Verdant Tea (Special)

Recent Tasting Notes

96

Backlog:

I absolutely ADORED this tea. Adored it. Loved it. It knocked my socks off. And if you read this review through: http://sororiteasisters.com/2014/07/21/mr-hes-1st-picking-laoshan-black-tea-from-verdant-tea/ You’ll see that it made me want to dance the futterwacken (not sure I spelled that right.)

Yep, an awesome tea.

A strong cacao aroma. A delightfully mellow flavor. The chocolate notes experienced in the aroma are tasted. A hint of almond. Sweet cherry notes. A delicious toasty note. Good for many infusions.

A wonderful tea.

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90

Old tea, it was ok but definitely had lost flavour and didn’t taste much like an earl grey at all. Reminiscent of other Verdant blends with the mix of base teas, which I liked.

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90

I’ve barely touched most of my Blends club teas… so, based on the rating and aroma of this one (YUM), I figured I’d try it tonight as well!

The aroma of the dry tea is very appealing to me – like with Yabao Snickerdoodle, it’s the right spice combination; if there’s something in here that I don’t typically like, i’m not picking up on it. It mostly smells like gingerbread, to be honest… kind of like the soft ginger cookies I just made last week (cloves, ginger, cinnamon). Delicious. Flavourwise, this literally tastes like liquefied ginger cookies, with a creamy base. Win. Big win. This reminds me a bit of Laoshan Apothecary Green, of which I just purchased a bunch more, since I love the combination. Maybe that means there’s coriander in here too? That would be okay with me… I believe people were complaining about it being in too many teas, but I like it! Now, licorice? That’s another story… but thankfully, none here.

Anyhow, loving this blend. It’s just so comforting and creamy and perfectly spiced. I have no idea why it’s labeled “Earl”, given that I don’t taste any bergamot in here at all, but meh. Happier it tastes as it does. Also, not tasting the citrus. Maybe it died of old age in the bag and I just steeped its skeletons.

ETA: Duhhhh, I brewed this up as a green for some reason. IDEK. So 1.5 tsp to 8 oz. water, for 2 min at 82 C. Curious to try it brewed as a black, now.

Preparation
180 °F / 82 °C 2 min, 0 sec
Show 2 previous comments...
Indigobloom 10 years ago

It says berg oil in the ingredients. Maybe it didn’t spread over to the leaves in your batch when they mixed it? Too bad, it sounds amazing

mrs.stenhouse12 10 years ago

This was SUCH a good tea! I miss it, maybe they will bring it back for the holidays this year! I might send them a FB message requesting it :D

Kittenna 10 years ago

Indigobloom – I read other people’s reviews, and it sounds like it wasn’t all that apparent to begin with. Juuuuust fine by me, though!
MissLena – That would be awesome! Not like I need more, though. But they do have the base teas in stock.

Indigobloom 10 years ago

Ah. Good then! If I ever come across someone having a cuppa I’ll try a sip :P

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78

I’m pretty sure I drank some of this before, but didn’t log it… oh well. Anyhow, giving it a shot tonight as I was going through my Verdant blends (and realizing I hadn’t added any of them to my cupboard count. Ouch.) The aroma is very much yabao – that piney, wintry sort of smell. There’s maybe a hint of spice peeking out too, but it’s primarily just yabao. The flavour does deviate a bit – piney yabao with some heat and spice in the forefront (I feel like I’m tasting ginger, coriander?), then a lingering creamy aftertaste which is where I’m finding the “snickerdoodle” spices are more apparent. It’s actually not too bad of a blend, although I personally don’t think that the spices are strong enough to mesh perfectly with the distinctive flavour of the yabao. This could very easily be age though, especially since my half is has been in a plastic baggie (albeit a reasonably thick one) for nearly a year.

