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This is one I really wanted to love a lot – it sounds like it’s made for me, and it smells like it’s made for me. There is no end to how luscious this tea smells in the bag. It’s not quite up there with Lupicia’s Cookie or Mariage Frères Mariage Impérial, but it’s seriously good, nonetheless. There’s caramel, vanilla and the lush, malty tea base.

It brews up rich and dark – most of the depth of the scent of the dry leaf is lost in the steep for me. Flavour wise, I do get most of the notes from the bag, but it’s just so subtle. If I’d tried this before any Mariage Frères or Lupicia teas with similar flavourings, such as the two mentioned above, I would have been completely sold. At this stage of my tea safari, though, there’s just no need for a tea this delicate.

This is beautifully put together, the base tea is silky smooth, and it’s definitely high up on the list of the Butiki must-tries. That much said, there’s no room for it in my permanent collection.

[From my Butiki order to Santa Clara, October 2013.]

Haha, oh, wow. Flashback to childhood, white milky liquid penicillin. At the hospital they always said, ‘Oh, no small child can swallow pills this big,’ but I very happily did, seeing as the option was that terrifying milky-thick, fruit-flavoured stuff. I’ve sort of gotten over artificial banana to some degree, but artificial cherry? Never. One sip of Dr. Pepper and I start to cry, begging for mercy.

This is just me and my freaky hangups, though – I gave a collection of DF’s Christmas teas to my friend when she came to visit me right before the holidays, and she allegedly loved this one.

Anyway, this isn’t necessarily artificial – it’s pretty much what candied cherries, or cherry preserves taste like – there’s sweetness and that hint of bitter almond. Both in the nose and in the cup, the cherry/almond combination is what comes through most noticeably. It’s a nice flavour idea for Christmas, and the dry tea is really gorgeous.

Just not for me.

[From my epic Instant-Thé order to Rome, October 2013.]

This is the fourth and final melon tea I have to try – it’s been great fun to compare. In this case, the dry tea smells perfectly melony – I often find that melon scents are a little hard to keep apart; I know it’s melon, but which melon? With this one, I get a lot of cantaloupe from the start, but then there’s this little coolness rounding it off that makes it more watermelony. I’m at a loss to describe it better, but it’s definitely melon, and definitely watermelon.

In the cup, the scent lingers nicely. Flavour wise, this is a subtle yet present melon, very smooth and tasty. I opted out of the recommended additives, and I have no regrets – this tea works just fine on its own.

This silver needle is definitely one of my favourite Butiki base teas – it’s wonderful to drink, and ever so pretty in the bag.

[From my Butiki order to Santa Clara, October 2013.]

This is one of the most popular Dammann Frères blends, it seems – both in terms of ratings and sales. It makes sense – if DF’s overall concept appealed to me, I’d be really excited about this tea, too. Smelling the dry leaf is interesting – at first, it’s a rich, dreamy bouquet with all the different scent strands weaving into each other. After a while, though, it’s possible to identify individual fruits and florals. There’s peach, and violet, some orange… and even what smells like DF’s passion fruit to me.

Steeped, it retains much of the same complexity – the beginning of the sip and the aftertaste leave very different impressions. But it’s just very, very delicate. Too delicate for me, and with a dominant presence of that perfumey note DF are so fond of. It’s a little bit like drinking someone’s grandmother – don’t get me wrong, it’s a grandmother of the Parisian variety, all old Chanel and pearls and dignity, but still. Too perfumey.

[From my epic Instant-Thé order to Rome, October 2013.]

Pistachio is my favourite nut; I think I’ve cooked and served and eaten it in every way possible, but this is the first pistachio tea I try. Random fact: the Swedish word for ‘pistachio’ is one of the most commonly misspelled words in the Swedish language.

In the bag, this smells like fairly generic nut tea; it could be a walnut, or a hazelnut – either way, it’s definitely pleasantly nutty. Steeped, it retains much of the same scent, but it turns rounder and smoother.

Flavour wise, this tastes a little too roasty, or smoky, to be a plain pistachio to me. Roasted pistachio, maybe? I miss the ‘green’, fat flavour of the nuts in questions – pistachios are so characteristic. In terms of the ice cream, well, I should admit I dip into the pistachio gelato pretty frequently when I’m here in Rome, so my assessment might not be fair; either way, I don’t really get a creamy feel.

