Compass Teas

Decided to use up close to the last of this one as an iced tea. It worked out fairly well, hint of banana and decent base. Husband thought he tasted prunes(?) but maybe that was the mate?

Didn’t have much hope for this tea, as it smelled just like black tea in the bag. Smelled about the same brewed up, but there is indeed the barest hint of banana in the flavour. Judging by some other reviews, this is likely age-related, so I won’t hold it against the tea. What I will note, though, is that the black/mate base is actually kind of yummy – just a wee bit astringent but reasonably flavourful. Another tea in the “drinkable but no longer amazing” pile. Thanks to JoonSusanna (or possibly momo?) for the sample!

Out of curiousity, I just went to Compass Teas’ website to poke around and wow – the teas seem to be quite expensive ($12-14.50USD/2oz), with no cheap sampler options (“samples” are $6-7ish, no size indicated). Which is probably for the best, as I don’t need more tea, but also kind of disappointing, because I’d like to try some of these teas fresh.

Delicious. Just a cup of this left! I’ll need to find a replacement.

Mmmm, so delicious. Just the perfect lavender earl grey, with all the positive qualities of both the white and black base teas. I wonder if it would be this good if it was fresher? There’s still so much flavour, I have to wonder if the EG used to be a bit stronger. Regardless, it’s good now, and I’m enjoying every cup! Upping rating from 84 to 90.

It occurred to me that this is what I wish the Bird & Blend Lady Lavender tasted like. Very similar idea, but this contains some white tea and the base is much gentler, which I enjoy. Much bigger fan of this one.

Curious. This tea is definitely a swap from someone, but I’m not sure who, and the lack of notes/ratings/etc doesn’t help me! However, it says last edited by JoonSusanna, who I believe I did swap with, so I guess that’s my best guess?

This was randomly in a 52teas bin, and the obvious white/black blend and current highlight ingredient, lavender, caught my eye. It looks to be basically a black/white EG + lavender. Sounds quite appetizing! And, unlike a couple teas I’ve had from Compass, it was actually pretty good. The mix of black and white made for a light but solid base, the bergamot was light and not harsh, and the lavender just added a bit of additional interest. Quite nice. I do much prefer when my earl greys don’t scream for milk and sweetener; this one would probably be overpowered with those. A great find within my collection that I’m excited to have another 4-6 cups of.

Someone passed this on to me… can’t recall who. I have a recollection that I enjoyed it at least once, but this last cup of it was nothing special, it just tasted like a genmaicha. Likely age-related, sad times.

This tea is excellent for finishing a meal or as a snack. The ability to convey apple pie without giant hunks of apples is a marvel to me. I would recommend.

This tea is no longer sold by Compass Tea but it may be something they restock in the future, or have something similar to.

The leaf is dark green with a high shine and a sweet, floral scent with a touch of grass. The leaves are of medium size with some broken pieces present, overall it looks as expected ie no discolouration or holes.

Steeping this at a lower temperature around 65C for one minute to try and draw out some of the umami and sweetness.

A golden brown/green liquid is produced (again typical of Superior Sencha) and it bares a toasted grass and seaweed scent, also slightly vegetal.

Flavour is medium strength with sweet grass highs and toasted peony lows, with a salty seaweed and kale type mineral after taste that lingers and becomes dry.Only a touch of astringency but some umami is present. Half way down my yunomi and it becomes so sweet and floral it’s picked up a perfumed quality has real mouth feel to it. Also slightly bitty at the bottom of my bowl.

A second steep of the same parameters reveals: less sweetness but more umami, mimicking soup broth in this steep. More mouth feel and dryness in the after taste and less perfume. Still it bares little astringency as such and it remains vegetal. It reminds me of Matcha, has a similar sort of flavour and feel about it in this steep. Just a very watery and non foamy Matcha.

Overall I was impressed. The quality was expected (average for a Superior Sencha) but it steeped well and had wonderful characteristics and flavours. A nice example of Sencha and pleasing to drink. I recommend low temperatures if your an umami fan though, at least to start with, I’m an umami fan at heart.

A nice introduction to Compass Teas for me and while this is no longer sold I will certainly keep my eyes open to see what line of Sencha it has in the future.

http://sororiteasisters.com/2017/01/25/superior-sencha-compass-teas/

this one came my way from kittenna I’m a fan! this is a really nice berry tea….somewhere between blueberry and “other berry” as it cooled, because i stopped paying attention to it, it still tasted delicious. I think that just a teeeny bit of sweetner would go a long way with this one, to make the flavours really pop.

Sipdown! 963.

Steeped correctly this time; not a bad bilberry (blueberry) black, but not overly exciting. Kind of what you’d expect from this sort of tea – mild base tending towards astringency if oversteeped, and a great blueberry aroma, less in the flavour. Good for travel mugs. Less so for drinking and savouring.

Thanks to JoonSusanna for sending this one out for me to sample (quite a while ago)! The packet was unopened(!!), so flavourwise I’m expecting it to be pretty good – especially after I opened the packet and delicious blueberry aroma wafted out at me.

Of course, I accidentally oversteeped it to the tune of about 6.5 minutes. Whoops. Surprisingly though, it was still drinkable, but I think the beginning astringency/bitterness clouded the blueberry out. I’ll have to try it again another day!

Side note: I brought the infuser to my boyfriend’s place and the whole time in the car, I kept thinking the tea had leaked because it smelled so delicious. Mmmmmm.