Overall, since I like yabao, and the spices included in this blend are to my liking, I am finding this to be a winner for me. Probably wouldn’t pick up more as it’s just not a tea I think I’d find myself wanting too often (I crave yabao maybe a couple times a year when it’s on my mind), but it won’t be a problem to finish off the rest I have, especially since we’re back in the right season again :D

Preparation
Boiling 3 min, 0 sec 2 tsp 8 OZ / 236 ML
OMGsrsly 10 years ago

I found the spices didn’t mesh well with the yabao, and ended up giving mine away. I prefer the yabao plain or with flowers. :)

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85

Another yummy cup of this. Mostly tasting lavender, I wouldn’t mind more bergamot! It’s tasty, though. Probably would have been even tastier when the green tea was fresh.

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Martin Bednář 6 years ago

Lavender, bergamot, green? Sounds interesting

Kittenna 6 years ago

Yeah, it is! It was probably more interesting when it was fresh.

LuckyMe 6 years ago

I miss Verdant’s flavored teas. They really have some interesting blends back in the day.

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85

So it seems I have done a complete about-face on this tea! I rated it a tragic 35 the first time I tried it, due in large part to a heavy lavender presence (I commented that the tea seemed like it had potential otherwise). But if anyone’s been reading my recent tealogs, lavender and I are a thing now. I somewhat randomly grabbed this tea as I was leaving to go to my MIL’s for supper tonight, and was very pleasantly surprised to find this lavender-heavy blend – and dang, it was so delicious! It was very lavender-heavy, with a delicious green base. I wasn’t paying a ton of attention (chatting, entertaining baby, etc.), so that’s all I really got out of it, but I really enjoyed this tea tonight, and am pleased to have a few cups left.

I’m glad I didn’t get rid of all my lavender-heavy blends, because rediscovering them has been such a lovely surprise.

Changing rating entirely, giving this an 85. I want more.

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85

Sil totally didn’t drink her whole half of this, heh. I suspected as much and seeing her rating….. Anyways, since I do not have the same aversion to blergamot, I hoped I’d like this blend better… until I opened the package. Surprise, lavender! In retrospect, joining the Verdant Blends Club was not the best idea for someone who doesn’t like a lot of “herbal” ingredients, which pretty much all of the blends are full of. There was the odd blend that didn’t contain such things (and it was usually a hit!) but… not often.

Enough said, onto the tea. I initially thought that I might like an earl green with a high quality green base, but I did not anticipate the lavender. I’m not generally a fan of it in tea; it reminds me of soap, and usually takes over in a blend. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what it’s doing here, too. Aroma? Lavender with a hint of…. citrus? No… that’s actually also lavender. Sigh. Flavourwise, there’s a big hit of lavender, followed by a very refreshing and lovely citrus (definitely not bergamot). It’s actually quite lovely, and I’m surprised that it’s able to emerge from the lavenderfest (which is still lingering, mind you). Actually, to be fair, I think I can smell a touch of citrus from the cup, as well as a touch of creamy jingshan. It’s just very difficult to detect. The lavender is just far, far too dominant here – a more apt name would have been Lavender Jingshan with a Hint of Citrus.

Overall, I’m pretty disappointed, especially since I think that minus the lavender, this might actually be really tasty. I might try removing the lavender buds another time, but I’m pretty sure that the essence has been thoroughly transferred to the other ingredients, so it’s probably not worth the time. If you like drinking a cup of lavender, this tea is for you. If not, don’t bother despite the enticing name.

ETA: Kind of the same as the Sleeping Bear blend for me; on the third or fourth infusion now, and there’s still too much lavender in the forefront, but I’m really enjoying the creamy aftertaste of the green tea. I feel like there would be so much potential here if there wasn’t any lavender! Or, just a touch.

Preparation
180 °F / 82 °C 2 min, 0 sec
Show 4 previous comments...
TeaBrat 10 years ago

blerg, lavender and bergamot…

Tabby 10 years ago

Hey, I’m totally drinking something with lavender and bergamot, haha. I like that combo!

Cameron B. 10 years ago

Ick lavender. Totally tastes like soap!

