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I need more evening teas! I haven’t been impressed with most of the Harney teas I have tried, so I’m surprised to find I like this one! It has a good EG/bergy flavor that is smooth with something fruity in the finish. A berry of some sort. I like this, I’d buy it again to have more decaf options, but it’s hard to type much right now with a playful feisty bird insisting that hands are for playing with birds, not typing on the computer.

This mixture of flavors in this tea is striking me as such an odd mix. Almond, chocolate, cinnamon… I should love it. The cinnamon is at the front of the sip where it dominates and lets a little of the chocolate peek out near the end. The chocolate dominates the finish and the almond is in there somewhere, but it’s kind of in and out. The chocolate tastes like the smell of scratch and sniff stickers. Not really chocolate, but what artificial recreations come up with to represent the flavor. It’s light, airy and perfume like. It’s unpleasant and it bothers my throat a little after the sip. There is a scratchiness that creeps in and it’s really weird. This is going in the get rid of bin. I’m not into it.

I recall liking Sun Cloud and Mist years ago and was excited to acquaint myself with it’s reincarnation. As I was preparing it I was noticing a similarity to Butiki’s Lemon French Macaron which was a favorite of mine. It tastes very similar, but there are a few differences. The lemon in this is sharper and more tangy. Like a fresh squeeze of lemon compared to a more baked flavor. LFM has almond in it and I don’t think this one does. Both have hints of lemongrass and this one has flickers of something that I can only think to describe as ashy, which sounds unflattering in a way I don’t mean. Maybe it’s the hay notes? Either way I’ve found myself quickly at the bottom of this cup and thinking of a resteep to prolong the enjoyment. This is the closest thing I’ve found to LFM and I’m really happy to have it in my cupboard for the brief time it will last before being consumed.

I was really hoping to find the next Teavana’s Almond Biscotti or Butiki’s Almond Indulgence or ATR’s Brioche in this cup and it’s just not happening. It smells hopeful when the tea is dry, but it’s not even close to the others when steeped. It has a nice malty flavor and I totally get the French cookie part. It’s sort of a buttery malt with a little almond mixed in at the end of the sip, but it’s bland. It’s okay if I’m not comparing it to long lost favorites, but it’s just okay. It doesn’t have anything that grabs me and makes me want more. I’ve tried steeping a few cups and keep coming to the same conclusion. To the reject pile it goes while my search for a new favorite almond black continues.

I’m not sure how this ended up in my cupboard. Maybe it was on sale and I thought the tiny roommates would like it? Probably. Not sure what to make of it. It does have a rainbow of fruit taste to it. I can pick out the lemon, but it also tastes like something red. Raspberry? Cherry? The hib isn’t too horrible, but there is something alkaline in the sip that is distracting and pops up at various points. It’s almost fruit punchy. I can imagine this being really good cold steeped and over ice. It’s more distracting while hot and I’m hoping that fades as it cools, but I have work to get back to at the moment.

I murdered my first cup of this. Forgot I was steeping it for a while and it went super bitter. Dumped it and started fresh and got a very interesting cup. It’s predominantly smoky with light jasmine notes underneath peeking out mostly in the finish. There is something malty in there, which is nice and a little bit of tannins. It’s alright and I hope to get better cups out of it in the future.

Mariage Freres says to steep this for 5 minutes! Seemed a little excessive, but I did it anyways and I think I’d like to dial back the time on the next cup. This is very smoky. I like smoky, but I was expecting something more subtle that allowed the bergamot flavor to come through. It was all smoke until a third or half the way through the cup, then the berg started showing a little. There is a nice malty base that I could taste through the smoke. This cup wasn’t terrible, but I feel like I could get a much better cup by adjusting the steeping parameters.

I got this tea for Xmas in a tin set that stacks three of their teas on each other. I didn’t realize this one had so much hibiscus in it and that I already have one of the teas or I wouldn’t have put it on my wishlist.
This steeps up tart, but not as obnoxious as most hib. I think the lemongrass mellows it out a bit and rounds out the tartness. There is only a hint of alkaline flatness from the hib. I’m actually enjoying this tea, which is weird for me and such a hib heavy mix. I can drink it as long as I keep pretending it’s a lemon tea.

Advent Day 5

Last day/tea to catch up on. I keep reading the description and try to taste the intended pomegranate and pineapple, but I mostly get plum. It’s surprisingly nice and flavorful after all the other plain teas in the advent. It’s gotten a little tangy in the finish in that oversteeped green sort of way now that it has cooled, something I didn’t notice while it was hot. It’s very smooth on the sip with the fruit flavor though. I can smell pineapple now that it cooled and I almost think I can taste it before my brain flips back to plum. It’s a nice tea, not something I’d seek out again though.

Advent Day 12
I missed two days in this advent and am catching up now. Of course one of the missed days was a blue tea! I finally took MF’s advice and steeped this for a full 5 minutes. This tastes like perfumy cherry blossoms. Very delicate, light and airy. There is a slight sweet feeling to it that is almost taste with a light fruitiness behind it. At the end of the finish there is a flash of savory. Or maybe that’s my breakfast sausage lingering? Who knows! I like this one better than most of the other blue teas, but I’m really over the entire blue tea with ethereal flavors thing.