Mariage Frères

I went to the DF shop to buy in person the tea Figue Fraîche but they didn’t have it !
I wanted a tea with fig so I bought this one at the MF shop.
MF rarely blends figs (Boléro has some but it’s clearly not the leading note).I found this one by chance just looking at their website and when I didn’t have the chance to buy at DF, I did know what to do instead.

So I am the first to review this tea and it is strange because the name of tea is an homage to you dear North Americans.

The aspect of the dry leaves is really beautiful : beautiful big petals of a mysterious blue flower (MF says this is a flower which is growing on the pacific coast…any idea dear pacific coast residents?)

Once I steeped it 5 minutes and it’s too much, astringency was really there and I disliked it.

I did it again with 4 minutes steeping and this is perfect, no trace of astringency nor bitterness.

The scent of the steeped leaves made me very happy : I had the fruits and especially fig.

Drinking it is a little bit different, I got more vanilla & exotic fruits (weird because not mentioned by MF but I picked Mango first I think)and the fig but behind.
The black Chinese tea base is nice

This is a very nice afternoon tea, it’s probably not to me to say but I think is this is a beautiful tribute to America.

I am not very confident with green tea, to me tasting a green is like playing lottery.
I find greens a little capricious especially because of the bitterness we can sometimes get (even if we steep the correct time)

This time I won at the lottery ! Thanks so much to cteresa for permitting me to taste this fantastic blend – I am just surprised you didn’t review it yet-sure you will asap your cold will disappear :)

Delicate and refined green tea base without any hint of bitterness nor astringency.

I get more the fruity notes (berries)and behind, in the supporting role the floral notes (rose is the floral leading note to me and then lavender)

I really enjoyed it – did anyone tried it iced ?

Definitely one of my favorites rooibos
The blend is both subtle (much more than Rouge Rushka) and not so subtle (less than Marco Polo Rouge). The citrus scent can be very easily identified but it’s nicely blended with other flavors that do not make the citrusy taste overwhelming. I’m currently drinking the second half of my second box of this tea. I’m not sure I will replenish this supply at Christmas, but I know for sure I’ll buy it again in the next years.
Depending on the moments, I tend to prefer Rouge Bourbon when I’m in the mood for a sweet sugary-feeling vanilla taste, or Marco Polo Rouge, when I’m in the mood for a very mellow evening drink, or this Nil Rouge, when I feel like having a drink feeling slightly more refreshing.

After having this around for a little over three years I finally polished off the can today.

In hindsight Marco Polo was on the inconsistent and finicky end of the tea spectrum, but darn if this last cup isn’t delicious. If it always mostly tasted like this it would’ve been an instant repurchase, despite the expenses. It’s smooth and delicious-smelling, a bit like Black Forest cake.

Before I start I have to come clean with something: I don’t like strawberry things. Weird, eh? I also have the worst hand at steeping black teas and avoid them for their astringency.

Already, the strawberry scented Marco Polo and I look to be in a doomed relationship but that’s not the case. Oddly enough, I find this tea to be delicious. I’m not even sure the “strawberry” tag is right- it’s more of an impression of many syrupy fruits. It reminds me of dark chocolate dipped strawberries, which I do like, or even of a cherry jam filled black forest cake. There are fruity and creamy components but the base is ultimately dark and strong. It’s nice to have a dessert tea that doesn’t scrap the “tea” part or isn’t masked over with sugar additives.

My cup today started out hot and astringent, to warm and floral, and then lukewarm with a finishing aftertaste of fruity chocolate. My now empty cup smells like caramel. It’s a complex tea and I can’t do it justice.

Side note: I received this as a gift, along with three other teas, from a friend who came over for a wedding. I’m chocked that Mariage Frères isn’t more readily available where I live but grateful for the experience.

ce thé est tres bons je l’ aime a 100 pour 100 :)
c’ est le meme que pleine l une voici pourquoi je l’ ai tres bien notée

ce the est tres bon quand on le goute on a l impressions d etre en automne c’ est a dire qu’ il porte bien son nom .

j’ adore ce thé quand t ’ on le goute on a l ’ impression d’ etre sur une ile desserte

This was a sample Ysaurella so kindly sent me, thanks so much! The joys of receiving great tea in the mail, made my week!

At my first thought when i sipped this was “oh my, Marco Polo and Thé à L´Opéra had a child together! And this is it!”. The red fruits and vanilla, the strong strawberry (?) note, the mixed green and black teas. And I just can not shake that impression from my head.

This is a very lovely tea – a blend of green and black, with vanilla and strawberry and a few things more indeed to make it more mysterious. It is IMO an afternoon tea, and I can see why they named it after an opera, it is such a perfect tea for an evening occasion. Lovely.

This is another of the premium imported teas that we picked up at the local Williams Sonoma store this weekend. I wasn’t going to buy it because it also carried a premium price. However, my sweet wife insisted that I do it. OK, she twisted my arm.

