Fru P Kaffe & The

This one is hazelnut and chocolate. I’ve mentioned earlier that I’m always on the lookout for a hazelnut tea, but it’s difficult to find one that’s just hazelnut. This one is sort of close enough given that the chocolate isn’t really all that prominent. I’ve tried both with and without milk, which is carries well, but the chocolate remains very shy. Which… a name like that, I expect some sort of chocolate spread sort of flavour.

The hazelnut is on the forefront here, lending quite a bit of nutty, wood-y astringency. This is probably why it takes milk so well. So that’s great! It’s not precisely what I was searching for, but what I was searching for I seem to have got. How’s that for a bit of luck.

Now that this need has been satisfied, am I going to get it again? Maybe not next time I visit the shop, but in future probably yes. Provided of course that I remember all this the next time I find myself searching for hazelnut teas.

Hmm, I really thought I’d reviewed this one. As in, I actually remember writing up my note… What did you do to it, Steepster?!

I drank this because there was a ‘splosion in the TTB, and I couldn’t save the rest of the sample. If I could have, it probably would have been a keep, because I remember this being very nice. It smelled delicious and tasted equally yummy. I got both strawberries and cream, and remember the strawberry being quite natural.

I tried this during the EU TTB Round 2 an age back, and only looking through my tries just now noticed that I never write up a note on it. I don’t remember a great deal about it, only that it wasn’t that memorable. Which I guess is self-explanatory seeing as I don’t remember it lol. It was nice enough, green, mild, and a little perfume-y.

(198!!!)

MissB passed this on to me ages ago, and as I was digging through my sample bin (seriously half my teas are in there right now), I saw it and decided to go for it.

It’s actually quite lovely. Not quite a “regular” green tea, it’s still grassy and a little spinachy. But it has a really… ergh, darjeeling-y feel to it and is somewhat astringent at the end of the sip. Quite fruity too, for all that it’s getting old.

I definitely prefer darjeelings when treated as a green for steeping, so a darjeeling that is actually a green is really neat to try!

Thank you for sharing. :)

(1.5 tsp, 9-ish oz)

Queued post, written August 20th 2014

This one came from the Fru P Christmas calendar that I had. It’s the last one of those teas that I haven’t had yet, and we used the rest of the leaf today. The weather has gone from heat wave-y to downright autumnal over the last few weeks, so it was appropriate.

I’ve shared some of it with MissB earlier and she was very pleased with it, so that stopped me being too scared of it. I like chai now and then, but it’s never something I would seek out and it’s extremely rare that I want to drink any. I don’t find it unpleasant. It’s just not very me. Maybe scared was an inaccurate word to use. Perhaps it would be better to say that MissB’s enjoying it made me less disinterested.

It is indeed a well balanced cup. I can easily pick up spices but none of them stand out in particular. It’s more of an ensemble performance, everything blending in neatly.

It’s quite sweet, and I’m getting a sort of impression that there might be a little bit of licorice root in there. Not very much, though. Not enough to get that tell-tale licorice root feeling at the back of the throat, but just enough to make it sweet.

It was quite nice.

Two more teas to go before I’ve emptied the box!!!

Well. I say ‘emptied’. Two more teas to go before I can start in on what I added to the box the other day because I was a Bad Dog. We had Husband’s Sister visiting for a long weekend, and took her into Skanderborg because she wanted to buy a souvenir and we wanted to buy some more plates and Husband didn’t want to drive in Århus when Skanderborg was closer and had the same sort of shops. While there, Husband suggested that we pop round to that chocolate shop we found last time we were in Skanderborg. They have NUTE tea. You may recall I wrote about one of those some months ago. Came in a very attractive but hopelessly useless wooden caddy.

“I’m not yet allowed to buy anything,” says I.

“Come on, you’re on holiday,” says Husband.

SEE?! Not my fault!

Came out with two NUTE caddies and another tin and six NUTE sample satchets. It all went a bit wrong. Especially since I went into a sort of feeding frenzy state where I didn’t realise until much later that two of the sample satchets were the same tea I also bought a caddy of.

“I can’t tempt you with some of our handmade chocolates?” says Shop Lady.

“It doesn’t exist!!!” says I, somewhat desperately.

Yes. It all went a bit wrong.

