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DAVIDsTEA Matcha Advent Calendar – Day 5

This review is for salted caramel matcha infused white chocolate star.

People really seemed to enjoy this one a lot but I have a weird thing about white chocolate. I like white chocolate flavored things. I will add white chocolate to things. However, when it comes to taking a bite out of a solid piece of chocolate, I really don’t like white chocolate that much. So that took away from this a bit for me. However, it did have a very nice salted caramel flavor in addition to the white chocolate and that has me very excited to try the salted caramel matcha.

DIY Advent Calendar – Day 5

Tea Lemonade and Cold Brew Sipdown (232)

I cold brewed this and then realized we have a large container of lemonade that is expiring on Wednesday so I used the rest of the sample for a tea lemonade. It’s a fruity black tea so it seemed like it would work both ways.

I started with the cold brew. It is really fruity but more tropical fruits than the generic fruit profile a lot of fruity teas have. I think the strongest fruit I am tasting is papaya, which is odd since I find that tends to disappear. Papaya and then the base tea, which isn’t the best quality and reminds me slightly of the Adagio black tea they use that I don’t really like. Thankfully its muted because of the cold brew prep method.

I think I actually like the tea lemonade less than the cold brew. The lemonade and papaya are playing off each other in a weird way. Also, the base seems to be coming through a bit more which is odd since you think the lemonade cover it.

Kenneth Ave Advent Calendar – Day 5

One sip and the rest went down the drain. I pulled it out and knew this wasn’t going to be a good one for me because puerh. However, I brewed it up anyways because Roswell Strange has sent me a couple puerhs last year that were tolerable. Except as soon as I pulled the filter out, the strong puerh sent hit me and I just knew I would not like this. One sip and the puerh wasn’t terrible if I am being honest but it was still a strong puerh taste. The other flavor was coffee, real coffee, and I don’t drink that either for a reason. So I wasn’t a fan. But I am not its target audience by a long shot.

CuppaGeek Advent Calendar – Day 5

I made this earlier and then got stuck acting as a human gate responsible for keeping the dog in the house while my sister stood in the doorway socializing. So I made it but only got a chance to drink it cold.

It’s good. Vanilla and peppermint are clearly the stars. And while they are nice in flavour, something is creating an oily mouthfeel that I could do without.

Smoothie Sipdown (233)

For the first time in a long time we had a breakfast smoothie. My plan was to add today’s advent smoothie into it but that wasn’t really an option. So instead I tossed the last of the peach matcha from yesterday into my strawberry banana smoothie. It was good but the peach flavor was lost a fair bit among the other fruit flavors.

CuppaGeek Advent Calendar – Day 4

Made this one iced since it seemed like it should be cold but I was already using the bottle I use for cold brewing for Strawberry Lemonade.

It’s nice. It’s not sangria for me, but its nice. What it does have is a lot of strawberry flavour. Natural strawberry flavour which is pretty uncommon since strawberry tends to be sweet and candy-like or milkshake-esque. This is more true to the fruit and thus not overly sweet. I do like it. With that said, there is something else here that I don’t like so much. It’s sort of medicinal and that leaves me sad. I wish this was just that strawberry flavour.

DIY Advent Calendar – Day 4

Made this one as an eggnog latte and I don’t love it. In fairness, I didn’t really expect to like it much given it boasts a coconut marzipan flavor. Coconut can be finicky and marzipan isn’t usually something I overly enjoy.

The marzipan is a strong flavor and its just not for me. The base is coming through a bit which is almost giving me a bit of a dirty marzipan vibe. And the coconut pops up but when it does, its not the freshest. Granted this is a year old so that could be my fault. Overall, not a fan.

Kenneth Ave Advent Calendar – Day 4

I cold brewed this since it was a whole lot of fruit and that seemed like a good call. It’s got a lot note strawberry sweetness than I expected. It’s like those candies in strawberry wrappers grandparents always seem to have. With a touch of lemon. I sort of expected more apple flavour for some reason but I’m happy that’s not the case. I do wish it had more lemon though. Also, while this is good, it doesn’t stand out among the seas of strawberry lemonade offerings out there.

DAVIDsTEA Matcha Advent Calendar – Day 4

Like yesterday, I went iced latte with this one. However, I didn’t use the full packet. I used about 1/2 the sample and this is much better. Yesterday was like drinking milk filled with berry flavored sugar. Today, while sweet, its not overly so. The peach flavor is also nicer than expected and pretty true to the fruit. Overall, I wasn’t too excited when I pulled this out but I think I enjoyed it more than I expected.

Eggnog Latte Sipdown (232)

None of my teas today (other than my matcha) said latte to me so when I wanted an eggnog latte, I searched my stash. This is one of the December 2019 teas so it seemed like a good idea to work through something a little older.

The latte used the whole package and ended up being really good. It has a nice balance of spices with cinnamon and clove standing out the most. The only other reviewer mentioned this tasting like a cinnamon pop tart, complete with icing and that’s fairly accurate tbh. Just add in some clove as well. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed this, though maybe it’s because I had it at the same time as the Lavender Earl Grey so in comparison it was better.