Tabby 10 years ago

I completely understand. That’s how I feel about jasmine.

Dinosara 10 years ago

Yeah they tend to go overboard with some of the ingredients. I’ve gotten some blends club fatigue at this point.

Anlina 10 years ago

Lavender and bergamot is one of my favourite flavour combinations, so this sounds really tasty to me.

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80

I got this one in August, when I was wallowing in the depths of an unfortunate mental low, so I never got around to trying it. Oh well, never too late.

It’s been a while since I had the sarsparilla tieguanyin, but I think this is like that, but better. The orange and vanilla (and the sarsparilla too, I guess) seem very subtle, but I think all of it comes together in a rather pleasant tea, and one of the better acquisitions from the blends club.

People in the reviews were mentioning how the straight tieguanyin was better, but I haven’t tried the traditional tieguanyin, only the spring and autumn harvest, so this tastes totally different and I have no standard of comparison. >.< More tieguanyin will be on the list once I’ve whittled down my cupboard and lifted the tea ban.

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Sipdown! Yay!

This tea was never a big favorite for me, but it kinda grew on me. I think I would have liked it better if it had more tea in it versus everything else. I think it has a herbal flavor, rather than oolong. In fact I can’t taste the oolong at all.

Looking forward to my new Verdant order that is coming! I will finally have my beloved Laoshan Black stocked.

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96

10/20/14 gong fu 100ml gaiwan/sub 200F water

I did not measure the tea, so maybe 3g? This tea is delicious! Lovely light edamame creamy greenness. Pale gold liquor, and a wonderful toasted rice aroma.

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79

I haven’t reviewed this tea either yet, and I’ve had at least one cup of it! Well, I will tonight. This was from the August blend box I believe…I have since quit the blends box as I was just accumulating too much tea, and some of the flavors (sarsaparilla) were just not to my tastes. Ah well, it was fun while it lasted.

Onto this tea! The dry smell is very strongly cinnamon, a bit off-putting for me, as I am not the biggest fan of cinnamon. There is also a toastiness that kind of reminds me of coriander in it. I steeped it for just over 2 minutes with boiling water, and added a bit of honey because it just seemed to go with this blend lol. The steeped smell is also a bit toasty and still cinnamony but not as strong.

As for the flavor, this one is kind of interesting. There is definitely cinnamon, quite a bit of it, and that toasty flavor is still there. It reminds me a bit of Campfire Blend by Verdant actually. It must be the cinnamon-ginger-vanilla combo lol, and Campfire Blend has orange peel instead of lemon. Interesting! I don’t find the licorice to be too overpowering, yes, it does add a smoothness to the end of the sip, not unlike Bravissimo by DavidsTea though. I also am pretty neutral about licorice, and even like it in some blends. Not getting much spicy ginger, which I find a bit disappointing, as I am a ginger fanatic lol. The honey I would assume makes this sweeter and smoother, it goes quite nicely. I probably should have reviewed it without honey, but I just felt like adding it tonight. #noregrets

Haha, anyways, overall this isn’t a bad tea. I am liking it more this time than the first time I had it, maybe the addition of honey is what it needed. It’s maybe not a favorite, but it’s not a bad tea and I will gladly drink through the rest of the bag, although I might save it for when I actually have a cold. Thanks to Verdant for the opportunity to try this tea in the Blends Club!

Flavors: Cinnamon, Toast

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56

This came as part of my recent swap with Cameron. Heh, after reading the reviews I see this tisane did not get very much love. It seems like licorice is a pretty well hated ingredient by many people, I don’t mind it in small doses and if it’s blended well. Since I am sick and licorice is supposed to be good for respiratory problems, I thought I’d give this one a try tonight. Between the licorice and the ginger, it should help something!

