Happy Turtle Tea

TTB sample. There’s lapsang souchang in this, but luckily I taste very little smokiness. Really, this tastes like a black tea with creme flavoring and a hint of fruitiness. I enjoy how all the flavors come together in an unexpected way.

The name drew me in, so I put aside this sample from a TTB. I taste the berries and the oolong; it’s a pretty straightforward tea. Nothing more to it. The berry is a bit fake, and the oolong is a bit toasty. I’m not an oolong fan, so this isn’t the ideal tea for me.

Sipdown! (18 | 421)

Ooh, this is actually one I was interesting in trying from Happy Turtle, thanks Gabby!

This is… interesting. They call it a dirty chai tea, which it is definitely not. Well, not unless your chai tastes like liquefied Red Hots ha ha. I do actually like it though? It’s basically a sweet cinnamon candy black tea (à la Hot Cinnamon Spice) but then there’s that earthy, toasty coffee note as well. It sounds weird, but I actually quite like the combination.

It is definitely too sweet though, as these candy cinnamon teas already taste very sweet, and then there’s added sugar in this one as well. If it wasn’t so sweet, I would consider ordering it as I enjoy the candy cinnamon and coffee together for some reason. A fun one to try!

points for the name, less points for a boring tea.

Theoretically this should be up my alley from a flavouring perspective BUT the balance in the flavours is off. Too much cinnamon in this is making it sweet and cloying versus adding to the other flavours.

Sipdown! (51 | 267)

So I overleafed this one because I didn’t want to have an awkward small amount leftover.

But I didn’t notice that it has actual sugar in it, so that was a mistake. It’s quite sweet with the amount of leaf I used. So I’ll try to somewhat ignore that while reviewing since I used more leaf than I normally would have…

Anyway, this is fine. I feel like it needs more of the butterscotch flavor? I can taste a little, but I feel like they’re leaning too heavily on the sugar to provide sweetness. Mostly I taste a generic Ceylon base that’s slightly astringent, plus a relatively small amount of butterscotch (and I do get a bit of the cream soda from the flavored sugar). And then the sugar, of course. I feel like it’s probably a reasonable amount for most people, but I really dislike any sweetener at all in tea.

Anyway, not a fave, but a lot of that is because of the sugar… I bet it would make a good latte though, if I were so inclined.

Sipdown! (44 | 260)

Courtesy of Gabby!

This is not my favorite. I think it’s because I’m not a lavender fan, and I don’t always love sage either (though sometimes I do, like in S&V’s Rocky Mountains). The ginger is nice though.

I just wish there was a bit of fruit or something sweet here to sort of counterbalance all of those savory herbal notes. So not loving it because of that, but still thankful for the chance to try a tea that I never would have ordered for myself! :D

A gorgeous blackberry and sage blend. I normally don’t enjoy sage-flavored blends but the lavender and blackberry really smooth it out for a delightfully comforting cuppa.

Sipdown! (30 | 246)

Mastress Alita’s Sipdown Challenge (September) – “A coconut tea”

I actually have very few coconut teas in my cupboard, because 1) I enjoy coconut situationally but I’m not in love with it, and 2) coconut tends to dramatically shorten the lifespan of tea, and since I don’t love it, it’s unlikely that I’ll finish the tea before it goes rancid. But happily, I got this sample in my swap, just in time for this monthly prompt! ❤

I admit, I was a bit nervous about this tea, because it has coconut AND lavender, neither of which are favorites of mine. But it’s actually quite nice. The main flavor is a light, creamy coconut with a touch of pineapple. It’s not overwhelmingly creamy, more light and airy, like a coconut marshmallow. The lavender is subtle, which I appreciate, and adds a nice citrusy floral note at the end of the sip. I don’t think my sachet had any butterfly pea flowers in it, as my cup is a warm brown color.

Anyway, pleasantly surprised. I’m not sure whether I would order it or not, just because I don’t crave coconut, but I would definitely sip it again!

