41 Tasting Notes
Sipping this while watching Louis C.K.‘s tv sitcom Louie. I love this show so much, its all awkward and I love Louis CK’s sense of humor. I’m watching this as my boyfriend makes a batch of muscato iced tea.
This is my favorite Jasmine tea, it packs such a lovely explosion of jasmine with a yummy vegetal green tea undertone. One of my favorites with and without sugar. One of the bags exploded, but that has never happened before, I think the water may have been a bit too hot and caused the teabag to break up.
Preparation
This is my first EVER teavana tea from my first EVER swap from oOTeaOo!!! First swap note. Yay! Thank you for giving me all these neat teas I can’t wait to try!
Observation 1: I prepared this tea myself. This tea was steep at 150 degrees F for 2 minutes as instructed. The blend is very pretty and smells a lot like cinnamon. The liquor is a deep amber color and also smells of nothing but cinnamon.
Observation 2: Naked, I taste the cinnamonn and white tea. It is very spicy and clean tasting. I suspect I should steep slightly longer than instructed or perhaps add more tea.
Observation 3: With sugar, this tea is very light. Somehow, the sugar seems to detract from the spice. I cannot taste any of the green tea; still just white tea and cinnamon.
Observation 4: With milk, I don’t even knnow how to tastefully describe this. Its gross. It tastes like milk aand something funky… like blue cheese maybe?
Observation 5: With milk and sugar: Just don’t do it. Trust me. I thought my milk was stale, I went to the fridge to investigat and my milk doesn’t expire for 10 more days.
I resteeped this later in the afternoon. It cam out very light. The cinnamon scent was still very prominent, but the taste wasn’t. It now has an after-tase reminiscent of spoiled milk..
Overall, blegh. I never say that about a tea, not even that horrid raspberry herbal of doom deserved a “blegh.” Will not buy and do not want to drink. Shame to see a tea go to waste.
Boyfriend review: Interesting combination…
Preparation
Somehow this tea is only bested in worseness by the tea that gave me nightmares.
Milk and white tea usually don’t pair well. Well, milk is always blegh for me but it’s especially blegh in white. Or green. Or green oolongs. :) Sorry this one didn’t do it for you!
I figured as much, I’m not a fan of green and milk, but I thought: its a chai, so don’t they make the blends expecting you to add milk? Second time I had it was naked and only with sugar and the spoiled milk flavor was still a prominent aftertaste. Unfortunate. :C
I don’t like this one either! I’m a big chai fan but the white ayurvedic chai just doesn’t hit my chai spot.
Another tea I had with History Laced, either one of her Christmas swap or that she ordered herself, my memory fails me. I love these little tea tastings, I always end up taking home something new.
Observation 1: My lovely boyfriend prepared the tea for us. The tea was prepared as instructed at 93 degrees Celsius for 4 minutes. Leaves were placed loose in the teapot.
Observation 2: Naked, this tea is very sweet. There is a chocolatey taste with lots of icing.
Observation 3: With sugar, the flavor is very artificially cake-like, more like the dye on sprinkles than actual cake. I can taste the black tea base very strong and clear.
Observation 4: With milk the taste is akin to cream cheese.
Observation 5: with milk and sugar it tastes the closest to red velvet cake; not only am I tasting the chocolate cake, but also the cream cheese icing flavor. This tea clearly tastes the way it was intended.
Overall: A very fun blend for tea tastings. I am not a fan, but this tea was a decent representation of a red velvet cake. History Laced even noted there were sprinkles in the tea blend. :P I am not a big sweet eater and over the course of recent years cream cheese icing has made itself the bane of my existence; so I think that I would drink this tea on very rare occasions in very small doses. I seem to be having bad luck with David Teas, maybe because they use artificial flavoring that throws off the experience on my palate? I am not seeming to be a fan of Davids Teas. Such a shame; I want to like them.
Boyfriend Remarks: With milk and sugar, tastes like cake.
^^ He REALLY likes cake. I think he would dump me for a cake my size. (After reading this, he replied: “I would not dump you for a cake your size; it would go bad.”)
Preparation
Ah, that was probably from me! I felt terrible, since I sent down a scrawny amount of David’s Tea, and History Laced gave me these lovely, filled out Lupicia samples in return; I’ve enjoyed them a lot more than the DT samples I sent down. I owe her a nice fat package full of tea from various companies.
Lately, the DT blends tend to lean on the artificial side of things and, unfortunately, this one is the epitome of that. If either of you are still curious of certain blends from their website I’ll pick them up for you though. :)
Well don’t feel bad; it happens! She enjoyed them a lot more than I did and even Lupicia’s pastry teas aren’t my favorites. :) Perhaps we can swap something yummy sometime soon; ill let her know about your offer.
Listening to: Amanda Palmer- Astronaut (A Short History of Nearly Nothing)
Had another tea tasting with History Laced and this was something she ordered online.
