from The Tea Merchant! The name of this tea is so lovely, I didn’t even need to know what flavors were in it before I immediately wanted it. Once you smell it, the name makes sense: the vanilla is silky smooth and I suppose the long, elegant oolong leaves are similar to a dragon. And man, is this vanilla-y smelling, almost like pudding! It smells soooo good, I could barely pull my nose out of the bag. In fact, once I let my dad sniff it he immediately wanted some too!

Thankfully, the vanilla is a bit toned down when you steep it. It’s lighter, airier, but still rich and creamy. Less dessert, more “afternoon treat” if that makes sense! The oolong flavors were pretty prominent for me, maybe because I started with the second steep (my dad got the first!), but there are floral and fruity elements popping up as well. The citrus is mild and really only in the very end of the sip, a finishing note. It’s a bit lemony, but very toned-down and not overpowering. For some reason, the vanilla + citrus are reading a bit cupcake-y to me, like a fluffy vanilla one without any frosting. Very nice!

Thanks to The Tea Merchant for this sample! I am woefully unfamiliar with the intricacies of Darjeelings, but I’d like to broaden my experience with them and I think this is an excellent place to start. They’re a really interesting type of tea—much lighter than a black, but with flavor profiles really different from a green/oolong/white/etc. Actually, maybe a bit similar to an oolong in complexity, and I think there are some Darjeelings that ARE oolongs so I suppose that makes sense! And they brew up so pale—this one is a soft, almost peachy amber.

It smells a little bit like an English Breakfast, but with much softer flavors. The dominant taste to me is woodsy and a bit fruity, apple or grape? It’s faint but crisp, and melds into a softly floral background. It’s very full-tasting, and it lingers in your mouth for quite a while. It’s also quite sweet with no additions, and I’ve gotten 3 good steeps out of it so far!

This is the only quality Darjeeling I’ve tried so I have nothing to compare it to, but I enjoyed it! A very different tea experience, and it left me feeling a bit contemplative. And for some reason, I think this would be really nice cold-brewed, so I’ll be trying it out that way soon!

Another gorgeous blend from Tea Guys, full of so many different pretty colors! This is also another one I only got a sample of, which of course I’m regretting already. I feel another order there coming on soon…

This tea is everything I wanted DT’s Strawberry Ginger to be. It’s light and sweet, with an almost honey-like taste from the white. The ginger is strong but not overpowering, giving the tea a bit of bite. It matches well with the tropical flavors from the papaya and pineapple, which keeps this from being a kind of generic pina colada-esque blend. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but the addition of ginger makes this quite unique!

Thanks to Kittenna for this interesting chai! At first I thought it was a tea-less blend, there are so many giant chunks of spice in there, but indeed a few gunpowder leaves unfurled in my infuser.

The weirdest thing about this blend is how it’s quite light in some aspects—the green tea is almost ethereal, barely there. The apricot is faint and adds a nice background fruitiness, though I don’t know if I would identify it as apricot if I didn’t know what it was. The spices, however, are quite strong. Mostly the pepper, and there’s quite a bit of clove as well.

I decided to add a splash of cream once I was down to about a third of my mug (hey, it’s a chai!) and man was THAT a mistake. It tastes like pizza. No joke, straight up cheese pizza in my cup. This should be good for a second infusion, so it’s not a total disaster!

This is such a gorgeous tea. The green and white leaves are full and fluffy, strewn with cornflower and marigold petals. The rosebuds are large and intact, and… yellow! Rose in tea is always pink/red (or at least the many rose blends I’ve tried), so I was surprised to see yellow ones here. It adds an extra pop of color to an already-colorful blend. I know the look of a tea doesn’t really affect the taste much, but starting out with something this pretty definitely sets the mood in a way.

When I had Lupicia’s Mango Oolong, it tasted very rose-y to me and I loved it. I think I like floral a lot more than most people, so of course I set out to find a mango rose tea. There are quite a few out there, but I don’t like placing orders for only one tea so I decided to wait around for the right blend. Thankfully Tea Guys had many kinds that seemed to call to me, so into the cart this went—and it showed up 3 days later, pretty fast shipping.

