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Day 2/24

So I’ve actually had this one a lot. It’s one of the first tea’s I bought from DAVID’s and I still really enjoy it. You can see my previous tasting notes for what I think of this tea in general but I just had to say that THIS SAMPLE had a really heavy stevia (or something similar) flavour. I have never picked up on this in this tea before and I’ve have it several times from several batches. There’s no way my tastes have changed either, because I had this one as recently as Monday morning. It was just bizarre and very disappointing; I thought I knew what I was in for here :( Not going to change my rating though.

First day of the 24 days of tea!

It was disappointing to see this was the first tea because I tried it a few weeks ago and it was TERRIBLE. Almost undrinkable even. However, knowing what a tart monstrosity this can be, I made it on the weaker side and it wasn’t half bad. Very similar to forever nuts, with apple, oats, and spices, but also a strong movie popcorn (with lots of that salty yellow butter powder) taste). Tiny bit of caramel as well perhaps? Tartness came out as it cools, which is pretty typical. I still have half a tin of this left, which I’ll try to sip down pretty quickly (maybe tonight even), just to get it out of the way.

Had this again. Started to notice the apricot. Decided against picking any up though, even if I could do so for free. I’m trying to reduce my stash, not flood it with teas that are “okay”.

I’m definitely not loving this one so much right now. This morning’s cup was a poor mix of apple and hibiscus with a hint of froot by the foot. No green tea notes at all, though there never really have been. Might find my old notes on this to see why my rating is so high, maybe I’m doing something wrong. More than likely my tea tastes are changing (which I wouldn’t mind if I didn’t have a fair amount of this left). Dropping the rating on this for now though.

SIPDOWN!

The dregs of this were really bitter, both hot and cold. I still have to finish drinking down the cold brew I made with the last of it and I’ll have to add sugar just to get through it. This was never my favourite, but it didn’t end on a high note.

I grabbed a cup on this on my way to a craft fair that I go to every year with my mom. I’ll admit, I was mostly focused on all the things I wanted to buy and not so much on this. Mostly got buttery caramel with a noticeable but pleasant (and maybe slightly astringent because I left it steeping a few minutes longer than I’d have liked—hard to remove a teabag in a moving car) base. It doesn’t stand out as being bad, but wasn’t good enough to distract me from other things.

A bit of a more adventurous cold brew today; I decided to go for a 50:50 mix of Ruby Red and Ginger Beer. They’re actually really good together! Ginger up at the front with a refreshing citrus finish. i didn’t make much because I wasn’t sure how it’d go, but I’d brew this up again.

So I’ve been wanting to try this for a bit, under the suspicion it was going to be similar to a Lady Grey, but I didn’t buy any because I still have lots of citrus teas from Kusmi lying around.

So I finally took the plunge with this by getting a to go cup at DAVID’s. Plenty of lemon. Getting both a fresh lemon and a Sunlight dish detergent vibe from this depending on the sip. It’s a little bitter, probably from over-steeping because I can never get ALL the leaves out from the basket in my travel mug and there’s no where else to put it except back in the tea :/ Slight bergamot taste, so it’s definitely got some of that Lady Grey taste. I’m not crazy for it. I’d definitely chose Twinning’s Lady Grey or Kusmi’s Anastasia over it, but it’s not terrible.

Now I’m not one to shy away from hibiscus, but this one has over done it for me. It probably doesn’t help that I prefer tart in cold drinks. Getting past the hibiscus this one is pretty good. Strong apple and cinnamon flavour that makes it feel like Forever Nuts, which I do enjoy, but I feel like this one’s trying a bit too hard. Plus all that hibiscus…

Super excited to try this (but if I’m not careful, I’ll have tried every tea from the 24 days of tea before I even open my calendar :/ ). Mixed feelings about this, mostly cause I didn’t realize it was a mate and the flavour is there (though for a mate, it’s not bad). Also…pineapple? Who’s eating gingerbread and goes “wow, I’m going to grab some pine aplle to go with this!”? It makes it feel like an odd mix between a winter tea and a summer tea (though that does match the weather today)
Aside from that, a very nice tea. More ginger molasses cookie that what I would traditionally consider gingerbread—it’s got that soft, sugar covered feel to it. If some appeared in my stocking at Christmas, I wouldn’t protest, but I’m probably not about to go buy some myself.