Artemis Tea & Botanical

Another garage sale tea! This is a little savory and mushroomy for me, but it does definitely capture the coffee vibe. I drink it with sugar and soy milk, and the mushrooms bring the right sort of bitterness to make it feel like a cup of unflavored coffee. I strongly prefer Teeccino, but this isn’t bad!

I got this one ‘cause it’s pretty and it’s wild in the ingredient combo. Scratch that-I asked nicely, and I got a very generous sample that came with homemade sachets of it. So, win and something I have a lot of grattitude for.

I know I’m writing about teas with the theme of bonkers ingredient combos, but this one was WIIILD with the kind of direction it went. Since this is a botanical tea company, they went with the Scorpio symbolism involved with shamanism and total spiritual transformation-hence the blue lotus. Although I’m an Aries, my moon’s scorpio so there’s a little bit of magical thinking appeal for me. Then they went with the sensual direction with the orange blossom and citrus dessert flavor profile of the tea. It’s almost creamsicle tasting, and very floral. It’s subtle in the flavor though, and not as pronounced as a regular flavored tea.

I brewed it western with probably a whopping 7 grams of the tea or more for three minutes, thus writing the notes hot above, and then I coldbrewed the remainder to try it out. My girlfriend mostly tasted the guava and orange, making her think of POG. The pineapple is kind of there to sweeten it out and not super noticeable. They write tres leches for their notes, and I can only think creamy. I’ve had that kind of cake once, and I think it’s a bit of a stretch, but I can see it because the of creamy vibes. I only have a little bit of the sample, so I can’t fully dissect it. However, know it’s mild, floral, and very creamy and citrusy. They went for the feminine sexy version of scorpio in this blend for sure.

This is the first tea I saw on instragram for Artemis, and wanted to try it, and I finally got some. HEAVY on the berry in smell and profile with a like of the cocoa like dark chocolate in the dry leaf, and the same goes in the brewed flavor western. The yunnan teas are a bit faded in the background in the first cup I made because the berries and wine skins dominate. The second cub (heehhehe get it? This was a typo that I decided to keep, ’cause ursa, ’cause “cup”) I rebrewed western had much more of the Yunnan Black with a smooth profile blending into the cocoa nicely with a little bit of chocolate tannin in the aftertaste despite being on the way lighter side of tea.

This one is like Byzantium’s older berrier sister. It was what I hoped for, and I really didn’t need 60 grams of it, but it’s a very good tea I don’t mind having around with all the others. No ratings yet, just enjoying it for the different take on a berry blend. To think of it, this tea reminds me of the Icewine flavored teas I used to get from Canada…

There’s way more ingredients than I can add. It’s also got poppy, mugwort, blackberry leaf, gotu kola, decaf green tea, and blue butterfly pea flower. I’ve always wanted to try Egyptian Blue Lotus because of its history and connections to both Greek and Egyptian mythology, though flavor is hard to describe. I’m glad this one is blended.

The tea brewed is insanely blue. The taste is floral and herbal, getting more from the blackberry leaf more than anything else. I kinda taste jasmine, but it’s muddled. Definitely get some green peas. Helped me sleep plainly, yet no knock outs or hallucination thankfully. I know the effects are mild anyway. I wonder how it would be if I put it in some beer…Anyway, not decided on it. I might add sugar and or cream and have some fun with it.

Another weird combo. I almost got the Agni Chai, which is more Ayuverdic in nature by combining Pu-Erh into a lavender turmeric chai (though in my head cannon, it’s a Avatar the Last Air Bender reference), but the elderberry, white oak, and marshmallow leaf got me interested. I really don’t have to much to write on this one, but it lasts a little bit longer than the other teas. The elderberry becomes much more prominent as I steep it. The other elements are harder to taste. It’s generally malty. The marshmellow adds a little bit of a flavor to round it off, and the oak might give off a bit of a sagey feel, but they are not prominent. A bit of oak milk creamer add more dimension and layered off the ingredients.

