Rituals

GenCon 2022! My husband qualified to play in the tournament for Ice & Fire so we made the trek from Minnesota to Indiana. At the hotel we stayed at this was their brand of tea. Which I’d generally avoid but today we are checking out the zoo & children’s muesum and I didn’t want to bring my set with. But I needed tea…. so… I was surprised to see some decent looking leaf size. Why did I pick this one?! I never pick the flavored ones… ugh. It tastes like they stored it in a metal shipping container. It’s astringent and not in the good way. I’m doing a snippy blarg and not drinking the rest.

Chinese sencha teabag. Very fresh, and I would hope so since the restaurant I had this at is brand new.

I made myself a homemade advent calender this year with samples and whatnot that I need to finish off or have never tasted/reviewed before.

Day 1: Citrus Green Tea (teabag)
I generally shy away from greens, especially bagged greens. That is why this has sat in my drawer for numerous years (I have no idea when or how I acquired it). I am seriously impressed by how good it was, though. This is one of the best flavoured greens I’ve ever had and I can only imagine how good it would be as a looseleaf or a fresher tea.

The citrus is really well done. I get fresh orange, some zest, and some blood orange or grape fruit notes. All of them are really bright and go well with the lightly toned green. Surprisingly, NO BITTERNESS. A citrus zest and green tea blend without bitterness? I have heard of such legends but never before have I seen one in person. It also resteeps! I made three great coldbrew cups with this one.

I’d keep this in my cupboard permanently for coldbrewing if I knew where to get it.

I went to see The Lighthouse today and while perusing the theater’s menu (I wasn’t really hungry, but contemplating getting a baked pretzel…you know?) I noticed that there was an option for a ‘pot of hot tea’ and it was like, comparatively, pretty cheap. so I got that. it was a lil’ thermos of hot water and two tea bags. this tea has a pretty low rating and I’m not sure why, it is a pretty okay english breakfast. very malty and smooth. very assam-y. I’m into it.

I’m still processing the film though. I think it needs a second viewing…..and possibly more tea.

Used 1 teabag for 375 ml

Very dilute flavour- I might try to infuse this for longer in the future. I can taste the green tea which seems to be a sencha-type. The jasmine is very mild. I think that I can smell the aroma more than I can taste it.

I received this tea as a gift and this is my second time getting a box of Rituals tea. I really appreciate the design and artwork on the box. It does make the whole tisane-drinking experience that much more special.

Used one teabag for 375ml of water

I am a fan of a rose-floral taste in my tea. I especially love it when I get notes of rose in my black teas. This infusion is one of the first that I’ve had in a long time where rose was the featured flavour. I don’t think that the spicy ginger is the best pairing for the rose but it certainly is something that I have been happy to try. It is a bit too harsh for the soft sweetness of the flower. This is a very well-blended tisane with herb-y notes in the background and at the end of the sip.

I was pleasantly surprised by this tea. I had it during breakfast at a hotel. I’m pretty new to tea tasting, so I can’t get terribly specific about my experience, but here I go trying anyway.

The tea didn’t have a terribly strong aroma. The flavor was strongly citric, with a sour finish, and it was slightly astringent. The citrus taste almost makes me wonder if it had some sort of flavoring added to it, actually.

I didn’t pay much attention to the preparation of this tea, since I didn’t expect it to be very good. I used 6-8 oz of whatever temperature water the hotel had at the buffet (likely just barely below boiling), and a single tea bag, for somewhere around 3 minutes. My experience with this tea makes me curious to try shorter steep times for the other teas I enjoy—it’s possible I’ve been oversteeping.

Had this tea at a weekend church/work retreat at Shocco Springs. Very minty but not pure peppermint ( I think there’s some camomile in it). Loved it and hope it returns to stock soon.

This tea was available at a Westin hotel. It tastes like regret, missed opportunity and hopelessness. Bland with a scummy after taste. Almost no aroma. It’s a pitch it and try another tea kind of tea.

Strong medicinal aroma which reminds me of medical plasters. The medicinal taste is probably from the savoury fennel which was included in the blend.

Wow, so many other people have had this tea in a hospital. That’s my story too! I enjoyed this tea as I was recovering from the birth of my first and only child. I was told to stay away from caffeine because I was breastfeeding. It’s nothing spectacular but it hit the spot. It will always have a special place in my heart because it reminds me of the birth of my daughter. :)

Absolutely the most delicious herbal tea that I h ever tasted,

My RA put up a tea bulletin board for hot tea month, inviting us all to take a bag, try it, and share our thoughts. Sadly there were only one or two I hadn’t tried already (oops!) but I still think it’s a great idea.

This is the bag I chose from the board, and I actually like it pretty well. It tastes a bit like Hot Cinnamon Spice’s less-sweet cousin. It smells like Red Hots, and there’s a huge amount of cinnamon in the taste too. There’s also some fruitiness—not really identifiable as apple right away, but definitely fruit—and a slight aftertaste of rooibos. I love spice teas in winter, so this turned out to be just right for this afternoon.