(and now this song is going to be stuck in my head alllll day… XD)

Sipdown! (25 | 241)

So my cupboard has just exploded with a bunch of new teas. Not only did I buy quite a few on vacation, but a couple of tea orders also arrived while I was away, plus I got my last Bird & Blend subscription and a large tea swap. All at the end of the month, of course. Sigh… So anyway, now I’m trying to sip through the smaller swap samples as quickly as I can, just to get them out of my cupboard. This was one of those single-cup samples.

I’ve been wanting to try Happy Turtle, so I was glad to see a few teas from them in the package. This one sounds right up my alley, a black tea with dark forest berries and evergreen flavors. But I think there might not have been enough berry in my small sample, as I’m not really getting more than a hint of blueberry. Mostly it actually tastes like sage to me, which isn’t even an ingredient. I guess it must be the eucalyptus combining with the blackberry leaf? I’m not sure I’ve ever had mistletoe in tea, so I can’t place that flavor.

Anyway, it tastes like a sage-forward black tea with a subtle hint of jammy blueberry in the background. It’s not bad, but not quite what I was hoping for either…

Iced and Plain Tea Sipdown (219)

This has a really nice raspberry flavour. For the longest time I was trying to place it and it finally dawned on me as I started drinking the iced tea that this is like DAVIDsTEA’s Fantasy Island, minus the coconut. The hot tea, once cool, got bitter so I was worried the iced tea may be bitter as well. It is not. It leans more into the raspberry flavour. It also has some mango. I like this though over time it will blend with all the other decent fruity teas I’ve had.

Grabbed this sample from a TTB, and oh boy is it sparkly! So pretty! I didn’t realize this would be quite so fruity. It really just tastes like an herbal hibiscus-based tea. I enjoy that variety of tea, but since the black tea is mostly undetectable in flavor, I find it pointless to have the added caffeine here. My cup of this was tart and tasty with a sweet, pleasant strawberry. It tasted best cold. I don’t know that it stood out enough that I’d purchase an herbal version of this either, but it was a decent cup.

Cold Brew Sipdown (1602)!

Y’know, with this type of Doctor Who inspired name it really feels like a missed opportunity to have not included rose in the blend. Even if it was just petals.

I’m kind of glad this is a sipdown. I was hesitant at first because how awesome of a fandom pick would this have been for future Geek Steep episodes!? However, sipping on it now… Yeah, not a fan. It’s busy. I can tell there’s jasmine and some type of citrus flavouring as well, but mostly it has this dominating overarching flavour of children’s chewable Flintstones vitamins. Definitely not the most pleasant flavour to be drinking longterm.

So… welp.

With this name, I expected this to taste like cookies, but the ingredients include lavender, figs, and currants, so I was interested to see how it would turn out. The flavor ends up tasting 100% like boba. I gave a sip to someone else, and they also said boba with no prompting from me. I’m bummed the tea box only had enough for one cup because this flavor is so fun! It’s pure liquified boba. The second steep tasted every bit as amazing. I even steeped it a third time, which was still tasty, but had lost some of the magic. I drank this a few days ago, and I’ve been thinking about it (even bringing it up in conversations with family members) ever since.

It’s my turn for the latest Reddit TTB! This was the first tea I tried – its scent is so desserty and irresistible. The flavor is just as butterscotchy as I had hoped! I almost never think butterscotch or caramel teas have gone far enough, but this one is really rich and good! It’s unmistakable butterscotch. Such an awesome latte. What a great butter beer inspired tea.

Cold Brew Sipdown (2622)!

This cold brew really tossed me a curveball because as I was sipping it I was definitely tasting strawberries but I also went through waves of tasting vanilla or cream and even chocolate at one point. Like, a whole Neapolitan fantasy situation happening here. Of course, though there are berries in the blends, both my weird phantom vanilla and chocolate flavours were totally out of place for this tea…

But, even if my sense of taste was all garbled together, it was very nice!