Eh, this is okay in my opinion, I probably like it better than most of the other tasters do but I wouldn’t say this is something I’d drink for the sheer pleasure of it, it definitely seems like a medicinal tea. I might have liked this better myself without the cinnamon because there’s a lot going on here, and the flavors are really competing. This has a bit of a really strange aftertaste as well. I don’t see this on Verdant’s site right now and I guess it’s no wonder! I think this will be really good for my sore throat though, I’m sure I can manage to choke down the rest of it.

I am tired of getting sick so often, who has an immune boosting tea that they really like?

Preparation
Boiling 5 min, 0 sec
Cameron B. 10 years ago

All of the ones I sent were from the Blends Club. :)

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73

Hey, I forgot I sipped this one down yesterday as a cold brew!

Anyway, it was decent and fruity. I’m not sad it’s gone, but at least I was able to drink it.

This month’s blends club has one tea that I can drink; unfortunately they felt a need to add rooibos to the Laoshan black blend. BLECH.

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CHAroma 10 years ago

Blech indeed.

Cameron B. 10 years ago

What else is in the blend?

Dinosara 10 years ago

Um, I can’t remember right now, and I haven’t entered them yet (and neither has anyone else). I believe there was also sarsaparilla (of course).

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73

So. A lot of leaf, and a shorter time to balance it, to try this one out again.

The good news is that this tea now tastes like something other than leaves and earth. There is definitely a bright fruitiness that I mostly associate with goji berry, and there is definitely an incense note. Not sure how I feel about that one. Ok, well I’m not in love with it. I don’t tend to like overly herbaceous teas, and I feel like the incense gives it an almost medicinal quality.

Overall, meh. Not my style. I can sometimes tolerate these things better in cold brew, so that will be my next experiment.

Preparation
Boiling 2 min, 0 sec 4 tsp 12 OZ / 354 ML

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73

When I read the description for this tea, I was not thrilled. Inspired by inscense in temples… inscence can be nice to smell, but I rarely want to drink it. However, when I smelled the dry leaf I was really surprised. It does not smell like inscense (to me), but instead dead up like molasses-covered grain (horse feed). I know that sounds like a bad thing to many people but it isn’t! Some of my favorite Fujian black teas remind me of molasses grain, and it’s a pleasant olfactory memory for me anyway.

There are (also surprisingly) not too many crazy ingredients in this one. The one that is an unknown quantity is the Aloeswood Tincture. That sounds like something that I wouldn’t care for, just because anything called “tincture” sounds medicinal and herby and gross.

Brewed, the smell of the mi lan oolong comes out. Kind of woody, slightly sweet smelling, a bit like autumn leaves. It tastes like… um, I’m not sure. At first I thought “nothing” and then I changed my mind to “dirt” but then maybe it was like “dead leaves on the ground”. Ok but that was when it was still quite hot. It cooled down and then it tasted like… not much. I mean, it did have flavors of autumn leaves and a bit of honey (the dirt taste went away mostly), but honestly it wasn’t very interesting. I couldn’t taste the berries, I couldn’t taste the aloeswood.

I would think my lackluster experiences might be due to needing to change my water filter (and I might anyway, it’s been a while), but I did just have a delicious and satisfying cup of Dammann Frères tea, so I doubt it. I will try to brew this one stronger and see if it can’t leave more of an impression.

Preparation
Boiling 3 min, 0 sec 3 tsp 12 OZ / 354 ML

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Sore throat today. Yesterday involved a ton of talking between a flu shot clinic and then manning the table for senior day at my Walgreens store. I’m not sure how I feel about this. This is my first licorice tea so maybe that is what is making my throat feel funny, like it’s being coated. That could be how it helps sore throats? It’s not pleasant, everything just gets stuck in one place on the top back of my mouth. I don’t even taste this otherwise. I think I’ll leave this one for the boyfriend to try but I doubt I will reach for it again.

Preparation
Boiling 5 min, 30 sec 2 tsp 8 OZ / 236 ML

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76

I am certainly behind on tasting notes. Well, here is me catching up. They will all be fairly brief!

