August Uncommon Tea

Highly recommend this rich tea. If suffering a sugar addiction, replace a donut with a cup of Veins of Gold. Hands down my favorite rooibos. Has a milky flavor, taste lingers on the tongue like cream. Has a faint wood vibe, but not really, tastes like roots of earth mixed with chocolate and delicious cream. I drink tea straight, don’t add milk or sugar. Don’t need it with Veins of Gold, rich enough, like a meal in a cup.

Here’s Hoping Traveling Teabox – Round #5 – Tea #43
First, the leaves in the sample do not look like the picture – that has solid sickle shaped leaves. The sample is mostly crumbly tiny leaves in green & black with a few sickle shaped white leaves here and there. Regardless, I love the story that this tea is processed during a full moon in the moonlight. AND it reminds me of Butiki’s White Rhino in flavor, so that is always a plus. It’s a really nice flavor profile – smooth, honey, hints of hay, some sort of light fruit. I definitely recommend trying the last steep at boiling… the flavor is even more pronounced and delicious, while still being smooth. Rather than a sheng it’s like a really light black tea. I love the slow flavor change from steep to steep.
Steep #1 // 30 min after boiling // 2 minute steep
Steep #2 // 20 min a.b. // 2-3 min steep
Steep #3 // couple min a.b. // 3-4 min steep
ETA: I’m laughing that the description mentions it tasting like wet limestone…. not sure how I would know what that tastes like.. haha.

Here’s Hoping Traveling Teabox – Round #5 – Tea #41
I can’t wait til this one is out of the teabox so I don’t hear that Cure song every time I see the name of this tea. :D Anyway, this is a nice green with a sweet nutty flavor that I was expecting to be stronger, like being hit in the face with an ocean wave. But it’s more like sweet macadamia nut. I had it a couple days ago, so not much else to say, but a fine green tea.

Sipdown from last night.

I finished this off because I was really craving chocolate last night but didn’t want to eat anything snacky since I had already eaten a lot yesterday. I let it oversteep a bit and didn’t add any sugar, which made it less candylike. But it still smelled totally boozy.

I realize now that I really want more decaf chocolate teas for the evening when I want something sweet but don’t want caffeine. What do you all recommend? I know there are many out there to choose from.

Oh. My. God.

I opened up the package that Sil sent me (which came with the GCTTB5) this morning, and it smelled LIKE BOOZE. CHOCOLATE AND BOOZE AT A QUARTER TO 7 IN THE MORNING.

Since I don’t drink a lot of alcohol I couldn’t name exactly what kind of booze I was smelling. Rum? Brandy? Nevertheless, it smelled amazing. Like chocolate covered cherries.

The flavour was more subtle, but very enjoyable. I super wish I had this tea on Valentine’s Day, it would have been so perfect.

Thank you to Dexter and Sil for sharing this.

It was… bad. So astringent. The chili barely made itself known, and the chocolate did not blend well with the astringent Ceylon base. “Brisk” is what they call it…

Even milk didn’t rescue it for me.

So disappointed. The flavours sounded like such a great combination after I tried Passage du Desir.

:(

Chocolate and something. The caraway (which honestly I usually detest) wasn’t extremely prevalent. But it was more of a savoury chocolate tea, and I much preferred the sweetness of Passage de Desir (or whatever).

Nice tea, but the flavours aren’t for me at all.

Thank you for sharing all the teas, Sil!

I made a good choice with this one.

Not as boozey as it was that first time.

Really delicious, though. This might not be my ideal chestnut tea, but it’s a nice nutty chocolate tea. Here’s hoping I don’t get tired of the chocolate flavour before I reach the end of my 100g!

Has this the other night while a bunch of us were on Facebook egging each other on to make an order. It’s nice. The chocolate is a good chocolate, but what really made it for me was the sweet and nutty flavours.

This is, however, nothing like Chaud les Marrons! from Lupicia. Which is sad.