Geek Steep S3E2 – Avatar: The Last Airbender

Y’know, you would think that with new podcast episodes just being biweekly now that it would be easier to stay up to date with posting my pod tasting notes. However, you would be wrong…

Anyway, this was the tea that I drank during recording two episodes back with my first fandom choice of the season – Avatar! Since this is an Avatar inspired fandom blend (named for the S3 episode with Zuko and Aang beginning their fire bending training), I debated actually doing this for my watch through. However, ultimately I thought the flavour was a bit too far off from what I wanted with this rewatch and I actually avoided the third season when picking episodes (for several reasons discussed during this pod). Still wanted to feature it though, so recording tea it was!

It’s not necessarily my favourite tea, but there’s nothing wrong with it either. The split tea type base kind of just fades into the background here and what’s left is a bit of a jumbled blueberry-ish fruity taste with some floral undertones. It’s not really the flavour I would think would be associated with this iconic series moment, but I also can’t think of what the flavour should be so I’m kind of letting the flavour mismatch go and just appreciating this cup of tea for what it is.

Thank you VariaTEA for this tea!

Truthfully I’ve put off trying this one because the ingredients list is very, very busy and I was having a hard time gauging just by looking at it what it was supposed to taste like. I felt like I had to be in a particular kind of mood to want to just go for it…

I guess I was today though because when I grabbed my teas to bring to work today this one jumped out at me. Honestly it was fine. The dry leaf visual is very, very pretty though! Lovely needle shaped green teas, small elderberries, and rather plump goji berries all jump out to me and everything is coated in a fine shimmery pink tinted luster dust that gives a very ethereal “pixie like” feeling. Sadly, once steeped, the shimmer doesn’t particularly carry to the steeped tea – I think there’s probably just not enough of it to make a noticeable enough impact.

The taste is light and sort of vaguely “red berry” in direction but it’s so soft/watery and muddled that it’s near impossible to distinctly call out anything more specific than that. Despite being a mix of green and black teas, it’s the green that wins out here: light and grassy and complimentary to the soft berry notes even if I don’t love it overall.

I think this will be easy to finish off overall, but I feel like for an Avatar The Last Airbender inspired tea I just wanted something more… impactful!?

Sipdown 162-2021
I didn’t care for this. It didn’t read as chestnut, but rather a an artificial chocolate flavor. Not undrinkable, just not great.

Sipdown 161- 2021

I was expecting the chocolate in this to taste much more synthetic than it does, based on the smell. Not really getting a nuttiness, but more of a maple chocolate. I’m guessing the caramel flavoring is reading as maple to me.

I wanted to like this tea. I wanted to like it so badly.

However, I think it’s one of those blends that’s unfortunately committed the crime of having too much going on. I mean, the ingredient list is long and it’s full of a bunch of competing flavours. Coconut and yerba mate sounds so nice, light and refreshing with subtle greener topical vibes – and some of that does come through! But there’s also A LOT of very herbaceous basil that seems diametrically opposed to the other flavours. Now, don’t get me wrong – I like basil in tea. A lot, actually. However basil and coconut!?

I’m sorry, but it just doesn’t work.

Sipdown (1456)!

Decided to just push through the rest of this simple and clear it out. It’s really not a bad chocolate tea, it’s just that I’m only getting that kind of plain chocolate note and the simplicity focused around a flavour I’m not super interested in combined with the really oily mouthfeel from all the melted sprinkles just… isn’t doing it for me.

However, like I said in my last note, the fandom connection is really fun and I do think the sprinkles add a cool Captain America inspired visual! I know other people will enjoy this tea because it’s a solid chocolate flavour – I’m just not a chocolate tea person.

(And, blasphemous to say I know, I’m also just not a big fan of Captain American either.)

The fandom reference here is really fun but the tea kind of just tastes like chocolate in a pretty average way and I didn’t love the thick ring of blue around the waterline of my tea from all the melted sprinkles. It’s fun, but kind of just… fine.