I just sipped this one down, after drinking it regularly as a cold brew. I actually really liked it as a cold brew! Apparently I never logged it as a hot brew, even though I did have it that way once or twice. In the hot brew, it was over lavender-y, without enough bergamot. I tried another incarnation of this ages ago (in the “Alchemy Blends” days), and it was really similar.

Cold brewed, the lavender tamed itself a bit and it was a better balanced green earl grey. Still not my favorite blend but I had no problem drinking it up.

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73

Last night I tried this blend with my husband as our ‘Saturday night tea time treat’. I already had my Gongfu teapot out from an earlier session so I used that, it’s 200ml and I used roughly 6g of tea. Honestly I felt I would try my method first before the standard instructions, partly because it was late and I felt like being a rebel and partly because I like my tea strong.

Well the first steep of roughly 45 seconds came out rather strong. Difficult to taste any orange (at all) but it was certainly spicy, smoky, earthen and toasted. Not unpleasant, much like a mature Tie Guan Yin, nice but just not what I was looking for.

The second steep of roughly 45 seconds came out lighter than the previous steep and there was a hint of waxy orange amidst it’s heavy and mature flavours. Nicer but still not quite right.

Then I went for a third steep, losing my faith in this tea due to the lack of orange I decided to give it a minute to steep and give it a final try. It mimicked the second steep rather well, it was waxy orange like rind and it’s strength was a little toned down from what it was.

I left it for roughly an hour or two before deciding I would give it one last go. So with the same leaves I prepared some more. Roughly 1 minute each additional steep. The wait made all the difference, my fourth steep ie first re steep revealed more orange flavour, less thick Tie Guan Yin and a spicy lingering after taste. Much more what I was expecting. It was still full of flavour too, medium strength overall so it carried on well. After that I did another two steeps and each was a wonderful greeting of orange, spice and lightly baked Oolong with wood tones. A fresh, autumnal style flavour that left me feeling warm inside.

I liked this tea very much (in the end) but it’s still not perfect to my tastes. I would prefer more orange and spice still, something sweeter perhaps to help lift the ingredients together. Though I know with certainty that I could happily finish this sample.

Flavors: Smoke, Toast, Wood

Preparation
Boiling 6 g 7 OZ / 200 ML

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80

Well, this one is gone. It made a pretty tasty cold brew, so I drank it up quickly. Not too sad it’s gone though.

I did finish this cold brew up with a bit of Silk Road because I didn’t have enough leaf, and that one did not make it better. I’m going to have to say a big “no” to all tulsi blends in the future, blech.

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80

I should probably drink more teas if I want my stash to ever decrease! I’m just not as excited about teas anymore; probably because I have spent a lot of time lately focusing on sipdowns and thus drinking teas I don’t really love. Good thing I have some new DF teas coming in; those should be a pick me up!

This is of course one of the blends club blends from last month. When I had my little rant about the redundancy of Verdant’s blends the other week I didn’t realize that this has sarsaparilla in it as well. WHY MUST ALL OOLONGS CONTAIN SARSAPARILLA? I say this as someone who loves root beer/sarsaparilla/birch beer. But it’s too much. They all taste the same.

I am nevertheless rating this one slightly higher than the others because I think the orange adds a needed brightness and the vanilla a needed smoothness that really help this blend. That said, I feel like the flavors are a bit weak in this one. I added a bit more to my steeping basket because the first scoop seemed to be mostly “stuff” and little actual tea, and I was wondering if it would be too much for my 12oz cup at 3 minutes, but not so. Definitely not oversteeped, and definitely wishing for more vanilla and orange. And less sarsaparilla/birch. Ah well, into the cold brew basket it goes.