Queued post, written July 26th 2014

Another hot cup of heatwave tea. This one serves two purposes. Purpose one being that it came out of the yet to try box. Purpose two relates to the ingredients. Peppermint and licorice root in what looks like more or less equal proportions. I woke up with a slightly achy throat, so I thought the licorice root would be good. I tend to find licorice root soothing under these circumstances, especially when mixed with chamomile. It’s not what I would call delicious in any way, but it’s a pretty good sick-tea. That said, I do hope I’m not getting sick. No other symptoms, so I’m thinking it just due to the heat and not sleeping well at night because of said heat. Perhaps a little dehydration as well, although I felt like I drank my own weight in water yesterday.

Anyway, this blend came along with the Christmas calendar I had from Fru P in December. It wasn’t one of the days, it was just a little bonus-sample that she added in. This is the blend that makes me convinced that she’s using the same supplier as the shop Hans & Grethe does, because they’ve been selling this for years. From what I’ve heard it’s one of their most popular blends. I have a colleague who hasn’t drunk anything else for years.

I don’t much like Hans & Grethe as a shop for two reasons. One reason is the coffee mills they have in the shop and they are always going. These big old-fashioned types with big turning wheels and whatnot. There are four or five of them in the shop itself. Right next to where they sell their tea. I don’t know if there is always coffee in them, or if they add a portion of beans when someone buys coffee. I can’t actually taste a difference whether the tea has been around a coffee grinder or not, and the mills might be purely decorative for all I know, but it just leaves me with a bad impression of the shop.

The second reason is probably more serious. I don’t trust that they know what they’re dealing with. I once went to a sort of tea-tasting event with a colleague of mine held by one of the Hans & Grethe people and while it was very good from a beginner’s view point, there were a number of things that disagreed with rather a lot. The way, for example, she told about keemun teas and phrased it in a way that would have you believe that all the keemun tea in all the world was ALL of it single estate. As in all of it the same estate. Which… well, that’s just not possible. That one was the last straw for me and I sort of stopped listening too much. (In general, the event could have been organised better, really)

A few weeks later I went into one of their shops wanting to buy some oolong, and I recognised it was the same woman minding the shop that day. I asked what they had in the way of oolong, and she showed me a Taiwanese oolong. It was one of those that were somewhere in the middle between a green type and a dark type oolong, and I tend not to find them super interesting. I was looking for a dark type, so I asked if she had that. She then informed me that that would then be a black tea I was looking for as oolong (by definition) was 50% oxidised. The ‘not 25%, certainly not 80%’ was strongly implied. I bit my tongue and let it pass, although I’m not certain I managed to hide the sceptical-cat-is-sceptical look. Then she showed me another one, as sort of an afterthought. This time a Formosa oolong, which she tried to have me believe was entirely different. Well, I’ve learned both history and geography so I happen to know that Formosa is an old-fashioned European name for Taiwan, and they also looked and smelled completely identical…

The really scary thing was that as I left I got the distinct feeling that she believed it was me who didn’t know what I was talking about.

I haven’t shopped there since. Don’t particularly fancy starting really. This is why I’m highly pleased that Fru P uses the same supplier, because it means I can safely disregard H&G completely and not fear missing out on anything. Fru P also has a coffee grinder, but it’s a smaller modern model of the sort that does one bag of beans at a time. I find that much much easier to deal with.

Now, the blend itself. If it is popular from H&G, I can’t see why it shouldn’t also be popular from Fru P. I can understand why it’s popular. The peppermint and licorice are both sweet things, so it’s a very sweet thing to be drinking. I get a minty fresh aftertaste and the licorice is lovely on my throat. If you don’t like licorice root or peppermint, obviously you won’t like this. I wouldn’t say I enjoy it immensely, but as suspected it’s very good for a sore throat and not actually unpleasant.

Queued post, written May 24th 2014

This one is from the Christmas calendar, actually, and I’ve only just got around to trying it myself now. I’m using the rest of the tea, having given most of it away and also made some of it for Husband once when I was having something else myself. He thought, if memory serves me correctly, that it was a very pleasant tea. I’ve shared it with MissB and Courtney, and MissB in turn shared it with Jump62359. All of them thought it was pleasant, although MissB found it triggered one of her allergies, so I’m quite confident that I’m going to like it.