I cold brewed this since I love cold rose teas, and hot mango has never really worked for me. It doesn’t really smell like rose or mango either in leaf form or after a 12-hour steep, and the color is so pale, like dew on the ends of grass. But it definitely tastes rosy and fruity! The white/green blend is what I taste at the beginning of the sip, a little grassy and fruity. Not mango fruity, but that kind of generic soft fruit taste you get from some whites. Then the mango comes in, juicy but not that strong, followed by soft rose. It’s really quite floral, not exactly a surprise with so many rosebuds in there, but the rose is at the end and it doesn’t overpower the other flavors. The mango is subtler than I thought it would be, but I had the same feeling when I tried the 52teas Mango Ice Cream so maybe my mango-related tastebuds are off? It’s delicious, just not as boldly mango as I expected.

At the suggestion of Scott B I made a maple blueberry tea! I added a generous pinch of Tea Guys’ Wild Blueberry to my once-brewed Maple Sugar leaves and something magic happened. I was worried the flavors wouldn’t be fully balanced since there’s a LOT more maple, but the lower water temp worked in my favor. The blueberry is quite strong, but the fruitiness is balanced by maple goodness. Oh my, this is heavenly. I’m almost tempted to buy extra ounce or two of each just to mix together!

EDIT: Made a second glass of this iced with a bit of brown sugar, I didn’t think it would be that good cold but decided to experiment anyway. And OH MY it is delectable, the maple is even sweeter and more pronounced chilled and the blueberry pops as well.

I was kind of hesitant to try a maple tea, so I only got a sample of this (which I now greatly regret!). I thought it might be like pancake syrup, that fake stuff that’s fine on, well, pancakes but I don’t really want my tea tasting like it. This, however, is the real deal. It smells like maple candies when you open the little baggie, the kind you get at rest stops all over NY. I’ve always wanted to melt one into tea, but now I don’t have to because I think that’s exactly what this blend tastes like!

It’s maple maple maple all the way through, from the smell when you’re drinking to the caramel, molasses-y ending. Surprisingly, it’s not overly sweet or cloying at all, and the black base really stands up to the maple (which is admittedly a very strong flavor!). They’re in perfect harmony, and I think this would be the most perfect breakfast tea ever. It’s brisk and bold enough to deliver a kick in the butt, but the maple makes it heavenly and comforting. In fact, this seems to be both a morning and nighttime tea! I am so in love, and I think I’ll be placing another order very soon so I can have more of this amazing goodness.

Today I have not been lucky with tea. First I spilled my cold brewed EGC all over the floor, then I had a mishap with this one! The top seems to be kind of loose, and it exploded EVERYWHERE when I tried to move it. Thankfully, it exploded over the floor I’d literally just cleaned because I spilled iced tea… so at least I was able to salvage all of the leaves. However, they didn’t all fit. Somehow they fit before the explosion, but not after? Anyway, I wasn’t planning on making any of this today but I had a heaping teaspoon of extra leaves with no place to go so I made it hot over ice.

It’s a way I haven’t used to make iced tea in a long time, and I’m so used to cold brewing that I found myself pretty sensitive to the bitterness here. Granted, it’s very very mild and is probably because I spazzed out and the water was too hot, so I won’t count that against the tea. It’s just funny how smooth cold brews are compared to the over-ice method! This is a mildly tart, fruity tea. The raspberry is definitely front and center, though I don’t know if I would really identify the other fruit as pomegranate if I didn’t know it was there. To me, pomegranate is rich and silky while this is bright and fruity. Not exactly a negative, but I did expect more, well, punch and tartness.

I realized last night that since joining Steepster a few months ago, I haven’t decupboarded a single tea. Kind of a horrifying thought, since I keep ordering more. I’m determined to cull at least a few of them, and this seems as good a place as any to start since I only had about an ounce to start with! I’ve been quite taken with cold brewed Earl Greys recently, but haven’t tried it with an EGC so into the fridge this went!

One sip and I was in love. It’s so good! I think I need to up the rating, I’ve really enjoyed this one a lot. It’s good hot, cold, and in ice cream! So sweet and creamy, the vanilla and bergamot combine to make something that tastes like a luxurious dessert. Sadly, tragedy struck and I knocked over the cup. ;~; So about half ended up on the floor, sob. My cat did seem to enjoy it, which is weird because he never tries “human drinks.” This tea is so great it even wins over kitties!

Of course with only one teaspoon of the leaves left and half of this brew on the floor, I instantly thought “I need to buy more!” But really, do I need THREE earl grey creams? Especially since I have 8oz of the Upton one and 4oz of the white, which is very voluminous. I went to their site anyway and ended up placing a teeny order… that didn’t include this tea. Somehow that counts as self-control to me, sigh.