Preparation
Boiling 3 min, 0 sec 3 tsp 12 OZ / 354 ML
Show 4 previous comments...
Ysaurella 10 years ago

which DF did you order Dinosara ? I’m curious :)

Dinosara 10 years ago

I ordered more Caramel-Toffee and Fleurilège, as well as Amore, Bulgare, and Rose de Mai (a limited edition tin). I haven’t tried the last three. :)

Ysaurella 10 years ago

seems great and rose teas are often so lovely. The classic rose of DF is one of my favorite rose teas.

mrs.stenhouse12 10 years ago

I dislike sarsaparilla in tea so far lol, the smell just turns me off. Unfortunately I quit the blends club because of this haha just not to my personal taste..I haven’t even tried this tea yet for fear it will be too sarsaparilla-y.

Dinosara 10 years ago

Having said what I said in this note, it wasn’t SUPER sarsaparilla-y. Not as much as the others, at least.

Fjellrev 10 years ago

You and I are totally in the same boat. I mean, I still love tea, but I’ve immensely slowed down on the tea consumption because I’ve been forcing myself to sip a lot down and cut the stash in half before trying anything new or restocking on favourites.

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I’ve hoarded my last little bit of this, because I was afraid I’d never be able to try it again after finishing it off. But I see on the Verdant site that they’ve blended it again, so another sip down.

Now I just need to figure out if I’m gonna order an obscene amount or just a moderately obscene amount. I still haven’t decided.

Many thanks to Cameron B for providing the sample!

Show 1 previous comments...
gmathis 10 years ago

Crazy ingredient list!

scribbles 10 years ago

But oh so tasty :)

Cameron B. 10 years ago

Obscene amount! :D

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This tea is absolutely divine. To look at it’s beautiful with the marigold petals. But to sip (really slurp and gulp), oh my my. And even though I seriously over steeped this, it was still ridiculously delicious. No bitterness even though I forgot about it for about 5 + minutes.

So smooth and creamy. I got loads of butter with mild vegetal in the background. It is deliciously toasty, just like a traditional genmaicha, but this has a little extra something that makes it so much more tastier and special than a traditional genmaicha. I didn’t notice the juniper, but I pretty much slurped my first cup back in about 5 minutes, it’s just that good!

I’m trying for a second steep, even though I’m not sure if there’s any flavour left in the leaf, but this is far too delicious to not at least try.

Why Verdant? Why does this have to be limited blend? If this became part of the permanent collection I’d be all over it.

This is tea that generated the amazing swap with Cameron B., who was generous enough to share this with me. Thank you so much!

Cameron B. 10 years ago

You should try their Laoshan Genmaicha, it’s the same tea but without the juniper and vanilla. :)

gmathis 10 years ago

Marigold always makes a tea more cheerful!

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79

Here’s Hoping Traveling Teabox Round #3 – Tea #29

Sometimes jasmine tastes almost like bubblegum to me, and this one does. It’s surprising because it seems like there are more of the other ingredients than there are of the jasmine white tea, unless everything is infused with jasmine. But I mostly get a jasmine flavor. There is also something that reminds me of allergies, something floral/pollen I don’t like very much but the jasmine is so nice I can live with it. The second steep was lovely as well, just less jasmine. I think the Yunnan on its own would be better than this blend.
Steep #1 // 30 min after boiling // 2 min
Steep #2 // 25 min after boiling // 3 min

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58

Here’s Hoping Traveling Teabox Round #3 – Tea #23
Another really odd blend from Verdant. I’m not even sure what these ingredients are… looks like some things I’ve never seen before. I wish Steepsterers who had the info for these blends (or Verdant) would update the Steepster page at least with the ingredients… it could become a potential allergy issue. Anyway, the dry leaf scent is not at all appealing. I decided to try it anyway… like the pear tea I had the other day I figured the dry scent could be entirely different from the flavor. Not here. The flavor seems kind of woody and kind of like BBQ. It definitely seems like something that would say ‘cask’ to me. And of course the natural woodiness of the rooibos helps. Sipped it while catching up on Supernatural… I’m going to be so sad when I’m done with season five but the new season will be epic, I hope. I can’t wait for the meta music episode!
Steep #1 // few min after boiling // 3 min

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