Czar Nikolas II

A sipdown!

Amazing to see that I received this as a Mother’s Gift and finished it at Mother’s Day breakfast – I think three years have passed? Two?

We had this hot but one reason a 250 gram bag can be polished off so quickly is because it makes really good sweet iced tea in summer. For that reason, I will eventually ask my godson to pick some up at the Russian market he goes to quite a bit. Not now, but when the cupboard gets a bit lower!

It is a very nostalgic tea for me with its berry and currant flavors, reminding me of our trip to Ireland and all the black currant water we drank and black currant in scones and such. I think the price is amazing for this much tea that tastes nice.

May Sipdown Prompt – a flavored black tea

Easy prompt for me, but I am using this one because I had it for breakfast today and then a guest requested it. This was a 250 gram bag but it is getting really close to a sipdown!

I had never had blackcurrant until I tried a sample of Harney’s black currant tea. It was okay but I didn’t know what currants were supposed to taste like. I found the tea a bit one dimensional.

This tea is supposed to be currants and strawberries, and I believe it is red currant rather than black. Either way, this tea evoked strong memories of all the blackcurrant things we had in Ireland. It is a very inexpensive tea for such a large bag, but I really like it. I have used to flavor homemade ice cream as well and it worked wonderfully for that.

I will be sorry to see it go, which will be soon, but I do have a tin of newish Blackcurrant from Elmwood Inn to step in and fill the gap for a currant tea. Would buy again in future.

A tea that reminds me of myself…because I have been nostalgic since childhood. Fall was bittersweet to me even as a little child. I loved school, and all that back to school entailed – the smell of new pencils, opening new books for the first time and paging through them, blank notebooks full of possibilities.

The tea is also nostalgic for me because we had a lot of blackcurrant when we visited Ireland and it was a pretty magical time. This was a gift from Youngest, so again…nostalgic.

Delicious hot or cold, sweet or unsweet. It is a good black tea base and the black currant flavor is spot on.

Confession: I don’t eat jelly beans. I haven’t had one in years and didn’t care for them growing up, probably because of the texture. I just wasn’t into them. But I really want to do every prompt so I tried to imagine a hypothetical jelly bean that I would enjoy. All I could come up with was blackcurrant.

Then I realized that a few years ago we got some jelly babies because of Doctor Who and there were blackcurrant flavored ones and I liked them! So that justifies using this tea as my jelly bean tea!

Blackcurrant is not a common flavor here in the US and years ago we had very little in the way of international markets. You could buy Ribena but it was expensive and we never did, mostly because of not really knowing what it was. Blackcurrants, I read, were a host for a fungus that afflicts white pines, iirc, and white pines were very important to the furniture industry so blackcurrant bushes were actually outlawed for many years. Might still be for all I know.

In Ireland, I noticed that the children’s medicines that were likely to be grape or bubblegum flavored here in the US were blackcurrant flavored there. Lucky kids.

The tea is easy enough on my stomach for mornings, and strong enough to go with breakfast. I add no milk or sugar, and sometimes makes sweet iced tea with this. It is a very large bag at a very good price, so I will likely replace it when it is gone.

As for the name, it definitely induces nostalgia for those early mornings in Ireland walking to the café with Youngest for tea and scones, and for the pitchers of blackcurrant water served in pubs and restaurants.

Some reviews on amazon refer to this as a strawberry tea. It has strawberry leaves in it but I do not detect strawberry flavor. I have had plain strawberry leaf tea and it does not taste at all like strawberries. Also, it makes you burp. Well, it made me burp. But the important thing is that it tasted nothing like strawberries. I thought the strawberry leaves imparted a sweetness and that is all.

It is possible that there is strawberry flavor added that other people are detecting but I do not. I am not a super taster like some of you amazing folks, though! This is just black tea and blackcurrant to me.

This was part of my Mother’s Day gift from Youngest, and before moving on with the tasting note I would just like to say congratulations to her! As of yesterday, she has completed her Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry, a minor in Microbiology, and a minor in Biotechnology!
She has worked very hard!

Nostalgia is a good name for this because I immediately thought of our trip to Ireland when I opened the bag. Black currant! It is not at all common here in the US but it was everywhere there, and one of the ladies I dined with a couple of times always ordered a pitcher of black currant water for us.

Reminiscent also of Tower of London, and perhaps a shade of Paris, it was delicious and fruity with my breakfast and had a stout enough base to satisfy me for a morning cuppa.