Observation 1: My boyfriend prepared this tea for me. This tea was steeped in boiling water loose for 5 minutes. The blend has an aroma that reminds me greatly of cinnamon.
Observation 2: Naked, this tea tastes just like cinnamon with a hint of sweetness.
Observation 3: Skimpily clad (with sugar) This tea gets very sweet and the cinnamon seems to stand out more. I don’t taste any marshmallow.
Observation 4: Robed (with milk) alot is taken away from the taste.
Observation 5: Fully dressed (with sugar and milk) the taste is again detracted from, but I get a better sense of where they were trying to get the marshmallow flavor from.
Overall: I don’t taste any marshmallow, but I imagine marshmallow is difficult to replicate. For what it is, I think its a very weakly flavored cinnamon tea for my preferences. If I’m looking for a cinnamon tea, I would go for Cinnamon Vanilla by Stash Teas instead.
Boyfriend remarks: It was okay; nothing to write home about.
Preparation
Listening to : Regina Spektor- Ne Me Quitte Pas
I remember Lindsay Gaardens teas from my childhood! The boyfriend and I found this at the dollar store and it sounded interesting, so we had to get it!
Observation 1: Packaging is blagh. Inside the box is this thin plastic with perforations on one edge for easy oppening. The tea bags are square and flat, with two attached to each other and no string, making them useless (lets face it, no string =useless). I made the tea. Yes, I MADE TEA. Boyfriend was mowing the lawn. >.> I took boiling water, cut the bags open and put them in myinfuser and steeped for 5 minutes as instructed. This tea is super fine, dusty almost.
Observation 2: Naked, this tea steeps a murky brown. The particles are so fine that there were little bits in the bottom of my teacup. I taste black tea and citrus and the fragrance is primarily black tea and a hint of coconut. This tea is a bit bitter. Maybe the water was too hot???
Observation 3: With sugar (scantilly clad): I only taste black tea. There’s no real outstanding tropical notes.
Observation 4: With milk (robed): Tastes like bitter black tea.
Observation 5: With milk and sugar (fully dressed): I taste very little coconut. Best taste for this tea yet.
Overall: its the instant coffee of tea, what can I say? I ended up finishing the pot by drowning it in sugar. Its a low grade black tea, but it did bring a lot of memories for me. After all the teas I’ve been enjoying, I’m sad that this was a chore to finish. But c’est la vie. By the way, no boyfriend review this time. He really was mowing the lawn and now he’s in the shower.
The chamomile tea was unexpectingly pleasant. I love my chamomile. Ran out the other day and ran to a store I don’t normally go to to get my tea , thank you for the unexpected pleasure.
I was pleasantly surprised by the fruity, tropical flavor of this tea. Weak so needs extra steeping and only one cup per bag but naked (without any dressing) this light and lovely tea suited my discriminating taste just fine, altho the plain packaging left me wanting.
Listening to: Crass- Bloody Revolutions
So I had this tea again today, aboout a week since my initial tasting. It is a tea I went halfsies on with History Laced, but she didn’t like it and gave me the entire packet.
It was prepared by my boyfriend again. This time we were at home, so we used an infuser. He also let the kettle cool a few minutes before steeping as usual.
Wow! What a big difference. I think the water was too hot during our initial test, which made the tea a bit astringent. This time it was very smooth with fruity and floral at the same time, I am in love. I’m not sure quite what I think about it as an oolong yet; I am still learning about oolongs, but definitely a very yummy tea. I will definitely be buying this again, but I have a good 50 g of it to myself so it may be a while! <3
Preparation
Listening to: Crass- Banned From the Roxy
It’s one of those nights. Apparently I more than woke up on the wrong side of the bed, I kind of woke up nearly glued to the wall. So its been a blargh day. I have tried this tea twice so far, this first post will be my detailed review from the other day and then I will post another on my thoughts on this tea today. :)
Observation 1:
The boyfriend made the tea. He steeped loose leaves for 2 minutes in boiling water. The liquor is a very bright yellow and there is a fruity scent about the tea.
Observation 2:
Tea without additives: The tea has a very clean bright taste. Not like any other oolong I have tried thus far.
Observation 3:
Tea with sugar to taste: Its kind of nutty and fruity. This tea is very easy to sweeten. I am reminded of fruitcake.
Observation 4: I hate fruitcake.
Observation 5: Considering the delicateness of this blend, I decided that milk was absolutely out of the question.
Overall, a very bright fruity tasting tea that I would like to try as an iced tea, I think it would really shine in that spotlight.
Boyfriend remarks:
“Blardablarg.”
Feel better soon :)
Thanks a lot! Once the pain ebbs enough for me to not need the vicodin anymore, I’m sure I’ll be just chipper. I have no idea how people take this stuff recreationally. They’re crazy.
I agree about the vicodin – I had to take it once and it was awful.
Ohhh. You know, I had great luck taking half-doses of that stuff. Still gives you the painkiller without so much of the pukey bit.
Here’s to being pain free!