I had never tried a French tea before. I realized that the leaves weren’t grown in Paris, but I still thought it would be fun to see if a French twist had been applied to the beverage.

The product came in some impressive packaging. A sturdy and glossy black carboard box protected the black metal tin inside. The tin was capped with a solid metal lid. Beneath the outer lid was a sealed peel-back inner lid with a pull ring, like vacuum-packed food items use.

When I pulled back the inner lid, I immediately smelled strawberries. It wasn’t an artifical aroma, but quite natural.

No steeping instructions came with the product so I opted to brew the black leaves for four minutes at 212 degrees. The steeped liquor was a reddish golden brown.

I could smell strawberries again as I raised the cup to my mouth. My first sip had a strong fruity taste. Again, strawberries seemed to be the dominant resident. There also was an underlying floral flavor, but it was a partner to the fruitiness, not a competitor.

As a rule, I am not crazy about fruity and floral teas. The main problem I have with them is that I feel like I am drinking perfume. I also find these teas to have a strong chemical-like aftertaste that lingers much too long for my liking.

This Marco Polo selection had none of those negative characteristics. The strawberry flavor was natural, fruity, sweet, and smooth. The floral attribute blended softly and amiably with the other flavors. The aftertaste was light, pleasing, and sweet. Bitterness was nowhere to be found. The black tea taste was so far in the background that it was hardly noticed. But, the overall body, taste, and mouth-feel of this brew left no doubt that this was a bona fide card-carrying member of the tea family.

I may have to rethink my philosophy about fruity and flowery teas. I really like this one a lot. Thanks to this Marco Polo blend, I say, oui, to trying more fruity and floral teas, plus grand oui, to tasting more French teas, and, le géant oui, to sampling more Mariage Frères teas!

Going to have to try this one again. For now, though I don’t notice any spices or honey. Smells of cinnamon when steeping, though. And there is a kind of bubble gum sweet smell to the dry leaves.

This is again, a very mild black tea (to my palate anyway) and it is nicely fruity and sweet. Nothing jarring or bitter about this. Mellow and smooth. Given my tastes in tea and my (admittedly limited) previous experiences with Mariage Freres I did use more than a teaspoon for this cup.

I’m very glad I got to try this. Thanks, Ysaurella!

EDIT: I tried this again out here on vacation. I definitely get notes of cinnamon, vanilla and what tastes to me like almond. A very complex and interesting tea! This steep I used boiling water but still steeped for about 5 minutes.

I rebought this, and making my first new cup of it, chai-style, maybe I was lucky, maybe I overbrewed it or overleafed it (in a good way!), but it was much more spicy and piquant than I remembered. Awesome for the sinus, but just leaving a note, not nearly as mellow as I used to think!

I did this tea not in the recommended manner but in a halfway chai manner – boiled some (unfortunately) skim milk with a tea spoon of brown sugar, when boiling added a couple teaspoons of this tea and left it to simmer for some 5-10 minutes.

And my first thought at first sip was oh, so this is FRENCH chai. I can not articulate too well why I would consider it french, but oh so smooth and refined and flavorful. But it packs some heat indeed, no matter how sweet and smooth it is at first sip.

On taste notes, it smells wonderfully at spices. In the dry tea the predominant flavours are cinnamon and cardamom and emphatically of cloves. When simmering at a boil, it´s the cloves which rule. The wet leaves, before being discarded, smelt most strongly of ginger and cardamom. The liquor (milk? tea? drink?) itself tastes equally of the cinnamon, ginger, cardamom and cloves and it´s fantastic. And the pepper finally gets its revenge in the aftertaste, with just-to-the-point heat. (If you are sensitive to chillies or pepper, better avoid this or avoid brewing this chai style). And oh so so smooth all the way, so flavorful and rich but smooth.

Another note, many people hate cloves, if you do maybe better avoid this – it´s balanced but the cloves are there. If you like cloves, absolutely get this.

If you are like me rather neutral about cloves, then do check it. I think the cloves are wonderfully used here, they bring a really exotic different flavour and seem to make the cinnamon and cardamom just so much better.

I want to try to brew this normal style, but I did love this so very much chai style brewing this normal style is not going to be a priority anytime soon.

I received this sample thanks to lovely cteresa

The dry leaf scent is fantastic as 99% of the MF blends. On the picture, it reminded me a lot Prince Igor but now I can see it “in real” it is different, dryer than Prince Igor.

The fragrance of the liquor is very special, very green, toasted green tea. This is to me the leading note, almost smoky and then, behind, almond.

Drinking it, to me the dominant flavour is exotic fruits and almond but a different almond from the one used for Pleine Lune, a dryer one less creamy.

It’s clearly not a spicy tea despite the presence of cinnamon (very discrete).

Balthazar has definitively its own personality as cteresa said.
To me it has nothing common with Pleine Lune except almond.It may not be its cousin…
Balthazar has the MF signature for sure. The exotic fruits are what I’ll remember from this blend, but non sweet exotic fruits.

