Mariage Frères

My housemate brought home a 30-muslin sachet box of this from her employer’s tea drawer. Best before 12/2012; it’s 01/2020.

It’s clearly a victim of neglect. Very light red fruit-cream aroma and taste. No discernible green tea flavor. Very drying.

Going to drop the box in the work tea cupboard. Somebody else might appreciate it or throw it out secretly.

I overindulged at breakfast and now feel the need to have a cup of something refreshing and light. I love the mist of matcha around the teabag and the light green color of the cup once it’s brewed. This is a very gentle, lightly grassy green tea. For me, there isn’t a lot that is special about this cup. It is soothing, vegetal and delicate. I definitely needed such a cup this afternoon.

I was expecting this tea to be far stronger for some odd reason, but it’s surprisingly light and a bit boring, if I’m honest. This seems to be a rather benign black tea with a hint of citrus. I wish that there could be a little bit more flavor, but it’s nice and drinkable. I think this one could be rather nice iced as well.

I was really expecting not to like this tea very much.. reading that this is a lemony green tea just seems more appropriate for the summer. It is cold and windy here today which makes me want to snuggle up with something else. Sipping this tea, it is so light and fruity. The lemon comes across as more of a sweet lemon drop instead of the punchy tart fruit I was expecting. It’s simply lovely with the green tea base that partners with the fruitiness so well. What I really like is that the green tea is there, but not overpowering and truly is the perfect match for the other flavors. I’m sure that this would be a delicious treat to have in the summer… very reminiscent of a candied lemonade.

Hmm.. I was in the mood for an herbal blend and this one seems like it would do the job.. mint and bergamot. It’s an interesting combination because those two flavors seem to be so strong and overpowering on their own if not blended right. Sipping… I taste mostly the mint and maybe something that resembles citrus on the tail end of the sip. Strangely, it reminds me of those fruity and minty gums. I suppose I’d prefer to have one or the other instead, but I’ll finish the cup.

This one is interesting…I don’t think I’ve tried a tea like this before. It’s softly sweet and floral at the same time. The green tea is the perfect base for this blend as it doesn’t get in the way of everything else. I really can’t put my finger on the flavors only that it tastes like flowers, fruit, a bit of mild spice like those in a pastry or cake and some very faint vanilla. I would drink this because of how unique and strange it is.. but I don’t know if I would repurchase.

I believe this is the tea I have from Sil, originally from Ysaurella, but it’s possible I read the name incorrectly… anyhow, it’s a green, and I’m sad to say it wasn’t very good. Very bland and tasted like older tea. Which, of course, it is. I’ll give it another shot in case I brewed it poorly, though, as I seem to be doing that a fair bit lately.

Thanks, both, for the chance to try it, though!

Thank you Cameron B.!

Refreshing and light-bodied tea with citrus notes, stonefruits, fruity… Not in your face type of tea. Really well balanced. Slightly malty to make it more satisfying. It’s also perfectly sweeetened with honey(?) so it’s not too sweet either. Enjoyed this sample in my daily sipper.

Delicious black tea with bright but elegant flavours of strawberry and raspberry.
Had it hot with light cane sugar and it was divine – like drinking a fresh berry compote.
I could see this being delicious iced as well in the summertime. Glad I requested a sample from the Cultured Cup.

This tea looks, smells and tastes very much like a medium oxidized oolong, so it’s probably not exactly a green tea though it is sold as such. High temperature recommandations fit for this one and it reacts very closely to an oxidized Tie Guan Yin. Gong fu cha works well too and as expected reveals more complex aromas.

Sipdown! 161/397

I’m so so sorry to the person who sent me this, but it’s not on my spreadsheet and I have no idea why not! I have a feeling it was either Tea Pet, OhFancyThat or Red Fennekin based on the way it was packaged, so thank you all for your swaps and apologies again for not knowing which one this came in.

I was really excited about this tea. It’s gorgeous, smells divine and I have had nothing but positive experiences with Mariage Freres. It is a nice tea, but I think because I had such high expectations I was disappointed. The flavour combination seems bizarre and cluttered – too many flavours, not enough thought behind the combination. The description is pretty vague, and I couldn’t detect many pronounced notes except for a thick, syrupy cherry at the end of the sip. The mouthfeel was very thick, too, and was accompanied by a little astringency (even though I steeped it at a lower temperature for a black) that made me think of cough syrup. This is all sounding more negative than I meant it to, I promise I enjoyed the cup. It just didn’t blow me away or live up to my high expectations. I guess it lacked the subtlety and complexity of most Mariage Freres and other French teas I’m used to. I paired it with homemade sunflower seed bread, which I think actually went very nicely and brought out more of the subdued spice notes in this tea.

On the 18th day of December, my tea advent calendar gave to me… a tea sample from MissB! That I don’t believe I have tried before. Unfortunately, if this tea was supposed to have any chai-like flavouring, it was absent. However, the base was pretty tasty, so I’m not sad to have a cup of it left. It was malty and flavourful. Not rating since I assume I’m not getting the full story here.

Not rating because, well, I really dislike clove unless it’s delegated to a very minor supporting role, and unfortunately that is not the case here. But it seems churlish to low-rate a Christmas tea for having too much clove. I mean this flavor is exactly what one would expect from something named “Esprit de Noël,” but I had hoped MF might handle it a bit differently and give me a nice surprise. All the other ingredients with no clove, or just the tiniest bit, would be right in my wheelhouse, but the amount of clove in this just undoes me.