The tea definitely has a pleasant, mellow smoothness to it, and the base tea is as lovely as ever with Butiki – it’s just not quite what I’m looking for.

[From my Butiki order to Santa Clara, October 2013.]

Again, one of those Dammann teas that exploded with tasting notes after I added it to the database. It’s been a lot of fun reading reviews of teas I acquired completely blindly.

In the bag, I get a strong, well-balanced cherry-orange. Definitely a nice combination for a Christmas tea, but, as always, the Dammann Frères tea smells like something very-tasty-but-not-for-me. It’s like most Italian pastries. Everyone goes crazy over all these cakes and cannoli and Sicilian anything, but I honestly wouldn’t get out of bed for any ricotta filling. This country is the country of the worst croissants (or, you know, ‘cornetti’) ever. I get better croissants in the Midwest, for crying out loud. No. French pastries, though? I don’t even want to imagine a world without them. (This is my bible, available in English now, too: https://amzn.to/3icoeEt)

So when I go to my favourite bakery here, to get some unassuming, basic almond cookies, and I’m surrounded by all these tourists devouring cannoli and more cannoli, loudly expressing their delight, I feel exactly the same way I do when fellow Swedes get really into soccer, or when friends get together for a Lost marathon, or when I read reviews of these Dammann Frères teas. I’m glad everyone is pleased, but I’ll be over here in my corner, eating my pain aux raisins, wearing my 49ers tee, watching Veronica Mars, and sipping something that isn’t a Dammann Frères tea.

It tastes nice enough – with some cherry and some orange and a little cinnamon, but we just fail to connect, this tea and me.

[From my epic Instant-Thé order to Rome, October 2013.]

I deserved a treat, and this tea is the ultimate treat.

Just smelling it makes me grin like a madwoman.

I use the Perfect Measuring Spoon from DT a lot, not so much because it measures very perfectly (because it really doesn’t) but because it has such a pleasant, sleek, ottery roundness to it; just like the person who gave it to me.

Lupicia, how are you even…

Lupicia, how can you even…

Lupicia, how is this even…

I can’t even.

Just like the melon oolong from the same company (Reviewed here: http://steepster.com/annchen/posts/199405) this is a perfect melon, both in the bag and steeped. It’s light, and smooth, and in every possible way beyond reproach.

It lacks the dirty ripeness of the oolong, which I really enjoyed, so I nudged that up five points, because this is a solid 80 and the oolong is even better. I’m sure this will be absolutely perfect iced, so I look forward to trying that very much.

In terms of melon teas, now that I’ve tried a few, I still feel it’s something I don’t have to have in my cupboard. If I just rated according to some, ‘Is this a good melon tea?’ standard, this would be a 90-95, but my ratings reflect what I feel I’ll want to restock my cupboard with until the end of time. I guess we’ll see what happens when it’s warmer; maybe I’ll get insane melon tea cravings. The weather right now isn’t what I’d call melony, after all.

[From my Lupicia spree at Westfield Valley Fair in Santa Clara, October 2013.]

I’ve spent the past few days contemplating how Dammann Frères’ violet, ginger, rose and citrus are good, but just not the ones for me. And here I am again, but with Butiki.

This is a great, natural strawberry. In the bag, it smells so ripe, like those near-moldy strawberries you’ve kept around lust a little too long. Strawberry rot; dirty strawberry.

So definitely natural, but maybe too natural for me – I like a smooth, round and very inoffensive strawberry flavour, preferably mixed with something that sweetens it further, like vanilla. The ginger here, albeit mild, only kicks up that eerie little is this berry rot note for me.

I know this must be a dream come true strawberry tea for a lot of people, so any berryfan should definitely try it.

[From my Butiki order to Santa Clara, October 2013.]

If Bali smells like this, I need to go there (I need to go there, anyway, but still). This is what scented island-life travel ads would smell like – floral, fruity and with a dash of something boozy.

The florals, however, amount mostly to a distinct rose flavour in the cup, drowning out the fruit notes. Rose is not one of my favourite flavours, and DF’s take on it is far too perfumey for my tastes; it’s a very cosmetic rose.

I understand why this is a bestselling tea, and why so many people like it – it’s just another case of DF not being a good match for me.

[From my epic Instant-Thé order to Rome, October 2013.]