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Ok since this drink is only possible in two US cities right now I’m sticking it in here.

So Starbucks in Atlanta and Austin have like a sodastream-esque machine for making three sodas and they’re also pushing carbonating iced teas and possibly those refreshers? So the manager said they were told green tea doesn’t really work but she found a way…by mixing it with the ginger ale. She is very insistent on drinks, I love it. I had told the guy when I first got there that I was fine drink-wise but she had him make her one when we were getting started then of course had to get me to get one.

It was worth it! I’m pretty sure all the sugar has destroyed me. I have been really trying to limit my carbs but I think I’m going to have to triple the amount that’s ok on days I work hahaha. As much as I don’t want to I don’t think it’s fair to limit what I can taste so that I can tell people how things taste. And that seems to be a big thing w/my manager. Don’t know what something tastes like? Taste it. And I really like that because it drove me crazy at my brief time at Pinkberry that tasting things was not done very well (franchisee was too cheap to even allow free yogurt after work or on a break. Ridiculous.), and I think when you’re working somewhere with food you had better know what everything’s like so you don’t give that lame “everything’s good!” crap when someone asks you what you like.

Ok anyway. If you have the opportunity to have such a thing as this green tea ginger ale, you must. I think the sodas Harney & Sons sell come in such a variety? I’m not sure what the exact parameters are (yet) but it was really good. And it has that fresh ginger taste to it, which typically isn’t my favorite but goes so well with green tea.

I’m excited to try the passion tea lemonade this way. I’ll do that Wednesday hopefully!

I have had a headache for seven hours and I can’t get rid of it. I’ve been drinking tons of liquid, I took magnesium, I’ve been drinking water with a potassium/b vitamin mix added to it, I took ibuprofen, oh and Sebastian is slamming his mirror around aka not helping.

I remembered I liked this iced so I cold steeped it. I love it. I can definitely taste rum in there along with banana and cinnamon. Still the cinnamon is kind of strong. But this is so good, I’m pretty sure to kill this headache I will drink it all by tonight.

And sadly I have almost drank it all. I hate that this is “sadly” because I should be really psyched it’s almost gone and I have one less tea, but I love this one!

About five billion internet days ago, I tried this tea and it tasted oddly savory to me, and Della Terra sent me a sample. I never got around to it. Until now. I’m sorry.

I still get a little weird taste but not to the same level as last time. I think it’s a result of the skins on the apple pieces.

This is alright, I don’t like the oily layer on top and as it’s cooled it’s just become apple. I had been hoping to have it hot and iced but it only had the full flavor hot.

This was my Formula 1 watching tea. I ended up oversteeping it because I got too into finding a live stream hahaha. Easily fixed with a touch of milk.

I want to like this more than I do but it just comes off so strongly lemon to me. I don’t get a lot of butter, or cake, or icing. I guess maybe I’ll try a lower temperature.

And I have to try it iced after reading the description again. Oh yeah.

I kind of forgot about this tea because I found out my apartment complex wants to raise my rent 7.5% and it’s already teetering on way too much. I’m hoping I can talk them down…

So because it’s also sort of shark week time I am so upset about this and I just want to freak out even though it’s not THAT big of a deal in the grand scheme of things I just really love it here and the people in the office like me and I just even if it just was just half of that increase I’d stop freaking out. So of course now I feel like I HAVE to go there tomorrow when I really need to wait a few days and not cry while doing it.

Anyway. Tea. This is one of the better maple flavored teas I’ve had, it doesn’t taste grossly fake at all.

I am drinking it cold because to calm myself down I went and made some new lip balm. I got a few sips in while it was hot and it was definitely more mapley then with a hint of vanilla. Cold it’s just black tea until the very end when it’s like maple syrup going right down your throat. I wish I hadn’t let it go to waste cold!

Thanks, Autumn Hearth, for the sample!

Ok, moving on to the next tea, this already makes me want the subscription. Since it’ll cost me about half a day of work per month I may have to go for it once I actually do get paid…eee.

So with this sample I just decided to use it all and make an 7-8 oz cup with it.

This is like my third or fourth sheng and I don’t like them as much as shu so we’ll see how this one goes.