I used the rest of the leaf that I had, and that turned out to be a bit more leaf than it looked like because it brewed up fairly strong. No matter, I like a fairly strong tea, so it hasn’t lost anything on that account.

It’s very rhubarb-y in flavour. I can’t comment on the aroma, because my nose is running a bit. I hope I haven’t caught anything. Or rather, I sort of hope that I’ve caught something, because I’ve never suffered from pollen allergies of any sort in all my life and I don’t much fancy starting now. But it’s got lots of rhubarb flavour and it actually tastes like rhubarb. It also tastes like green tea. It’s about equal parts flavour and base and they are flavours that seem to go quite well with each other, finally ending on a sweet note.

I might actually purchase some more of this if it’s still summer when I’m allowed to buy tea again. I doubt it is, to be honest. It seems like there’s still lots left in the box I haven’t tried yet. Next year, then!

miss B sent this one my way, and i suspect she may have been provided this one by angrboda since that’s whom i associate with fru P :) i’ve been putting off trying this one since there is something about the smell that just gets to me. Suspect it;s the anise smell, though that’s not usually something i dislike. brewed up, this isn’t nearly as bad as the smell would have you believe. it mellows out a bunch and becomes something that i could drink or not. It’s neither offensive or delicious…just sort of there. just not sure i could get past the dry smell to keep it around…or why i’d want to since it doesn’t inspire excitement and joy :) thanks for the taste miss b!

My first tea to review from the return of the EU TTB box round 2. I’m loving flavoured black teas today and I also love rhubarb so the chance to try a rhubarb based black tea is high on my list of priorities for the day. :)

Oohhhh lovely, tart yet sweet rhubarb notes are crisp amongst the lightly malt black tea. A lovely scent, exactly what I wanted to sniff, raises my expectations for this blend somewhat.

Served with a drop of milk.

I took a sip and couldn’t help from verbally declaring “Oohhh this is nice!” while my husband said he could taste rhubarb which is excellent since I didn’t tell him it was a rhubarb flavoured tea. It doesn’t taste strong and the black base doesn’t add anything to deter from the beautiful rhubarb flavour. It is tart yet sweet but rather natural in flavour and it seems to melt in my mouth through the after taste. I’m actually salivating as I drink this tea :) I can happily compare this blend to Bluebird’s Rhubarb + Custard, the main difference is that their blend is creamier and sweeter than this one, but regardless this blend is still wonderful. I would happily buy some of this tea. :)

Great start from the return of the box.

Queued post, written April 18th 2014. I just decided this morning that today would be a green tea day. Seems fitting that the next post in the queue is also a green tea. Queue is only 15 pages long these days, btw!

And another one bites the dust. First time I’ve had it, but I’ve given some of it away so I actually used the rest of it now.

After the oddness that were the Northern Wilds, I rather fancied something different. Something completely different. Green was the answer and this was the first one I found.

It smells kind of citrus-y. A little like lemon-water. Other than that I’m not getting much in the way of scent.

The flavour is completely different from the aroma. I almost came to expect something really mild with a bit of lemon twang, and instead something bit my tongue. There is the lemon, but it’s more pithy than juicy, and this is then followed by something I can best describe as default green. Sort of vegetal but without me being able to really say what sort of greenery I think it is.

I find myself actually rather enjoying this. Imagine that. A Darjeeling that doesn’t have me nose-wrinkling even a little bit. How surprisingly nice!

Queued post, written April 18th 2014

I tried this in a cold brew, because I don’t really care for these blends that are made up of only dried fruit. I find them often rather sour and frequently somewhat bland-ish. Generally I’ve had the best experiences with them in cold brews, so that was what I went for.

Lots of the blend in a couple of filter bags in a jug over a couple of days, and the result was… a really thin vaguely apple-juicy concoction. I tried it hot as well, and that was pretty much the same story.

Unbelievably dull. I might as well have been drinking water, it just didn’t work at all. I’m not certain what to do with the rest of the bag now. It may very well find itself relocated. To the bin. As it came from the christmas calendar I have no qualms at all doing this. I didn’t pick it myself and there is a great deal of it.

A world of meh.

Oooh, this is yummy tea. Although, I must admit it’s less ‘cherry’ than I was expecting, it’s still a cherry-like tea… more caramel cherry, if anything? A bit of creaminess to it? Gulped it down though, and look forward to more in a day or two.