I don’t have a strong opinion on it yet other than interesting and generally likeable. I also had a good clear headed feeling after it before work, so it’s solid. Byzantium is lighter and more complex, so I like it more, but this is up my alley. I’ll play around with it as I get more acquainted.

Easy favorite. I wanted to get this one with Ursa, which was a cocoa bean laoshan blend with some dried berries, but I wanted this one because I love dramatic history of luxurious places. Byzantium gets often ignored by history classes despite continuing Rome’s legacy and served as a major influence over Christianity, trade, and the futures of Eastern Europe. The makers of the tea definitely have an idea of that vibe with the picks of flowers. It would have been cool to have purple with the yellow flowers to really hammer Byzantine aesthetic, but the tea looks exactly like the picture you see above.

I’ve done this tumbler style, and western, and western is the way to go. The flavors are smooth and incredible, but gets mistaken as a generically good black tea in a tumbler. Western style draws out and balances out the nuances. The teas picked are on the more chocolaty/milky side for black teas. I think there’s some Laoshan in this too, but I think the blend has changed from years to years. There’s some god buds, but not too many. The clover is especially prominent, and the immortelle has a bit of a taste between chamomile and chrysanthemum. My mom wondered if it was an Earl Grey when she drank it blind. The aftertaste is a little bit different and more subtle, yet there’s enough sweetness to make the tea a little bit more distinct. Malt, graham cracker and honey are good descriptors too, yet the clover is distinct enough for me.

It heavily weakens after steep two. Graham cracker and black tea with light malt are the main players. Tannin and vague florals are all that remains after a while.

I’m pretty happy with this one. If it were more flexible in a tumbler, it would be an easy breakfast and work tea. Since I have to pay attention, I’ll have to wake up earlier, or reserve it for lunch or the weekends. It’ll do the job of getting me up well, though I’m missing some of the other teas I’ve sipped down for breakfast.

I added some honey this time. The taste is mostly the same. The honey smoothens over the harsher and drier elements. There’s something about this that makes me think of the incense at church, so despite having a pagan bent, I figured it might be an appropriate tea for Easter.

I’ve wanted to try this company for the past few years, and they finally had a stock that I wanted to order as a combo. Artemis Tea and Botanicals lives up to their name and all of the teas I tried out are heavily herbal. There’s a clear homeopathy bent to the company, but they prioritise the ingredients, and very few of their teas are actually flavored. Their artwork and packaging are gorgeous as well.

I had my sights on Ursa originally, and then this one. It’s spring time, and despite today marking a nearing of Christ’s resurrection, I figured I get this tea to honor the hellenic roots in the holiday, and the universal passage from winter into spring.

The tea really captures that weird transition from frost, permafrost, to dew, rain, dirt, and finally, blooms in the trees and in the grass. I would not recommend this tea for flavor since it’s extremely earthy and herby, but it does something interesting. The smell has a mix of earth, lilac and jasmine in the scent, and the taste is much the same. It starts off as earth, then hardens into mineral, then cools off like birch into a floral body of lilac, jasmine, and then a lightly green and creamy malt. I kinda get stonefruit mid sipped, but it’s something like a burnt apricot or peach for a split second. The mineral, salt, birch, and flowers are more dominant. I wonder if the birch note is actually the acacia.

The tea didn’t last beyond the second steep. It was muted after even five minutes losing some power. It oddly relieved a huge headache I had, and my muscles weren’t as tight, so the power of herbs or wishful thinking was effective.

I think this tea is super interesting, but I’m not sure if I’d recommend it. If I go for a blend, I usually look for something atypical anyway and it meets the mark. I am also not a huge fan of the taste, but I am a huge fan of how the taste encapsulates its namesake as a goddess returning from the underworld in the spring. The flowers are also absolutely gorgeous brewed and unbrewed. I was very happy with the package and service too, and the other blends will be just as fun to write about.