84 Tasting Notes
I can’t believe I got a sample of this and waited a year to review. I’m hanging my head in shame guys. This is what happens when you’re drowning in tea and always say you’ll write a review “later” .
This is my second to last serving. I wanted to make it proper style on the stovetop but then I realized that since we just moved I one—don’t have a proper pot, and two—have no sweetener. So I’m drinking it straight up.
It’s good. Not amazing but balanced spices and a solid foundation. This isn’t a fancy tea. It’s a no muss no fuss basic chai and it does it’s job well.
Wait a minute….
I haven’t reviewed this tea?
My favoritest comfort tea. My cuddle up in bed tea. My it’s been a dreadful day tea. My it’s been a wonderful day tea. My I need some tea tea.
This over site is glaring and I almost feel embarrassed.
But what can I say about this tea that hasn’t been said. It’s amazingly creamy without tasting artificially flavored. The creaminess lasts many infusions before gently transitioning into light fruityness(stone fruits) with a hint of floral.
This is the first time I was able to use my Zojirushi 4l (Thanks Garret for the steal!) with decent filtered water. I had a very disappointing cup of this tea while I was waiting for my filter to come in the mail. I knew it wouldn’t taste as good but I just couldn’t make myself wait. I wanted instant comfort! Well somethings need time and I need to learn some patients.
I am in heaven now. Simply heaven. A badly needed cup of comfort in a crazy world.
I need to try this one. A Mandala tea (Special Dark yo) is my comfort tea as well. It’s the equivalent of getting into my PJs no matter what is going on.
You need too! It’s a snuggly tea for sure.
It’s my favourite milk oolong EVERRR.
MzPriss, I can send you some :-)
Good water makes all the difference, doesn’t it?? Whenever a customer tells me that the same tea always tastes better in the shop than at home, it pretty much always comes down to water quality. RO, distilled (both devoid of minerals needed to draw flavor out of tea) leave a flat-tasting, one-dimensional flavor and aroma, too, is lacking. Chlorinated tap water will sap good flavor and has smell all its own. Always good to filter water. That is, unless you have the fortune of having your own artesian well bubbling up in your backyard :) Good carbon-based filter systems, some of which can be had for as little as $80 for a decent one are so worth the small investment if you don’t.
So happy that you are liking the milk oolong! And the Special Dark, yo!
Oh god, I’ve been terrible at doing my writing up my reviews for samples. My goal is now to do one a day.
I’m really glad I waited on this one till I got my water filter. I think it would have been completely ruined by my tap water. It was actually quite delicate and sophisticated. I’m a bit zoned out right now so I didn’t get many specific notes. Just a general feeling of refined contentment.
I will try to add more useful information next tasting.
Just want to say cheers to this tea for still tasting good with my icky chlorinated water! I was getting depressed when some of my more delicate teas were completely ruined by it and thought I’d have to stick to flavored teas and tisanes completely but on a whim I brewed some of this up with lots of leaf and it’s kept me happy through several steepings!
So yay for new apartment! Yay for new beginnings! Booo for nasty water :(
I’m not going to rate it now cause I’m sure it’d taste even MORE yummy with good water but for now I’m a happy camper. I highly caffeinated happy camper but one none the less.
I’m waiting not so impatiently for my Golden Tips tea club order to come. It’s out for delivery so no more caffeine for me till it gets here :(
I might sneak in one of 52teas flavored whites or greens shhhhhh.
I read that you can boil water for 15 minutes to remove the chlorine.
If it’s just chlorine, it will dissipate out of the water if left out over night. A pitcher on the counter overnight will have lost the majority of the taste/smell by morning….
Brita filters do wonders for chlorine taste as well :) We recently got the travel Brita filter bottles for our traveling tea and coffee needs!
I have a PUR filter on my sink spout and it works great. I got the device and the refills at Costco
I think it’s more than just chlorine but I’m going to try leaving some out overnight until I can get a filter. I’ll report back.
If I end up getting a countertop one this is what I want http://www.amazon.com/MAVEA-1001125-Elemaris-Filtration-Pitcher/dp/B002U50QQQ/ref=sr_1_11?s=kitchen&ie=UTF8&qid=1404754163&sr=1-11&keywords=water+filter It’s huge enough to fill my Zo a good ways and I like that it takes out the icky tasting stuff while leaving in the minerals. The design is also huge plus for me, I want the purple one.
