ChariTea select Send Message

I was smelling something grape-like in my sample box and stumbled upon this sample from Lady 0f Spaydes. Yum! It tastes and smells like the Kasugai Grape Gummies from H Mart! This is so delicious and sweet. I love the medium-long, brown-black oolong leaves dance in the cup and unfurl. The taste is like a little floral with some roasted nutty nuances intermixed with the grape flavor. The grape flavor isn’t too artificial, and I like it! I usually don’t like grape flavors (though I absolutely love grapes!). Yummy!!!

Delicious tea! The mix of black and mostly green leaves with the pieces of crispy rice is amazing! It smells sweet! The brew was a bright cheery yellow. I’ve never tried flavored genmaicha before!

The taste was amazingly airy and smooth. Delicious and sweet! I love the sweet caramel and vanilla flavors. It was almost like I was eating cotton candy. I love the hint of the nutty rice flavor in the background. I didn’t think it was too prominent. It was blended very well!

I absolutely LOVE oolongs, and I unfortunately don’t have a lot of them. My tea cupboard comprises mostly of blacks and herbals! I decided to treat myself today with this tea. I ordered 2 sample sizes of this tea a couple of months ago from Teavivre when there was a sale.

I opened the small metallic wrapper and immediately saw the bright, fresh green balls of this leaf with a stem on each one. It reminded me of cooked spinach! It smelled so delightful! It was sweet smelling and vegetal.

I recently purchased a beautiful yixing teapot set! I wanted to use it, but I felt like I should make my first cup with my husband. So another day with that! Wow I really went off topic…

Anyhow, this tea, as with most oolongs and other teas, withstood several steeps. I always watching the first steep because it is beautiful to see how the leaves “dance” in my gaiwan.

First steep: 30 seconds, 190 degrees. The brew was a light yellow color. This one smelled very vegetal, not like nori, but almost like a green. The taste was amazing! Light and airy florals dancing in my mouth. It was smooth like butter! There was a slight sweetness to it as well.

Second steep: 50 seconds. The leaves are nearly unfurled at this point. Brew was a jaundice/neon yellow! This brew was more floral and bolder than the first steep. It is sweet and juicy like a berry!

Third steep: 1 min. This steep was lighter and became more fruity! Delicious! The floral tones were fading more. There was a bit more astringency, but it still went down like butter!

Delicious tea!!

Thank you Teavivre for this sample again! I know I had rated this before, but it has been a while since I revisited this tea. I have one more sample of this mini cake left after this. I love the small round cakes with the semi-hollow center.

Dry, it smells like nori and earthy. I rinsed it for a little less than a minute and let the cake soften and unfurl a bit. The bits that fell off were small but larger than CTC leaves. The liquid was a dark amber color. It tasted sweeter than other pu-erhs that I’ve tried… almost like berries in the background mixed with nuts and cacao bits. The earthiness isn’t that strong. One of the things I did notice in the beginning was a sort of cardboard like flavor that quickly disappeared. I will steep this again later. I brewed this in a mug, but this tea can withstand multiple steepings. I added some sugar and milk to this after, which seemed to bring out the berry flavors even more. Good tea overall.

I am 6 months now, and its a girl! I am super excited! So, I chose to try this tea today. I received a teabag sample of this in the mail with my Kusmi order. I adore the cute, smooth brown and pink wrapping. What was even more interesting was the bag that this came in! It was a cloth or cloth-like teabag! WOW! I’ve never seen anything like it. I have the large reusable teabags, which is comparable. However, this is different because its not reusable (I don’t think).

Onto the tea! Have you ever smelled the scratch and sniff chocolate stickers or pencils? This smells exactly like that! It brought back childhood memories! I could definitely smell the chocolate and a bit of spice. It wasn’t that prominent though. After steeping, the liquid was a dark brown. The spices didn’t come through as much. In fact, it tasted like a very watered down sugary cocoa with a hint of warmth and spice. I was expecting a more robust cup, but this is good for those days that you want a small chocolate kick but nothing too spicy. There was no bitterness to this cup, which I love. I added some sugar to see if anything flavors would come up. I sense something nutty. Perhaps its cacao? I can definitely taste something woody and nutty with the chocolate. Very delicious. After that, I added just a tiny bit of skim milk, and this turned into a mild hot chocolate of sorts. VERY mild and light. This isn’t something I would purchase just because it wasn’t as chocolate-y as I would like it to be. The flavors were a bit bland. Perhaps a longer steep time would have helped it out.

I drank this all up today! Yes! I am feeling accomplished! :) This was a good tea! Nice blend of spices. It was best mixed with milk and sugar, otherwise, it tasted too strong. My husband felt sick after drinking this. I think he may be sensitive to the tannins… He feels that way about a lot of black teas.