But I still bough some of this because it’s unlike anything else I have at home, and I happily drank the whole mug, and then uhh, a tea friend whose steepster name I forget came over and had the second steeping, and then we tried Leatherbound.

It was a good evening. :)

Sipdown.

This was a sample that Sil gave me when we met at the Toronto Tea Festival. I know that August Uncommon has some unusual blends, but I’ve never really cottoned on to the idea of mixing green tea and vanilla, or green tea with chai spices. This has green tea, vanilla, and cardamom.

It smells lovely, I will give it that — vanilla and spice and cake. But the taste is pretty much what I was expecting: vegetal and vanilla. It was smoother than I expected, but it didn’t quite win me over.

Rambling thoughts:

I’m sitting here watching the hockey game, wondering why I haven’t opened my X-mas gift from my boss. It’s sitting here on the coffee table. I haven’t opened it because she doesn’t believe in opening gifts before 25Dec. She would never know if I opened it early or not. Why am I not opening it? Why am I even pondering it? Must be too much bourbon in the tea…..

Brutal cold out there tonight. Staying in drinking Low Country with honey bourbon.

It really is a beautiful thing…..

https://www.instagram.com/p/BB_PCBuuE8F/?taken-by=dex3657

Yet another one that Sil shared with me.

I had a cup of this a few days ago and wasn’t quite sure what I thought about it. It was nice and really caramel – but wasn’t getting the burnt bourbon notes that are mentioned.
Not sure what I did different tonight – but wow – boozy. More leaf longer steep is what I think. Really like how it is tonight. A little smokey – a little caramel – a lot of bourbon (sweet booze). I’m going to get more of this one too – I will need to play with it. Me thinks a little maple syrup would go well in here (or even a little bourbon on those crazy nights)….

Just for the record – yes I"m drinking all three of these August Uncommon teas while I’m putting together a shopping cart – this is going to be my first purchase of 2016…..

Thanks so much Sil for introducing me to these amazing teas….. :))

OMG!!!!! This is the most amazing chocolate nut tea. WOW!!! Fantastic. It’s chocolate chestnut and just screams hot chocolate by the fire. Mmmmmmmmmm
I don’t have much more to say – other than 200g of this is in a shopping cart right now. Sooooo gooood.
Thank you Sil for sharing.

Drinking though a few of the August Uncommon teas that Sil sent to me.
Wow – this is really fun. A little unusual but really interesting. It’s just a really nice molasses, chocolate, bready black tea – and then there is this something in the background – if you don’t read the ingredient list it’s hard to put your finger on it. But then yep – that’s it – caraway – that’s why it’s a little pumpernickel bread ish. Awesome – in a strange kind of way.
I need more of this in my life – even though I don’t think it’s the kind of tea that I would drink everyday (that’s probably a good thing – it’s pretty expensive) – but on those days you need something special – this would totally fit the bill.
Thank you so much Sil for sharing.

Honestly, this tastes like something I should be using to season up some lamb. So I put a good teaspoon of honey into it… and it still tastes like something I should be using to season up some lamb!

Really really neat tea, but extremely savoury. Fairly rich, which is nice, especially compared to that tomato-and-red-pepper-water tea I had a few days ago. Not something to drink when you want a sweet treat, but I actually quite like it. I have enough for another cup, and I might also use the leftover leaves from this cup to flavour a piece of chicken… guess it depends on if I manage to get out and do grocery shopping tonight, or if I stay home and continue hassling the cat.

Thank you, Sil! :)

I am really eager to try this blend as I’ve never had a tea blend with caraway included. It sounds like such an interesting combination – assam tea, caraway, cacao.. so unique! Plus, I love the idea of this tea bringing to mind a library and old books.

Sipping… hm, the first thing that I taste is the smooth black tea base and the cacao. It reminds me of other chocolate and black tea blends I’ve had in the past. There is a tiny bit of astringency as well. A strange thing happens after I’ve sipped.. a bit of a buttery flavor blossoms on the tongue. It reminds me of caramel squares and buttered toast. I also pick up on hazelnuts and very lightly, cherries in syrup. The finish is very drying, but it’s still drinkable despite being slightly unpleasant. I can’t seem to pick up on the caraway flavor… but then again, I’ve never had caraway in a tea.. so I could be tasting it, but just not know it.