I’ll check out the PUR. I"m not a huge Brita fan but they do the job in a pinch. I hate the charcoal floaties I always seem to get even after pre-soaking the filters and going through the first few fills.
I made a thread on water filtration on the general boards. You all need to go post there! This is valuable information that I’m sure other people need to. Tea is 99.99% water and if the water isn’t good the tea won’t be either.
I think people who think they don’t like tea don’t understand that. They use too hot(for greens, oolongs, and whites) bad water for the wrong amount of time on tea bags. No wonder it tastes bad!
Oh, they have an ORANGE filter! That is so awesome.
Dexter— I think leaving the water out overnight helped.
But now I have this sneaking suspicion that my cat assumed open source of water simply meant really big water bowl for her, on the kitchen counter. Not because of anything in particular, just because of how well I know her.
This is another sample from Just Organic.
I was whining about my last tea not being strong enough to wake me up. This wasn’t quite what I was looking for but I really wanted to sip something down especially before my kickstarter teas from Just Organic come. I was a bit meh on it(I swear all my samples were effected by some weird herbal scent/flavor that I’ve been bitching about in all of my Just Organic samples!)
I decided to add milk and sugar and that helped tremendously. Chai is the one tea I don’t fault for needing milk and sugar and this is lovely. I think it would be great made on the stovetop. I had to check my kickstarter order to see if I ordered any of this and it looks like I chose the pumpkin chai instead of this one.
Not quite feeling this tea this morning. I should have gone with something stronger.
My bursitis in my shoulder has gotten really bad to the point I only got a couple of hours of sleep last night so I’m feeling kinda crummy.
I mentioned using this as a cold steep when I move. Well I move tomorrow! I won’t have access to all my stuff from storage still monday and even then it’ll take forever to unpack, especially trying to protect my shoulder. I still haven’t decided where the Giant Cabinet of Teas(GCT) is going in the apartment yet. Better figure that out soon!
But so excited I’ll be able to have an address and access to all my teas so I can do swaps. I don’t even remember half the teas in my GCT are! It will be so nice to get reacquainted.
Ok enough about my move. Back to the tea. As it cools it’s tasting much better to me. No longer weak, just delicate. The fruitiness is like a juicy peach. Peaches and cream. The cream note isn’t as strong as like a milk oolong but it’s definitely noticeable.
I’m certainly making an assertive black for my next cup but starting to relax into this cup and enjoy it.
Flavors: Cream, Floral, Orchid, Peach, Stonefruit
Thank you Stacy for the sample of this!
This is my first “straight” tea from Butiki. I tend to gravitate towards their flavored teas because they really are the best flavored ones I’ve found. So I end up spending my whole tea budget on those. I asked Stacy to surprise me with an unflavored tea and she chose this one.
I should have written this right after drinking it in my sleepy stupor this morning. It helped me get out of bed but almost felt to good for half awake tea drinking.
It was strong without being astringent.
Oh and I was really good this time and didn’t under leaf! I used the whole sample. I feel stupidly proud of myself because I have a strong and stingy urge to save the precious. With my stash out of control I really shouldn’t be stingy. This was worth using the whole sample even if now I feel sad I can’t order any for a long time.
Creamy yumminess.
I’m in the middle of a stressful move and this is a great comfort tea. Problem is it’s so comforting it’s making me sleepy!
I always have a tricky time measuring this one cause the leaves are so long they don’t fit into a teaspoon. I have a scale now but I don’t know how many grams I should be using.
The one thing that’s missing from from this eggnog is spices! It’s creamy and eggy with some vanilla but no spice. I’d really like to try the nutmeg side by side. I don’t mind the lack of spice but it isn’t what I expect from an eggnog tea.
A good morning tea when you’re craving something sweet. I made the mistake of not putting the timer on so I think I may have over steeped it because the orange was a tad bit bitter and overall the tea wasn’t as sweet as I remember it.
The base tea is nice and brisk to me and helped me wake up.
As a side note I love the tin it comes in. It really makes it feel special.
Flavors: Chocolate, Marshmallow, Orange
Oops I forgot to mention it smelled super appley to me. Like I thought it was an apple cider tea at first wiff. There was definitely an apple note in the flavor as well.
This is what happens when I write tea reviews before I’ve properly woken up. I forget to actually mention the notes of the tea!