Thanks Angrboda for this lovely, large sample! I must admit that all of these lovely teas are making me re-think my travel plans this summer…

The only time I’ve ever had a rhubarb tea was from The Spice and Tea Exchange and it was their Mystic Dragon tea. A great tea! But just like all the other ones I’ve had, it doesn’t really stand out? A nice tea to have, but not a must have

I got this from MissB a while back and I was very grateful for all her samples!

This smells very similar to Mystic Dragon, just less strawberry, obviously, because I don’t even thing this has strawberry in it.
Ohh don’t know how rhubarb tastes like, but I feel like this very much tastes like rhubarb haha. A nice tea! I don’t think I’m super in love with rhubarb teas, but it’s nice to have in the cupboard :)

Another from Angrboda. Thanks! To compare with rhubarb green from Fru P.

I fully expected to enjoy the rhubarb vanilla white/green blend more, and I don’t. The vanilla overtakes the rhubarb a bit more than I’d like, though it’s still tasty. The vanilla scent is awesome though. Fru P seems to know her vanilla. I’m enjoying the base here too, yet the rhubarb green just seemed crisper. This one is more comforting (thank you vanilla), and while still great, I find myself wanting more rhubarb. I would still be happy to drink this one semi-regularly though.

I believe that finishes up my envelope from Angrboda!

I decided to brew up this one and Rhubarb Vanilla together for a bit of a comparison.

Upon first sip this one is exactly what it claims to be – rhubarb green. It’s tasty. I am picky about greens, and they generally get neglected in my swap pile. However, all the Fru P teas Angrboda sent have been awesome. I really enjoy rhubarb everywhere, including tea. This is definitely a tea I could get behind. Like cupboard-worthy. And a cupboard-worthy green is quite something.

Thanks Angrboda!

Bah, I messed this up royally. 30+ minute steep?! I am so sorry Angrboda, as you graciously sent me some of this, and I’ve just plain been bad. In my defense, as soon as I brewed this, the mailman delivered an order of tea…

Leaves are long and pretty, with some yellow flowers scattered throughout. Smells tropical, like a mango or pineapple maybe, very sweet and juicy. Due to the ridiculous oversteeping, it’s bitter. I can still pull out the fruit flavoring though, and quite enjoy it once I stop scolding myself.

i haven’t drunk so much rooibos before so it’s hard to compare. I love the strawberry part of if, of course, which make me want to try it. it sweetened the rooibos part, which is less bitter

From the queue

Another instance of yes, that is actually what the blend is called. This is from my Christmas calendar, and the name amused me so much that I had to go on Fru P’s website and ask if I really had deciphered the writing on the bag correctly. I had.

Best name ever! :D (Although I will say that rather than morning cranky, I prefer the term morning quiet which in my opinion is far more accurate for the condition)

Also slightly worrisome.

The name in Danish is ‘Morgensur’. Sur. Cranky, but also sour. Tart. One of my least favourite things in the world to ruin tea with is often used to make something taste more tart. And occasionally green tea can be plenty sour on its own already.

I have to admit my hopes aren’t high on this one, but the hibiscus-y fears were rather put to rest there, but I’m still not really expecting to be keen on this one. Then again, I do like lemon-y, citrus-y things (bergamot excepted), so it might be that sort of citrus-y sourness. That would be totally fine with me. Could be grapefruit, perhaps. That would fit the ‘morning’ theme, even if the green base certainly doesn’t.

It definitely smells citrus-y. Lemon-y and also something else which I’m not certain is citrus. It’s a thick sort of sweet smell that rather reminds me of vanilla, but it can’t be vanilla. Trust me, if she had told me when I asked on Facebook that it had vanilla in it, I’d have remembered. She did tell me what was in it on Facebook and I may have to go and look it up. Perhaps some sort of berry?

It isn’t actually living up to its name here. Not really particularly sour or tart, but with a touch of a pleasant lemon-y, citrus-y sharpness. Not too little and more importantly, not too much. Again, there’s that smooth, sweet note that I can’t place. I don’t know what it is. I saw there were a few flowers in the leaf, so it might simply just be them affecting the texture and bringing out some natural base notes. I am, however, also getting a berry-y aftertaste.

Okay, it’s time to go back to Facebook and find out what she said was in it and attempt to not be distracted by Candy Crush or Pepper Panic on the way.