Thank you, Youngest! Love from Mom!

Sipdown

First note wouldn’t go. Here’s hoping this one does.

A favorite of some of my students, this finishes off one of my four big tins of floral tea!
Economical and tasty, strong of base and strong of rose.

July Sipdown Prompt – tea from your prettiest tin

This is nearly a sipdown, and I may come back in later to edit this and label it as such because one afternoon latte might do it.

Also, this tea does not come in an especially pretty tin. In fact, mine was in a bag. I MOVED it to a pretty tin when I finished off Fortnum and Mason’s Rose Pouchong. I think the F&M carousel tins are very pretty, indeed. There are so many pretty tins to choose from but I wanted a black tea for breakfast so here we are.

This tea is very rose-y and the base has nice heft. I drink it plain but it makes good lattes and also would take milk and sugar quite easily. Ashman doesn’t care for rose teas so it is up to me to drink them by myself, and I often have as many as five or six different ones ln shelf.

My favorite tins so far are Bellocq, Whittard’s collections, Fortnum’s Carousel type, and Harney’s Royal Palace line as well as some of their regular black tins with gold labels that have extra design.

What are your favorites?

February Sipdown Prompt – your cheapest tea

These Czar Nikolas teas shocked me when I saw the price for the amount of tea. I truly didn’t expect it to be very good, but instead the Nostalgia blend became one of my favorite blackcurrant teas. When this was purchased I think it was around $12 for 8.8 ounces of tea.

This is a tea for rose lovers, which means I don’t give it to Ashman! He did very much enjoy the rose/black tea ice cream I made with it, but he doesn’t prefer rose as the floral note in his tea. He likes jasmine quite a lot, though. And he loves rose lemonade so I dunno…

If I make really good progress on my sipdowns, I will acquire some more Nostalgia. It is marvelous for iced tea, too. My godson loves going to the Russian market near his college and they sell it there.

RECIPE FOR A BLACK TEA ICE CREAM:

I have been wanting to try to mimic an ice cream that was brought to me by Youngest. I believe the name of it was something like English Rose Black Tea? It was beautiful. When you opened the pint, there were bright pink crushed rose petals and tiny bits of crushed tea leaf on top. There were a few leaves scattered throughout the pint and it had nuts in it as well.

I had three rose black teas on hand and I thought this was the most likely candidate for making ice cream. The tea needed to have lots of rose flavor and also needed a hearty base to stand up to the sweetness and the rich creamy dairy base.

I added five generous teaspoons of this tea to one cup of hot milk and let it simmer on the stove for five minutes. I strained it and added 3/4 cup sugar, a tablespoon of homemade vanilla extract, a tiny pinch of salt, and two cups of half and half and whisked. (We prefer lower fat. Also, when making our vanilla ice cream and root beer floats, the lower fat ice cream seems to have a better texture than high fat.) That chilled in the fridge while I taught afternoon lessons and then I put it in the Cuisinart ice cream maker. We got the cheap one on an outrageous Christmas one day only doorbuster sale and it has lasted over a decade, so I am very pleased with it.

I added chopped pecans on top when I served it. I had forgotten there were nuts in the ice cream I was trying to replicate, so next time (and there WILL be a next time) I will stir them in prior to putting it in the freezer to set.

It was sooooo good. Ashman loved it, too. The only thing that would have made it better would have been to have some light, thin cookies to serve with it. I think lemon cookies would be perfect with it.

There was a ton of rose flavor, so I am glad I went with my instincts and did not add additional rose water, and the black tea flavor was well balanced, also.

I really like this tea and Nostalgia by the same company, especially for breakfast. This one is my floral tea for the scavenger hunt, but it is far from a sipdown. These are big bags!

The rose flavor is rich, and sometimes tastes like peppery rose. It reminds me of the scent of Fresh Cut Roses from Yankee Candle. The black tea base is pretty smooth and doesn’t make me reach for milk or sugar, but after drinking a couple of cups it does have an enjoyable briskness, which is why it goes so well with breakfast.

This is another birthday tea from Youngest!

I am hunkered down waiting for the big storms that are supposed to hit in a few hours. I moved the rockers and table, rolled up the outdoor rug, and put my car under the back carport. I don’t think this is a storm I would care to sit and watch from the rocker…Now I am sipping tea and reading everyone’s notes. Ashman will be at work until the storm ends and I am hoping for no tornadoes, no downed power lines, and no wind damage!