It really tastes like olive oil, minus the weird texture there would be from consuming ounces of olive oil. I’ve only had one decent olive oil ever and it wasn’t even this green tasting…of course most of those are too much money for my tastes. I definitely taste the holy basil too. It’s not spicy but more herbal.

Third steep was getting into that hard astringency I don’t like with sheng.

Fourth steep…I can’t drink this. That astringency has become stronger and SHARP.

One day I’ll get there. But once I hit this point I just can’t bring myself to keep steeping and see if it moves past that.

Cold brewed this overnight. It’s really, really orangey this way. That’s about it, green rooibos and orange. I think the name doesn’t really work, oranges are not summer fruit to me, peaches and berries and watermelon are. When I bought this I think I was hoping for berry.

From my review last summer I see I said it had strawberry but I’m not getting any of that, it’s like orangina kind of orange tasting.

Oh well, I’ll still finish it but I’ll steep it hot first again next time.

Soooo upon looking in the puerhs I still have to try from Terri, I discovered that I got the sample set for the Verdant TOTM back in…March. I didn’t ever put the teas in there in my spreadsheet so honestly I’m not surprised I didn’t remember them.

So now time to taste those! Finally. I figured I’d start with this one coming from a sheng before. I also just realized that with the previous tea that was the farthest I probably ever made it into a sheng. Progress!

Very exciting: I pulled the big piece from the little packet and it was exactly 5g. No work necessary! Woo. Did the two rinses and I’m ready to drink.

Have I ever mentioned that one of my favorite things about shu is that most of them smell like pasta? I think this super low carb thing is getting to me. Also they come in cakes, cake, man. Cake.

Though sometimes w/puerh you don’t even need cake.

It’s pretty light at first, but I love that crispness to it, like champagne bubbles. And there’s caramel, of course. But it’s not too in-your-face about these flavors.

I ended up forgetting about it for over a day so now I’m back to it. I don’t think it lost anything from the wait, although I did not cover it very well. It’s still very light, although just a tad earthy, there’s a lot of mineral notes to it, and it’s sweet.

I did two more steeps but I just can’t get into it. I don’t know if the air got to it maybe? But I have some left so I really want to try the other workshop suggested steeping method with the rest.

I wasn’t sure this was the right tea but then I read tea color and I was indeed certain this was right. Chardonnay for real!

I did a rinse first and I am steeping as quickly as I can.

First steep: As soon as I raised the cup to my nose I could smell spices. I love how peppery it is mixed with that typical puerh hay taste. I love that there’s this smokiness to it that melds into the peppercorn. Is smoked pepper a thing like smoked salt? Because it should be. This is the way I can handle smoky, in such a savory way.

They are! http://www.savoryspiceshop.com/spices/pepptelsm.html

It’s also pretty creamy, like almost even has that whipped cream feeling where it has coated your mouth, minus the actual gross film feel on the roof of your mouth. I can see how it’s kind of not one to drink, should have rinsed twice but whatever!

Second steep: really, really reminiscent of leather. That was almost all I got. It was starting to get a bit much for me to drink but I must keep on~

Third steep: Still a lot of leather, but there’s something like hazelnuts coming through too.

Fourth: leather leather leather Pepper was back for just a fleeting few sips. I am going to go for one more steep, I can’t take much more of the smoke.

Fifth: I don’t like this much anymore :( I know I should keep going and hopefully get past the smoke but since it’s lost that savory peppercorn I just really don’t like it and it doesn’t taste good to me.

The day is young, time to pick out a new one.

Thank you for the sample, Terri HarpLady!

Finally got to try this last night. When I opened it, it was pretty strongly spiced…definitely not how I have French Toast.

I used 200 deg. water so that sounds like it may be a slight problem? I am trying to avoid sugar but I’ll gladly put brown sugar in here if it helps. I tried some maple syrup granules but it didn’t do much.

It just tasted like spices. No butter, no bread, I’ll try it again sooner or later.

I’ve decided if it’s going to be cool all day and rainy I’m going to have some fun with a puerh now and listen to Sebastian chirp like the weather doesn’t even matter. Last night I watched him duck under a bell and lift it up with the back of his head to shake it. My precious goofball.