I did have it steeped in hot milk this afternoon, and that’s probably the only way I can enjoy it … once in a blue moon. I need to give this to someone who will appreciate it.

Okay, I guess I better go ahead and give this a number, finally. The reason I’ve avoided this is that Marco Polo and Wedding Imperial were in my very first “posh” tea buy, the purchase that put me on the road (not very long ago!) to trying more and more teas, and the reason I hardly drink coffee any more. But! I really overdid it with these two, to the point of making myself sort of sick of the taste of them … thus my delayed write-up.

To be honest, I would have waited longer, but I just got one of those fancy new gravity infusers, and had to give a thought about what tea to christen it with. Well, why not the first fancy tea I ever sampled? Marco Polo, then, yes. Unfortunately, I was also a bit hungry, and had eaten some salted almonds just before. Unwise. As a general rule, I’d guess that “don’t salt your mouth before tea tasting” might be a good one. At least it’s a good one for Marco Polo. My first few sips, black with a tiny bit of sweetener, were awful! “Bejabber!” I moaned, “And zooterkins! Truly I have bespoiled this once fair elixir by my own depraved intemperance!”

Luckily, though, those first sips did a good job of rinsing my mouth, and when I added more sweetener and some milk, my old love was back to the lovely, luxurious, creamy strawberry shortcake flavor I remembered. Maybe too much so, since now I’m tempted to have more … and more! But no, I’ve sworn I’ll not ruin any more delights with gross overindulgence. No, really.

/me hums innocently

Sipdown no. 127 of 2018 (no. 483 total).

This one found itself at the bottom of the ratings and so became my take it to work tea until it was no more.

I feel like I just wrote the initial note on this the other day so I don’t really have anything to add, except that because its problem (at least for me) was that it was neither fish nor fowl — it wasn’t really fruit and it wasn’t really floral, but was trying to do both — I noticed that when I was taking it to work and not focusing on the warring fruit v. floral or indeed anything else really, I enjoyed it a lot more.

I thought for some reason that this was a green version of Montagne D’Or, which is why I slated it to try today. But it’s not a lychee tea.

It’s a fruit and floral combo. The fruit is mostly what I smell in the packet. I don’t really smell any rose.

After steeping the tea is a deep gold color and clear. The aroma is mostly apple, a little papaya, and a little rose at the end of the sniff.

The flavor is a weird in between of something trying to be tropical fruit and something trying to be floral. This is a rare situation in which I think a French tea’s mystical ingredient combo isn’t working as all for one and one for all. I think this tea is trying to do too much at one time.

I’d prefer it choose to be one thing, and I think I’d prefer that one thing to be tropical fruit.

As it is, this is not a favorite. It isn’t bad, it just isn’t doing the mystical French thing. It’s more of what I’d expect of a lesser blender than Mariage.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUZEtVbJT5c

I have made it to the last black tea in my cupboard! And as far as I know, I don’t have any black tea samples left to taste either.

This is a pretty tea, and yes, it is lychee — very strong lychee, a very singular lychee note — that I smell coming out of the tin.

The tea is a dark chestnut color, leaning toward mahogany. It smells like lychee, but also like something else. Something minerally. Rock like. Maybe a little like potato. For those synesthetes out there, if a malty yunnan smells gold, this smells silver.

There’s also a warmer note in there somewhere. Something coffee-like.

Flavor-wise this is better than I expected. I am not a huge lychee fan. I don’t dislike it, but it isn’t something I’d put in a favorite category. Still, done well it can be quite enjoyable for me.

This one is done really well. It’s probably the best lychee black tea I’ve had, though I haven’t had that many (oh Steepster, when will you let my search my notes based on flavor profile? Or based on rating? Or based on anything? I would so love a search function as the ordering functions are limited in their utility.)

If I was going to stock a lychee black tea in my permanent collection, this would be it. Say no more.

A woodsy, not overly sharp smell comes from the dry leaf. I steeped at a lower temp than usual, 195F for 3:30. I think I might have to up the temp some. The tea’s color is a sort of apricot-to-amber and a bit on the pale side, which makes me think hotter might get more out of the leaf.

I smell the Sakura from yesterday in the steep — it must have worked its way into the Breville or I failed to rinse it fully. The flavor is mild, vaguely like champagne.

I am going to do this again at 200 instead, and hope that the Sakura has been ousted.

Second try at 200F. The combination of the hotter temp, and the Sakura having washed away (or at least not being noticeable) is an improvement. The tea is a little darker amber, too.

This is a very mild darjeeling. Smooth, no sharp notes at all. No water logged effect on the stomach that I sometimes get with first flush darjeelings.

This is actually a blend of teas from various estates. I don’t think there is a Princeton estate — I did google it and nothing came up, but I suppose it could be the one thing that managed to escape google.

The tea has a fruity aspect, grape, maybe some plum. And a woody aspect, though it is subtle. Not much earthiness.

It’s really everything I like about first flush darjeelings and nothing I don’t, which is why it is getting high marks from me.

I mentioned a few days ago that I’m a fan of cherry green teas. And fortunately for me, here’s another one.

In the packet there’s a strong smell of cherry, like Luden’s cough drops. After steeping, this becomes mellower, and takes on a vanilla note as well. The tea is a medium, golden yellow color and has some particles suspended in it.

The flavor skips that vanilla note I mentioned, but keeps the cherry and adds a floral effect as well, which I suppose isn’t surprising given that this is flavored with cherry blossoms rather than cherry fruits. It’s not perfumy, though — it’s a gentle cherry essence mixed with a mild, grassy green tea.

A very nice example of its kind.