A very nice tea (mix of green and black teas)

I’m having my favorite this morning, but it’s with the horror of realizing I’m almost out. I MUST ORDER MORE. I think I let it steep for too long. Anything past three minutes and it gets bitter, even with the sugar, but if you steep it just right, it tastes like rainbows and magic.

I have very little new to say about it, except that it is my favorite forever and ever, amen. Strawberries and vanilla and something unnameable.

Mmm, Marco Polo, how are you so delicious?

This is my favorite tea IN THE WHOLE WORLD. I like it best when I can afford my two-cup-a-day habit.

Mandalay is a cousin of Esprit de Noël blend. A cousin by cinnamon & cardamom filiation

The scent is strongly spicy, not floral at all.

The dry leaves are so beautiful, a large amount of petals of sunflower is mixed with some red spices.

Steeped four minutes only to ensure not having a too spicy cup, the tea was perfectly balanced between the spicy notes and the rose note.

If you want to taste this tea, you should be spice lover otherwise you can be very disappointed. Rose flavour is really sweetening the liquor and is really present but the main notes remain spices, cinnamon & cardamom on the top.

I won’t have Esprit de Noël (sometimes called Noël) and Mandalay in my cupboard at the same time.
I have to think about that but I really appreciated the rose flavour in this blend so not sure I’ll won’t change my dear Noël by this blend sometimes.

Backlogging this one! Surprised I haven’t done this one yet but then I don’t drink it all that often; being the first tea I bought on my pilgrimage (yes, my cultural, romantic, artistic, linguistic, idealistic pilgrimage) to Paris, and to Mariage Frères beneath the Louvre, I tend to guard it preciously and use it only for special occasions.

Hooowever my manager asked that I complete the last exercise of my tea training workbook today, which involved comparing two teas of different grades, so I compared this one to Whittard of Chelsea’s Afternoon Earl Grey, also with cornflowers. But French Blue will always come out on top, for me!!

Something always tells me not to brew this one for too long but it’s never come out badly for it; the floral scent is consistently amazing without being terribly pungent all through the steeping and, with the leaves carefully measured, never brews to any darker than the richest amber. (I do feel like I’m writing a love letter to this tea.) It’s dry on the tongue but so, so good for it- the bergamot and the china black tea and the cornflowers all come out separately, strongly, and so deliciously, none of this merging of flavours that tends to make the ingredients indistinct from one another. Being able to taste all the different harmonious elements here really works to its advantage.

I’ve had this one with milk before but unless you’re not a fan of the dryness, I’d recommend it black, to be treated as you’d treat a First Flush Darjeeling. This one is such a great classic!

One of the tea I absolutely wanted to taste- I bought a full bag today.

The dry leaves scent is amazing, opulent & floral more than fruity, very promising.

The liquor is less amazing than the dry leaves scent but the notes are very well balanced between floral and fruity ones.
It’s so well balanced that it is complicated to get the ingredients identified clearly.
Even if I know there are vanilla, red & black berries, citrus and cornflowers and mallows, none is overpowering.

Warm, it becomes even better than very hot.

I’ll need to taste it more to see if the experience is different. To be continued so !

A couple weeks ago I got a package of Davids´s Tea Read My Lips, and was struck by how awesome the idea of peppermint+chocolate flavoured black tea could be. After Eight Tea. Read My Lips was not going to last long in this household anyway and I got into the hunt for another peppermint and chocolate “After Eight” tea that was easier to find this side of the Atlantic. And wow, found this easily enough, locally and from my favorite blenders and quite reasonably priced (cheaper than David´s Tea even discounting shipping). I had to get some, it was meant to be, even if I had not yet run out of Read My Lips (it´s only been a month).

And it is just as good a idea as I remembered. I still got some Read My Lips to compare, and there are some differences between the two. RML has got fillers, the chocolate and the little peppermint lips and the peppercorns. Choco-menthe is a simple flavoured black tea. RML has a little bit extra texture from the melted chocolate and peppermint and is also sweetened by those. Choco-menthe is a bit more intense and concentrated (use less tea), and the tea seems a bit stronger, a stronger body. IMO choco-menthe is one of those teas which while not needing anything gets better with a smidgeon of sugar. I added milk as well and that was also a good idea. Delicious. A sort of candy bar tea – nothing too special or too refined, but so nice.

About ratings, I have some trouble being accurate with the slide bar. Between this and Read My Lips, maybe I will pick up a favorite in time, but so far, I hope I am giving the exact same rating to them both. Different teas but honors even, good takes on a very good idea.

Additional notes: Sipdown! I like this one, but I don’t think it’s my favorite vanilla tea (Della Terra, Adagio, Harney…probably forgetting so many). I don’t think either the vanilla or the black tea has enough flavor. But it was nice to try, anyway!