Overall, I enjoyed this tea and I appreciate that it had many different flavors to discover. I’m not sure that I really experienced the library comparison just by taste… perhaps the description is slightly far-fetched, but it was certainly interesting. I’m excited to see how my next cup will be when I add a bit of milk!

I decided to copy Sil today and try this tea, since she sent it to me recently. :)

It’s interesting. This is the second tea of theirs I’ve tried, and I’d call this one boozy as well. Not AS boozy as the other one, thankfully.

The vanilla is loud and clear. The green base isn’t too vegetal or marine, although it’s definitely more vegetal than marine. It’s definitely cakey. Ohh, I want to bake a cake. But I’m doing a “healthy food” challenge. So maybe no cake for me.

Anyways, this is interesting and I’m mostly enjoying this cup. I’d like it better without the flavours that are making me think it’s full of booze.

Thanks so much for sharing it with me, Sil!

Thank you, Sil! omg.

This smells like star anise and booze. Seriously. The star anise and a dried/candy cherry note, the kind of cherry you would have in frangipane, dominates. This is, IMO, not an amaretto tea. The flavour profile is armagnac, and I’m getting a boozey anise-cherry interestingness. Not really any almonds, though there are almond slices in the dried leaf.

And it honestly tastes just like that. Anise. Booze. Cherry. Rooibos. It’s weirdly appealing, although I’m not sure I’d ever want to drink this often. I’m super curious about icing this now, but I used what was left for this mug. :D As an iced cocktail, this would be fantastic. As a hot tea, it is a little weird.

As it cools, my tongue is numb with the star anise.

I don’t know. I’m not sure I like this. I’m really glad I got to try it, though. It’s a super interesting flavour combination.

Sipdown!

My previous lack of success with this tea prompted me to give it a much shorter steep time — 1.5 minutes compared to the recommended 5. It did make it much more tolerable — with prominent chocolate, caramel, and blueberry notes and a suggestion of rye bread — but it unfortunately had an overall note that reminded me enough of my previous failures that I couldn’t get fully into it. The drying effect was less harsh this go round, but still present. Overall I think this tea just isn’t for me. While this cup wasn’t bad enough to deserve a 35 (probably more like a 60-65), I think I’ll keep the rating the same as my previous experiences were just so off-putting.

After giving this a proper chance I have to admit I’m still not a huge fan. I find it very dry, like drinking cedar, and I still find it has a bizarre blueberry yogurt vibe. I’ll try it on a quicker steep time for the last cup, but I don’t see myself picking up any more of this.

Urg, over-leafed, over-leafed, OVER-LEAFED!!! It was like syrup! What a way to start the semester! Ah well, no one to blame but myself.

So considering my lack of regard for steeping parameters, this tea was a little hard to get through. At the best of times it tasted of chocolate covered blueberries, at the worst of times it tasted like pickle juice… There was a pretty consistent blueberry yogurt feeling, so I feel maybe the blueberry notes weren’t completely imaginary, though I can’t see where they would come from.

Thankfully I still have some left to do this properly because frankly this was a little stomach churning. I won’t give it a numerical rating for now.

Had a cup of this later in the afternoon so say goodbye to it. The last of this is getting shared tomorrow at the tea festival so i figured why not. In theory this brings my cupboard down to 111, while my goal for this month was 120. Guess that leaves room for the samples i’m picking up tomorrow and possible tea purchases heh. This is a really nice green. I have to say, AU does a bang up job with their teas – making me like things i wouldn’t normally necessarily love.

Final Count: 111

Got this one to work today. Steeped for 3mins. Vanilla and cardamom come through in deliciousness. the cardamom is more subtle but adds to the vanilla and makes this tasty for me…when i steep it right haha