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I got to bed a little late last night so I decided I needed some heavy duty breakfast tea to wake me up, so I grabbed this. Amazingly, I actually steeped this for the amount of time it is supposed to be steeped today and got an interesting smoky note out of it.

The second steep was really weak though. I guess breakfast blends front-load a lot of their taste. Or something.

I keep meaning to try this and then forgetting about it’s existence, so I had put it at the very front of my tea cupboard so I would remember it. Naturally, this mostly meant that it fell out every time I opened the cupboard, but today I finally noticed it before anything else.

The list of STUFF in this is a little insane. For a moment I couldn’t find the bit where it actually said “green tea leaves” and was all like “holy crap it’s just mint and spices that usually go in chai! and anise!” But yeah, then I saw it, so…crisis averted!

I was distracted while making this and used water that was too hot, which is kind of a bummer, but I’ll get it right next time! I’m not sure if it’s because of that, but the mint is TOTALLY dominating this tea. To the point where I’m like, is there REALLY other stuff in there? By really concentrating, I can sort of notice a spiciness and a vague sort of sweetness (could be the anise!) around the aftertaste but that is IT.

As the tea cools, I am starting to get more stuff. I’m not entirely sure that I am capable of telling ginger zing apart from mint zing and once you add pepper to the mix you can REALLY forget about it, but there is definitely zing going on, and I’m starting to get other spices as well. The cardamon definitely, and more sweetness. And, oh yes, there is definitely a peppery aftertaste here.

Well, in attempting to analyze the flavors in this cup, I have basically gone through the entire thing without figuring out whether I actually like it or not. (I mean, beyond just being a mint tea and therefore unlikely to be terrible) I know I am DEFINITELY gonna have to try this at the right temperature considering how much it changed as it cooled though. I shall tentatively give it a smiley, because it’s not like I DIDN’T like it.

Oversteeped this by accident and got it more bitter than I was really going for. But it is still my favorite!

This is the end of my sample, which saddens me. Although I guess really it just means I need to buy more. Anyway, after seeing Rabs’ log from a while back, I decided that I also have to try this iced. I had kind of a stupid amount left in the tin, enough for like, one and a half cups, so I decided to just dump it all into the teapot and dilute it a bit with ice water.

The first steep made me decide against continuing the dilution. It was just “all right.” Pleasant enough to drink, but not some sort of revalation. The second steep, though, I didn’t dilute at all, and HOLY BUCKETS is this good. I would never have guessed that this stuff would taste so good cold, but there’s this sweetness to it now that just goes perfect iced. I’m not getting very much in the way of maltiness, but, come to think of it, when is the last time that you saw sweetness and maltiness in the same room together?!?! Could it be….they are the SAME PERSON? and THEY, which is to say HE (it/she), STOLE DUCHESS MCSNOOTY’S DIAMOND NECKLACE!

Ahem, got a little carried away there at the end. Also, I am now getting malty notes in the aftertaste.

So I was thinking about the nonexistence of the white chocolate in this tea and I thought that maybe if I added milk it would somehow bring that out. And if I was adding milk, I may as well go all the way and treat it like a chai. Because why not? (note: this is my reasoning for a LOT of stupid things I do)

The end result was, first of all, tasty. And I think the chocolate and vanilla taste really came out BUT now the berry taste has faffed off somewhere. Man, I can’t win! Well ok, there was a slight HINT of berry around the edges of each sip but that was it. In addition (and not particularly surprisingly) the rooibos taste came out a lot more. Hmm, I didn’t bother to save any to cool down and try it iced, but perhaps I should have, maybe the berry taste would come back? I’ll get you next time, Vanilla Berry Truffle!

Logging this with the Sinharaja since I combined them.

Temperamental!

Tried to get around the fact that I didn’t really have enough of this left over to get a full steep out of by combining it with my Twinings Black Currant, Ginseng and Vanilla – since the residue the first time I tried this tea was quite pleasant.

Sadly, this time around I got mostly Black Currant and almost no Black Tea. Also, I really need to figure out how long to steep the Twinings stuff, because I keep overshooting the mark and turning into this sharp taste of not quite ripe vegetation. And I didn’t even keep it in that long this time! Man, that tea is so temperamental! Still, it wasn’t untasty just a bit too tart and a bit too…hm, I guess I’d call it sharp.

Overestimated how much was left in the packet and got a pretty weak tea out of this. Not suitable for morning tea at all. Sadface!

Finished off this sample last night.
I’m glad I decided to only use half of the packet the first time around because I think I’ve come around a bit more to this tea. Not to the point where I want more, but I definitely find it a pleasant tea to drink. In addition, the Oolong was a bit more oolongy this time around so that was good, although I was still having some cognitive dissonance with the whole combination.

Golden Moon Sampler Tea #31
Well, this is it, the last one. I’d been kind of avoiding finally drinking the last sample because that would be the end, and it made me sad. But I guess that now I have my 52teas order to look forward to (and my Matcha!) so I will not be pining for new things to distract me from the teas I have for too long. Of course, this also means that I can get down to the business of getting the teas that I was particularly impressed with, but, alas, Ewa’s Pocketbook dictates that this must wait. In fact, my Golden Moon order must compete in line with: samples from Harney & Sons, the teas I decided on from my Upton samples, AND replenishment of some Adagio teas I am running low on. So who KNOWS when I’ll get around to them.

But let’s talk about this tea. The leaves were very light and smelled almost sweet, which was intriguing, but unfortunately I think I used too much water, because the taste is very faint and doesn’t have the sort of “full” quality that teas with a naturally light taste have when brewed properly. The liquid is very light, a pale brownish yellow almost verging on tan. Not quite the same color as white tea though. It’s somehow…greyer, if that makes sense.

The taste, light as it is, is a delicate sweetness and a very light generalized vegetal taste. The longer it steeps the more hay-like it gets, but I’m not really noticing any of the herbal notes that the description talks about. It’s certainly pleasant enough, but I like my teas a little bolder. Okay, a lot bolder.

And that’s that. The end of the sampler! It was a lot of fun trying all of these different teas, and, to be perfectly honest, I DO still have some left over samples that happened to have slightly more leaves in them. I do wish the packets were slightly larger, so I could try each of these teas two separate times, or so if I accidentally oversteeped/overwatered/overanythinged a tea on the first go around I would have the chance to correct the mistake, but beggars can’t be choosers and the sampler is still a great value and great fun.

I take my leave of my Official Golden Moon Sampler Tasting with this reminder:
And in the end, the tea you take, is equal to the tea you make.
HAHAHAHA THAT’S STUCK IN YOUR HEADS NOW! MY EVIL PLAN IS COMPLETE