Turns out she said bergamot and mango! Bergamot? Really? It doesn’t taste like bergamot at all. Bergamot is a dusty grey sort of floral taste. This is more yellow and sharp. On the other hand, I have had EGs before that tasted more like lemon tea than anything else, so perhaps it has something to do with the level of flavouring and how this or that particular base responds to that. Mango, however, now that explains a lot. That’s the sweet and smooth note, I can see that now. Mango does have that sort of flavour, but it was so far from my thoughts that it never even occurred to me.

To my vast surprise I’m finding that I’m actually really enjoying this. Isn’t that just fab, when you find something great in something you expected to dislike!

On a name related note, I tend to translate these Danish names to the best of my abilities so that you other lot have some idea of what it is I’m drinking without having to do a lot of detective work first. I’ve noticed, though, that French names hardly ever get translated on here, so I’m wondering if it’s silly of me to do it. Would people prefer it if I kept the Danish names, I wonder? Am I just creating unnecessary potential confusion in the database if other Danish Steepsterites were to show up (Ha! Dream on, Ang)? I had a small discussion in a comment section of a different post about this, but it was well hidden and I am particularly interested in hearing what people who don’t understand Danish thinks about this. Opinions below or on a postcard please.

So this one came to me from MissB who got it from Angrboda. :)

It was labelled “herbal” so I dumped it into a basket last night… then decided it looked weird and checked it out on steepster. Mate. Of course.

So I’m having it this morning instead. It’s a green mate. I much much prefer them roasted.

But now that it’s been sitting around for a while, it tastes more like lemongrass. I can get behind that.

Thanks for sharing the tea, MissB, but it’s not really for me.

Thanks again Angrboda for sending this wonderful tea. This is my last cup, and I’m sad to see it go. It’s such a delightful base tea with a nice strong, but not overwhelming vanilla flavour.

This one is pretty awesome. There is a distinct, rich vanilla flavour, with a strong, but not overwhelming black base. I could happily drink plenty of this one. I bet it would be tasty chilled too.

Angrboda you were right about this one! Thanks for sharing. :)

From the queue

Yes, that is what the blend is actually called! Can you imagine going into the shop and saying, “hello, may I have some bad weather, please?” It makes me really want to like it, just so that I can buy some more and get to say that. Also, this was December 22nd in my Christmas calendar, but since I wasn’t very good at keeping up with that and still (writing this in mid-January) haven’t actually tasted half of them yet, I’m just going to start adding them to the queue.

Unfortunately, it smells rather anise-y and I’m not really a fan of anise in general. It gets far too cloying very quickly. I can’t tell what else might be in here, and looking at the blend itself isn’t really helping much at all. I can see some yellow bits and some green bits and some reddish brown bits and a few red bits. Could be anything, although I think the red bits look a bit rose-y. I’m also wondering if the reddish brown bits might be some sort of freeze dried fruit. There is a note under the anise which may or may not be kind of fruity.

The first note I can taste is anise, and then with something possibly fruity underneath. I think there must be some mint as well, but that’s really a no-brainer, because I’ve found that it’s difficult to find a herbal blend which doesn’t contain mint in some form or other. I’m sure they exist, but few of them have crossed my particular path.

In spite of the anise, this isn’t actually as dreadful as feared when I first sniffed it. I shan’t be going into the shop and asking for more bad weather, but I can probably finish this lot off.

I’m not sure about the rating here, as I find myself in the odd situation of not really having an opinion on it either way. I think I’ll just leave it off for the time being.

Green Darjeeling? I had to look it up. It’s as simple as it sounds: same tea bush, it’s just the green isn’t oxidized. Which makes it a green tea (hey, I had to check!) and thus I brewed it correctly. It’s a basic green tea with something apricot-ish in the background. I like it, and I’m glad I had the opportunity to try it. I likely wouldn’t order more, but now I know what to expect with a green darjeeling. Yay!

Another Fru P Kaffe find from Angrboda – thank you again! It’s a lovely thing, being a tea tourist in a country I have yet to get to, and I really, truly appreciate it.

I want more of this. Angrboda, I may need to see if you’re willing to be my tea mule for more, because this is just plain amazing – and I’m so grateful to you for sharing it. Funny, because I’m double-fisting it with the Yu Lu chai from Verdant, and they’re both equally amazing, if quite different.