This is an okay earl grey. After the last cup I wanted one that actually tasted like EG, but sadly this one isn’t as fruity as I’d like. The tea base is assertive and the bergamot is floral without being too much, but there’s something missing and I think it’s the fruitiness that I associate with my favorite EGs. In this case it’s completely a personal taste thing and nothing wrong with the tea itself; it’s drinkable and smooth, and I’ll have no trouble finishing off what I have. It’s doubtful this will go on the list to buy, though.

My faith in Compass Teas is sadly fading…. not a big fan of this one. At least I can taste the coconut here, and it’s alright (whew, not rancid!), but it’s a very plain, boring tea, with a very unremarkable base that’s verging on astringency with even just a short 2-minute infusion. It’s not terrible, and if milk/sweetener didn’t cover up the mild coconut flavour, it might actually be good that way, but I’m not keen to have this one again.

Oops – forgot to thank JoonSusanna for passing some of this along :) Always curious to try, even if a tea doesn’t work for me!

Thanks to JoonSusanna (I think) for passing this tea on! Unfortunately, I’m not getting even the slightest butter-pecan flavour; it just tastes like a mildly astringent basic black. I don’t know if it could be age, but it’s in a nice sealed pouch, so that would surprise me a bit. I may give it another chance at some point, but sadly was pretty unimpressed this time.

Backlog:

I love Earl Grey tea – as many of you probably know already. There are few teas out there that make me as happy as a good Earl Grey and this one qualifies as good! A strong bergamot aroma, and a tangy flavor with just a tad of sweetness to it. A very uplifting taste. Not soapy or perfume-ish, just beautifully bergamot-y.

A rich, medium-to-full-bodied black tea base.

Here’s my full-length review: http://sororiteasisters.com/2014/01/25/earl-grey-classic-black-tea-compass-teas/

Big mug of this with a late breakfast.

I like this with milk and sugar; it has a bit of the Bailey’s flavor then and feels rather a sinful thing to be drinking before noon. It’s quite coffee-like, if you like that sort of thing. A two minute steep is definitely all it needs if you want additives in it; I had a sip plain and while good it was quite astringent, so I’d go less if I wanted it by itself.

Glad I sifted through my cabinet and settled on this today!

I have been wanting coffee lately, especially since the boyfriend is really wanting to start into grinding beans himself and buying the good stuff, a la 100% Kona style.

So, I remembered that I had this tea and it reminded me strongly of coffee and then it seemed like a good idea to have it last night to help me stay up and get school stuff done.

It is thinner in body than coffee but it does have a nice french vanilla undertone to it that creamer brings out nicely. It gave me the hit of energy I needed to power through, as well.

I can’t wait for this week to be over – one more night at work and I can maybe focus on myself and recuperate from the crazy. I hope it goes by fast.

Note #700 and it’s a tea I’ve had for a while but never tried.

I think I was just nervous because it had a coffee like scent to it. And well, Dublin cream? It just sounds like it would be coffee-esque. I have an on-again/off- again relationship with coffee and since I’m liking it okay of late I figured I may as well just suck it up and try this for breakfast.

Steep notes: 1 tsp. leaf to a cup, below parameters. Creamer to sweeten.

That creamer really does make it seem like I’ve having a cup of coffee. French vanilla coffee, even. Strange. I did take a sip plain and it didn’t taste like much of anything (vague hints of vanilla at best) so I wonder how much of this is the tea and how much is the additive.

Anyway, I liked this. I just don’t feel like I actually drank tea this morning.

this was in the BBB box grab bag so i pulled it out to try. I must try ALL THE TEAS so even if i don’t think i’ll enjoy something, if it’s going to be tossed, i am happy to try it lol. This isn’t quite spiced donut but it IS a decent chai. I like the blend of spices going on in this one.

Sipdown!! (163)

I made the last of the sample JoonSusanna sent me and this tea is incredibly underwhelming. More than anything, I get a mediocre black tea base. If I search very, VERY hard, I can mildly detect a hint of banana but it is a lot of work to pick up a very subtle note. There is also a bit of thickness that might represent the pancakes. All in all, I was not impressed but I am glad I got to try it. You never know what a tea will be like unless you try it out first and with that in mind, thank you JoonSusanna for sending a sample my way :)

JoonSusanna sent me this in a take it away package. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find any steeping recommendations so I used 1.5 tsps and brewed it in just-below-boiling water for 4 minutes. That definitely was not right for this tea because all I am getting is a bitter base. I still have more to try to get this right so I will hold off numbers for now. Anyways, thank you JoonSusanna for sharing this with me.

Backlog:

Definitely one of the better pineapple teas/tisanes that I’ve had, and I don’t know if this is even available any longer. Back when I wrote my full-length review of this tea (see it here: http://sororiteasisters.com/2013/06/19/sunset-pineapple-tisane-from-compass-teas/ ) … back in June … yes, I’m still so very behind! This tisane wasn’t available back then and it doesn’t appear to be available now, some months later.

Unfortunate because this was really tasty.

Sweet, pineapple-y and the green rooibos base is light and refreshing. An amazing iced tea!

last tea of the evening and it’s a sipdown! Thus bringing my total at the end of the weekend to 220. 70 teas to drink up between now and black friday, ignoring the few swaps/samples that are on their way to me. 70 teas in 52 days. I can totally do this! While this tea is ok, it’s likely not a repurchase for me unless i need something to up my cart to free shipping or something. At the end of the day it’s really just a rooibosy ginger blend, and it’s less delicious than the blend from tao leaf tea that i like :) Thanks though Kaylee for sharing this one with me!