I have a bit of trouble rating this tea, because on it’s own I find it just alright. Pleasant enough, gets a bit too gingery quite quickly. But then I had a cold one time… (funny how I keep discovering good tea stuff this way), and I ran out of lemon ginger tea, so I thought – this has ginger, what if I just add some lemon juice? So I added a splash of lemon juice from one of those plastic lemon-shaped thingies you get in the supermarket, and added some honey, and oh dear lord it was yummy! The honey and the lemon and the ginger blended amazingly well with the rose and it was just delightful. So, if you get your hands on this, I highly recommend trying it this way. It’s just too good – no cold required.

Had this at a company event tonight, in lieu of coffee. It’s utterly unremarkable.

Bummer.

Asked for hot tea at a restaurant tonight, thinking that it would be maybe like a dollar fifty at most. I get the bill after the meal, and it turns out that the tea was $2.00! For one lousy teabag. I didn’t even get a pot of water- just one crappy mug of water.

This tea tastes exactly like Lipton, which means that they probably only cost the restaurant maybe ten cents apiece. Ridiculous. Not worth it. Lesson learned. I’m getting ice water with lemon next time.

Had this one with dinner in a restaurant tonight. It was actually pretty decent. Better than Lipton, but not quite at the Stash or Twinings level as far as commercial bagged black teas go. It was smooth and full-bodied, with a surprisingly thick mouth feel.

Pretty okay with me!

Was served this tea at a restaurant that apparently discontinued tea on their menu a while ago. Nice of the waitress to give it to me with no charge but after tasting it, I figured it must have been quite old. There was no real taste to it. If the other tasting note here is any indication age must have turned a mild ea to a really weak one. I couldn’t taste any bergamot at all. Not going to rate this because I suspect it tastes very different than I got.

I find the name of this tea amusing “Hint of Mint”, pretty sure it’s nothing but mint. Had a few cups of this at Boyd and Wurthmann in Berlin, OH http://www.boydandwurthmann.com/ It’s a neat bustling seat yourself restaurant filled with locals and tourists alike.

It was much more enjoyable than all the bland “Amish” kitchen/buffets (we only went to one this trip, but I’ve been to a few). I find it amusing that all the reviews for those places said the staff and cooks were clearly not amish, despite their uniforms, but honestly what do you expect? Amish women have better things to do, it’s all the other people in the area that need jobs.

I had the trail bologna and swiss sandwich with potato salad. Trail bologna is pretty awesome, it’s made in Trail, Ohio and we brought some back with us. The husband and son actually made me a trail bologna and cheese omelet yesterday brought to me in bed (Rowan actually sent me back to bed), unfortunately I could’t eat it.

Sick story follows:

The moment I smelled the bologna frying I knew I was going to be sick, I actually had the husband run out to get me a pregnancy test, negative (which I’m grateful for, I have an IUD in but you never know). They also made me oatmeal with raspberries that I opted for, but couldn’t keep down. Yesterday was just awful flu + migraine is my personal idea of hell, complete with fever and hallucinating that my body was made up on things it is not. The only way I was able to regain stability was by just focusing on just my breathing for over an hour. Feeling significantly better today, but not without issues that need not be spoken over tea.

End sick story, resume travel/food log, still not tea related but there is wine:

Next time we’re in Holmes County I want to have breakfast at Boyd and Wurthmann, The Wreck sounds fantastic! Third favorite place to eat was the Chalet in Valley, owned by Guggisberg Cheese in Charm, OH. We ordered way too much food as we wanted to try their fondue, which was delicious, we took most of our entrees home and split an apple dumpling.

We also went wine and cheese tasting around Sugar Creek, the Little Switzerland of Ohio, elderberry wine, strawberry-rhubarb, dandelion wine, ice wine, sherry, tawny port, fun! We brought home Apricot, Peach and a Watermelon Wine (which is surprisingly boozey), sage derby, smoked bacon cheddar, salami cheese and butter cheese.

Our last stop was just down the road from Chalet in the Valley, Hershberger’s Farm and Bakery. It’s really a pie shop the sells other goods like bread, apple butter, jams, cider, condiments and other dried and jarred foods with petting farm (with Holmes County’s biggest horse who looked very sad and lots of goats, momma and baby goats inside and billy goats on the roof that you can send treats up to), a hamburger stand, kettle corn and a wooden toy store and pet shop cringe. Elderberry, Strawberry-rhubarb and dandelion fry pies were fantastic and now I know what a fry pie is, or rather what the packaged things the husband picks up from the gas station are, so much better fresh.

On the way home we stopped at the Toyota dealership and traded in the husband’s leased Corolla for a new small, very orange (habanero) Prius. We bought this time, because with his commute to work it made no sense to lease. My credit is even more solid than it was before, husband’s is not great but it’s getting better. None of the picture online due that orange justice. Husband got made fun of at work for it, someone asked if he was a “fairy”, yeah… they didn’t know him when he had a yellow beetle, but then again neither did I.