Of the two Czar Nikolas teas I received, this is my favorite! The other is bergamot with some extras and is a nice Earl Grey stand-in, but I don’t reach for Earls that much. This one is rose and I love me some rose tea!

The tea is broken leaf, not CTC. The pink and yellow rose petals are very faded but the safflower is very bright red/orange. Maybe they just hold color better. It is still a pretty blend.

The rose flavor is thick, as in rose oil thick. Thicc. It says it has natural and artificial flavors and I am sure this is how they achieve of the strong rose note but I don’t care. I dig rose and this has it in spades! It is smooth enough to drink without milk and sugar. As rosey as it is, I feel like sugar would be too much and would ruin it for me because mild rose really just tastes like sweetening to me. Strong rose would surely be overpowering with sugar.

The base is smooth and doesn’t anger my tummy like many black teas do. This is going to be a breakfast staple for a while…

Thank you, Youngest!

I could have sworn I wrote a note on this but I didn’t.

Youngest gave me this for my birthday, purchased from an international food market near where she lives.

I tried it hot first and initially thought it was pretty much just an Earl Grey, but I liked it more than most that have a Ceylon base. I generally prefer Earls on Keemun or other Chinese base because Ceylon can be too lemony with the sour bergamot.

I noticed some reviews here and there that said it made great iced tea.

It does not. Those people were lying liars of lies. It is horrifying sweet and iced. I made just over a quart and after doggedly trying to finish my 10 ounces with supper (I couldn’t) I poured all of it down the drain. It was a big old carafe of sour. Maybe treating it like a darjeeling would save it here? Maybe.

Fortunately, it tasted good hot so I don’t mind it not making good iced tea!

Thank you, Youngest!

A great blend of flavors, though you need to get the water boiling hot for the full steeping time and you have to use a lot of leaves for some reason. (I also like to brew this strong.) The Russian grocery store that used to sell this closed down, so I’m afraid of depleting my stash.

This is the second Czar Nikolas II sample I got from Sara. Looking at the tea itself, I’m not sure what I was thinking when I asked for this one. There are about a million rose petals mixed in with the black leaves, and it smells like a giant rose bomb went off when I open the bag. Ah well, onward!

The steeped tea also smells strongly of rose and not much else. Ick, nope this one’s not for me. It tastes like straight rose black tea. Withholding a rating. :P

I got this and another Czar Nikolas II tea in my swap with Sara. They sounded interesting and unusual, so I had to give them a try. This tea is a mix of very curly jet black leaves and various flower petals. It’s interesting that this tea says it’s only scented with flowers, because it has a tart, fruity smells like apricot or peach.

Mm, the steeped tea smells very fruity as well. I would describe the aroma as strawberry rhubarb – there’s a strong tart element. Wow, this is an interesting one! There’s definitely an element here that’s very tart, in fact it reminds me of a cross between lemon juice and hibiscus. The base tea is super mellow and somewhat malty. I can taste a hint of peach at the end of the sip. Something about this tea is chalky, and I’m not sure what it is. Overall, a strange and unusual tea.

Second sip down of the day and it’s not even 10 am. See you Czar! I feel really bad about that whole firing squad thing. Take care.

I picked this one today because it is black, didn’t smell flavored and I have a very small packet of it and hope to sip it down today.

It’s fine, basically tastes like tea. I don’t get mint or really anything mentioned in the other reviews. Once it’s gone I see absolutely no reason to get it again.

I like this tea. It reminds me of Mariage Frères’ Montagne d’Or, but it’s not quite the same. I feel like there’s a little bit of rose and then a sharper element so that it’s not completely mild. Overbrewing doesn’t make it super bitter. I think I might get tired of it after a while if I drank it too often, though.

Definitely tastes better when steeped for six minutes.

Just pure and beautifully full of flavour. Definitely one of the best black teas I’ve had.

Tea #29 from HHTTB2

I’ve noticed there were a lot of rose teas in this box. At least three, anyway. That’s three more than I’ve seen in previous boxes at least.

This one has a slightly stronger base than the H&S, and the safflower imparts a little bit of savoriness to the cup. There’s also very naturally sweet, and a little candy-like. It’s pretty heavily flavored, and the aftertaste is quite perfumey. But if you like rose, it’s a very good cup.

Ahhh. Rose teas are so romantic tasting~